Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T11:34:12.425Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

With English the world is more open to you’ – language shift as marker of social transformation

An account of ongoing language shift from Afrikaans to English in the Western Cape

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2013

Extract

This article gives an appraisal of bilingualism in Afrikaans and English among the Cape ‘Coloured’ community and of shifting patterns within it. It has become customary to use quotation marks around the term Coloured and lower case to signal that this and other race-based terms are contested ones in South Africa (see Erasmus, 2001; Ruiters, 2009). On the advice of the ET editor for this issue, however, I will use the term with the capital and without quotation marks, since he argues – conversely – that the use of lower case and scare quotes in print can also be misconstrued as disrespect for a community. In this community it appears that a shift is underway from Afrikaans as first and as home language to English as the dominant family language. However, this shift does not follow a straightforward linear trajectory, and while some speakers appear to have abandoned Afrikaans in favour of English, in many families the language has not been jettisoned. Before citing studies that explore this complexity, including current work by the author, it is necessary to give a brief overview of the background to Afrikaans and English in South Africa and their place in the country's overall multilingualism.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anthonie, A. N. 2009. Profiling bilingualism in an historically Afrikaans community on the Beaufort West Hooyvlakte. Online at http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/2678 (Accessed January 31, 2013).Google Scholar
Anthonissen, C. 2009. ‘Bilingualism and language shift in Western Cape communities.’ SPIL PLUS 38, 6176.Google Scholar
Anthonissen, C. & George, E.. 2003. ‘Family languages: bilingualism and language shift.’ Paper presented at the 21st World Congress of the World Federation of Modern Languages Association, Rand Afrikaans University, Johannesburg, South Africa, July 2003. In Conference Proceedings (CD publication).Google Scholar
Davids, A. 1990. ‘Words the slaves made; a socio-historical linguistic study.’ South African Journal of Linguistics 8(1),124.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Den Besten, H. 1989. ‘From Khoekhoe foreignertalk via Hottentot Dutch to Afrikaans: the creation of a novel grammar.’ In Pütz, M. & René, D. (eds), Wheels within Wheels. Papers of the Duisburg Symposium on Pidgin and Creole Languages. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, pp. 207–49.Google Scholar
Den Besten, H., Hinskens, F. & Koch, J. 2009. Afrikaans: een drieluik. Münster: Nodus Publikationen.Google Scholar
Erasmus, Z. 2001. ‘Introduction: Re-imagining Coloured identities in post-apartheid South Africa.’ In Erasmus, Z. (ed.), Coloured by History, Shaped by Place. Cape Town: Kwela Books, pp. 1328.Google Scholar
Farmer, J. L. 2008. ‘Language choices of English L1 learners in a Western Cape high school.’ Unpublished Master's thesis, Stellenbosch University.Google Scholar
Farmer, J. L. & Anthonissen, C.. 2010. ‘Transitions and translations from Afrikaans to English in schools of the Helderberg area.’ SPIL 39, 123.Google Scholar
Fasold, R. 1984. The Sociolinguistics of Society. Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Giliomee, H. B. & Mbenga, B. (eds) 2008. New History of South Africa. Cape Town: Tafelberg.Google Scholar
McCormick, K. 2003. Language in Cape Town's District Six. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
McWhorter, J. H. 1998. ‘Identifying the creole prototype: vindicating a typological class.’ Language 74, 788818.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Milroy, J. & Milroy, L. 1992. ‘Social network and social class: toward an integrated sociolinguistic model.’ Language in Society 21(1), 126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nettle, D. & Romaine, S. 2000. Vanishing Voices – the extinction of the world's languages. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nieuwoudt, H. P. 1990. ‘Variasie binne Oranjerivier-Afrikaans.’ Unpublished PhD dissertation, North-West University, Potchefstroom.Google Scholar
North West Territories (NWT) Literacy Council Resource Manual. 1999. ‘Languages of the land.’ Online at http://www.nwt.literacy.ca/aborig/land/cover.htm (Accessed October 2, 2003).Google Scholar
Onraet, L. 2011. ‘English as a Lingua Franca and English in South Africa: distinctions and overlap.’ Unpublished MA thesis, Stellenbosch University. Online at http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/6545 (Accessed January 31, 2013).Google Scholar
Platt, J. T., Weber, H. & Ho, M. L. 1984. The New Englishes. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Roberge, P. 2002a. ‘Afrikaans – Considering origins.’ In Mesthrie, R. (ed.), Language in South Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 79103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberge, P. 2002b. ‘Convergence and the formation of Afrikaans.’ Journal of Germanic Linguistics 14, 5793.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruiters, M. 2009. ‘Collaboration, assimilation and contestation: emerging constructions of coloured identity in post-apartheid South Africa.’ In Adhikari, M. (ed.), Burdened by Race: Coloured Identity in Southern Africa. Cape Town: UCT Press, pp. 104–33.Google Scholar
Shell, R. C-H. 1994. Children of Bondage: a Social History of the Slave Society at the Cape of Good Hope, 1652–1838. Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press, pp. 104–33.Google Scholar
Van Rensburg, C. (ed.) 1977. Afrikaans in Afrika. Pretoria: Van Schaik publishers.Google Scholar
Worden, N. 1985. Slavery in Dutch South Africa. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar