Book contents
- Youth Language Practices and Urban Language Contact in Africa
- Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact
- Youth Language Practices and Urban Language Contact in Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Series Editor’s Foreword
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 Language Contact and Structure in Urban IsiXhosa and Associated Youth Languages
- 2 Not ‘Deep’ but Still IsiXhosa:
- 3 Rethinking Youth Language Practices in South Africa:
- 4 Tsotsitaals, Urban Vernaculars and Contact Linguistics
- 5 Grammatical Hybridity in Camfranglais?
- 6 Sheng and Engsh in Kenya’s Public Spaces and Media
- 7 Exploring Hybridity in Ivorian French and Nouchi
- 8 Authenticity and the Object of Analysis:
- Index
- References
6 - Sheng and Engsh in Kenya’s Public Spaces and Media
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 August 2021
Book contents
- Youth Language Practices and Urban Language Contact in Africa
- Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact
- Youth Language Practices and Urban Language Contact in Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Series Editor’s Foreword
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 Language Contact and Structure in Urban IsiXhosa and Associated Youth Languages
- 2 Not ‘Deep’ but Still IsiXhosa:
- 3 Rethinking Youth Language Practices in South Africa:
- 4 Tsotsitaals, Urban Vernaculars and Contact Linguistics
- 5 Grammatical Hybridity in Camfranglais?
- 6 Sheng and Engsh in Kenya’s Public Spaces and Media
- 7 Exploring Hybridity in Ivorian French and Nouchi
- 8 Authenticity and the Object of Analysis:
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter will discuss the role of the media in the development of Sheng (showing largely African language syntax with salient English lexis) and Engsh (showing the reverse; i.e. largely the syntax of English and lexis from several African languages) in Kenya. While African urban youth languages may start as anti-languages of the streets, many develop a much wider speech community due to their gradual spread from the street and the informal transport environment into song lyrics and thus the radio, and into comic strips and cartoons and thus the printed press. The use of these two youth language varieties in these media has the additional effect of making them acceptable for a larger part of the society as a style of youth and modernity and rendering this style fit for advertisement and use on television, such as in soap operas. This development is illustrated with Sheng and Engsh examples.
Keywords
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Youth Language Practices and Urban Language Contact in Africa , pp. 141 - 158Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021
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