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How to cite this thesis

Surname, Initial(s). (2012). Title of the thesis or dissertation (Doctoral Thesis / Master’s Dissertation). Johannesburg: University of Johannesburg. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/102000/0002 (Accessed: 22 August 2017). LANGUAGE AND MOBILITY: A STUDY OF MIGRANTS’ LINGUISTIC REPERTOIRES AND DISCOURSES IN WINDHOEK, NAMIBIA

by

Julia N Indongo Student number: 216085587

Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree

DLitt et Phil

in the

Department of Linguistics

of the

Faculty of Humanities

at the

University of Johannesburg

Supervised by Prof Eleanor Cornelius

Co-supervised by Prof Christine Anthonissen (Stellenbosch University)

Date of submission May 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to thank Almighty God for making this study possible. Also, I would like to thank the South African National Institution for Humanities and Social Sciences for funding this study. To my supervisors, Prof Christine Anthonissen and Prof Eleanor Cornelius, thank you for believing in me. Your patience and guidance mean a lot to me. Prof Anthonissen, the time you took out of your busy schedule to accompany me in the field in Windhoek was invaluable as it contributed tremendously to the development of my academic skills. Thank you for helping me to understand sociolinguistic research. Your efforts were not in vain as I will transfer this knowledge to future generations.

Furthermore I would like to thank my parents, Mr Sakaria Indongo and Mrs Tusnelde Mvula, for their unwavering support throughout this study. Your words of courage kept me going. I would also like to thank my fiancé, Trophimus Haiduwa, for your love, support and motivation. To my siblings, Kachiku, Penda, Megameno and Ligola, thank you for standing in for me whenever I needed your help during my time of my study. My dear Twapewa, your presence motivates me to work hard.

I would like to thank my employer, Namibia University of Science and Technology, for affording me time to devote to this project.

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ABSTRACT

This study investigates the multilingual profiles of recently arrived migrants to Windhoek, Namibia, and to the author’s knowledge, the study is one of very few to reflect on the relation between language and migration in Namibia from a sociolinguistic perspective. The research questions relate first to the vitality of multilingualism in an African urban space in that it surveys more than 400 respondents regarding their linguistic repertoires and language biographies. The respondents selected for this part of the study were either of foreign African origin or from rural and relatively isolated regions within Namibia, who had been in Windhoek for less than two years. The vitality of languages in a multilingual city such as Windhoek is of interest as the local language policy prioritises English, raising questions on the value of the linguistic repertoires of those with home languages other than English (LotEs) in such an urban context. Particularly, in the second part, the study enquires how migrants’ linguistic repertoires facilitate or inhibit their social and economic integration. Here, the study relies on 25 recorded interviews with selected respondents for more detailed information that develops insight into how migration trajectories contribute to shaping linguistic proficiencies, and also how knowledge of various indigenous or other language(s) shape the migrants’ life chances by providing them with access to different ways of earning a livelihood. This part of the study takes a qualitative approach.

Methodologically, information on the linguistic repertoires of newly arrived migrants was collected per survey among relatively vulnerable migrants who were making a living in informal settings such as in trading, security work or in construction. Second, from the group surveyed, 25 were selected for interviews in which more detailed data and a contribution of more depth could be gained. Survey data was used to give an overview of language vitality through the repertoires and biographies that respondents described. A thematic analysis of the interviews shows which kind of topics migrants introduced in connection with language, their mobility and their abilities to survive in Windhoek. In addition, the interview data is critically analysed, particularly relying on postcolonial theory.

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The study reveals that Windhoek can indeed by characterised as a multilingual city in which indigenous Namibian languages are vibrantly used, and even foreign migrants still use their mother tongues in private as well as public domains. However, to secure economic opportunities, most agreed that knowledge of English is vital. Also, the study finds that different language repertoires are vital in different suburbs and areas of employment. For instance, Oshiwambo is mostly helpful for those operating in Katutura. For the vendors operating in Khomasdal, knowledge of Afrikaans is helpful, and in town suburbs English is the most facilitating language. Except for knowledge of Oshiwambo for those trading in Katutura, according to the migrants, the Namibian indigenous languages do not carry any benefit in settling and securing jobs in Windhoek. Foreign language speakers depend solely on English for settling and securing employment as they do not know Afrikaans or Oshiwambo and knowledge of their vernacular languages is hardly relevant in the employment sector of Windhoek.

The mobility of the migrants who know their first language (L1) only is limited to Katutura. They work and are accommodated there. The migrants who know English well, especially the Zimbabwean migrants, move around the entire city of Windhoek to sell their products. Only the migrants (both Namibian and foreigners) who know English and/or Afrikaans find formal employment, while those whose linguistic resources are limited in the economically dominant languages are street vendors who do not even attempt to seek further employment. The study finds that postcolonial perspectives persist that afford little value to African cultural capital. Not only do the former and current powerholders perpetuate ideologies of European languages’ superiority; even the indigenous language speakers themselves, in given circumstances, internalise the perception that their first languages are of lesser value. In spite of such tenacious views of the lesser value of certain languages, the vibrancy in use and maintenance of local languages is remarkable.

The study concludes that if English remains to be officially promoted, at the cost of Namibian indigenous languages in public spaces such as education and formal workplaces, as well as at the cost of recognising the value of other African languages that migrants from neighbouring countries nurture, there could be detrimental effects. Indigenous language speakers may, as parents, choose to raise

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their children in English only, to improve their life chances and upward mobility in Windhoek. Also, L1 speakers of indigenous languages may currently and continuously, on the basis of their linguistic repertoires, be denied access to educational and employment opportunities to which they should have a natural right. Therefore, this study delivers a strong message to language policy designers and those implementing a restrictive language policy in a linguistically diverse community. The community is multilingual – this should be seen as a valuable resource, and should not be used as a discriminatory measure.

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DEDICATION

The study is dedicated to students in the field of linguistics, worldwide. Specifically, I also dedicate it to all the girl-children in Africa.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Affidavit ...... i Acknowledgement ...... ii Abstract ...... iii Dedication ...... vi Table of contents ...... vii List of tables ...... x List of figures ...... xi List of abbreviations ...... xii Glossary ...... xiii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION OF THE STUDY ...... 1 1.1 Introduction ...... 1 1.2 Problem statement ...... 3 1.3 Research objectives...... 4 1.4 Research questions ...... 5 1.5 Structure of the study ...... 5 1.6 Original contribution to scientific knowledge ...... 7 1.7 Conclusion ...... 8

CHAPTER 2: SOCIAL AND HISTORICAL CONTEXTUALISATION ...... 9 2.1 Introduction ...... 9 2.2 Contextualisation: Namibia ...... 9 2.3 History of mobility in Namibia ...... 10 2.4 Namibian languages ...... 12 2.5 Setting the scene: Windhoek ...... 14 2.5.1 Windhoek during the German government ...... 14 2.5.2 Windhoek during the South African government ...... 15 2.6 Linguistic setup of Windhoek: setting the scene ...... 22 2.7 Conclusion ...... 23

CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ...... 25 3.1 Introduction ...... 25 3.2 Multilingualism ...... 25 3.2.1 Multilingualism in Africa ...... 28 3.2.2 Contextualising the history of mobility in the multilingual context ...... 29

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3.2.3 Multilingual communities ...... 32 3.2.4 The benefits of multilingualism ...... 33 3.3 Lingua franca ...... 35 3.4 Linguistic repertoires, multilingual and trajectories ...... 36 3.5 Translanguaging ...... 38 3.6 Language choice ...... 39 3.7 Language biography ...... 40 3.8 Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) ...... 41 3.9 Postcolonial theory...... 47 3.9.1 Theoretical contribution of postcolonial theory ...... 48 3.9.2 Multilingualism and identity in the postcolonial context ...... 51 3.10 Conclusion ...... 54

CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ...... 56 4.1 Introduction ...... 56 4.2 Research design ...... 56 4.3 Qualitative approach ...... 57 4.4 Sources ...... 58 4.5 Population and sample ...... 59 4.5.1 Population ...... 59 4.5.2 Sample ...... 60 4.6 Research instruments ...... 60 4.6.1 Questionnaire ...... 61 4.6.2 Interview ...... 62 4.7 Data analysis ...... 65 4.8 Research ethics ...... 66 4.9 Conclusion ...... 67

CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION ...... 69 5.1 Introduction ...... 69 5.2 Namibian respondents ...... 69 5.2.1 Respondents’ places of origin, and associated L1s and L2s ...... 70 5.2.2 The gender and age of Namibian respondents ...... 78 5.2.3 Geographic location of migrants and their employment ...... 80 5.2.4 Education ...... 85 5.2.5 Migratory trajectory ...... 86

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5.2.6 Family and personal relations ...... 87 5.3 Respondents of Non-Namibian origin ...... 88 5.3.1 Respondents’ places of origin, and associated L1s and L2s ...... 88 5.3.2 Gender and age of the respondents ...... 94 5.3.3 Foreign respondents’ locations in Windhoek and occupations ...... 95 5.3.4 Education ...... 99 5.3.5 Migration trajectory ...... 101 5.3.6 Family and personal relations ...... 102 5.4 Summary of trends...... 103

CHAPTER 6: PRESENTATION AND INTERPRETATION OF INTERVIEW DATA ...... 104 6.1 Introduction ...... 104 6.2 Migrant voices articulated in interviews...... 106 6.2.1 Language(s) found to be vital to run a business or secure a job in Windhoek ...... 107 6.2.1.1 Namibian migrants ...... 107 6.2.1.2 Foreign migrants ...... 112 6.2.2 The importance of multilingualism ...... 119 6.2.2.1 Namibian migrants ...... 119 6.2.2.2 Foreign migrants ...... 122 6.2.3 Discrimination/abuse based on languages ...... 127 6.2.3.1 Namibian migrants ...... 127 6.2.3.2 Foreign migrants ...... 133 6.2.4 Dealing with monolingual speakers and those who cannot speak English ...... 136 6.2.4.1 Namibian migrants ...... 136 6.2.4.2 Foreign migrants ...... 139 6.2.5 Language and identity ...... 144 6.2.5.1 Namibian migrants ...... 144 6.2.5.2 Foreign migrants ...... 146 6.2.6 Migratory journeys, and how language facilitates mobility ...... 148 6.2.6.1 Namibian migrants ...... 148 6.2.6.2 Foreign migrants ...... 149 6.2.7 Narratives of hardship ...... 152 6.2.7.1 Namibian migrants ...... 153 6.2.7.2 Foreign migrants ...... 153

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6.3 Case studies ...... 155 6.4 Conclusion ...... 162

CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ...... 163 7.1 Introduction ...... 163 7.2 Multilingual repertoires, trajectories and identities of the migrants ...... 164 7.3 Multilingual values in the integration of new migrants ...... 169 7.4 The migrants’ discourses and postcolonial theory ...... 174 7.5 Summary of findings as per the research objective ...... 179 7.6 Conclusion ...... 184 7.7 Recommendations ...... 186

REFERENCES ...... 188

Appendix A: Questionnaire ...... 216

Appendix B: Interview guide ...... 219

Appendix C: Informed consent form ...... 220

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.1: Population growth of Windhoek from 1936 to 1991 ...... 16 Table 5.1: Respondents’ regions of origin ...... 75 Table 5.2: First languages and second languages of Namibian migrants ...... 76 Table 5.3: Gender and age of Namibian migrants per L1 ...... 84 Table 5.4: Occupations of Namibian respondents ...... 90 Table 5.5: The L1s of foreign respondents ...... 94 Table 5.6: The gender and age distribution of foreign respondents ...... 99 Table 5.7: Occupations of foreign respondents ...... 104 Table 5.8: Education statistics of foreign migrants ...... 106

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1: Suburbs and townships in Windhoek ...... 15 Figure 2.2: Windhoek population and constituency map ...... 17 Figure 2.3: Location of Windhoek with arrows indicating recent migration flows both internal and cross-border to Windhoek ...... 21 Figure 5.1: Regions from which Namibian respondents of different L1s migrated ...... 77 Figure 5.2: Location of Namibian migrants in Windhoek ...... 86 Figure 5.3: Total number of foreign respondents...... 94 Figure 5.4: The locations of foreign respondents in Windhoek ...... 102

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CDA – Critical Discourse Analysis GDP – Gross Domestic Product L1 – First Language L2 – Second Language NLO – Northern Labour Organisation NSA – Namibia Statistics Agency SADC – Southern Africa Development Community SLO – Southern Labour Organisation SWANLA – South West Africa Native Labour Association SWAPO – South West Africa People Organisation UNESCO – The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization USA – United States of America WWI – First World War

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GLOSSARY

Migrants – People of foreign African origin, i.e. from countries such as Angola, Zimbabwe or the DRC, and Namibian citizens who recently relocated to the city from rural and relatively isolated regions.

Linguistic repertoires – All the languages that the migrants know and can actively use in the conversation.

Migration trajectories – The journeys taken by migrants before they arrive and settle in Windhoek, as well as their movements within Windhoek.

Multilingualism – (i) The ability of individuals to speak more than one language in different contexts, and mostly with different levels of competence. (ii) A characteristic of communities where speakers of different first languages and with differing language repertoires share public and private spaces, thus having to find ways of intercultural communication, also in using a lingua fanca, or in translanguaging practices.

Monolingual – People who can speak only one language, which is usually their first language. They can understand a few expressions in other languages, but they cannot speak any other language apart from their L1s.

Urban area – Refers to towns, cities and suburbs that are located south of the veterinary "red line" (see Chapter 2 for a description of the red line).

Rural area – Human settlements, mostly villages, in remote areas away from cities and towns.

Translanguaging – The use of various languages, style and register in one conversation to convey the message.

Vernacular languages – Vernacular languages refer to the languages of different ethnic tribes. The vernacular languages are the same as the community languages.

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1.1 INTRODUCTION

This study investigates the multilingual profiles of migrants who recently arrived in Windhoek, Namibia and their discourses of mobility in so far as these discourses relate to the development of linguistic repertoires and the status of various languages in the city. In particular, it surveys the language biographies and linguistic repertoires of a large number of migrants. These are used as foundation for a closer study of the discourses of language, migration and mobility of a selected number of relatively vulnerable newcomers to the capital city. A small sample of African migrants was asked to reflect on their histories of mobility and their life chances in relation to the facilitative (or limiting) functions of language. The research questions, therefore, first relate to the vitality of multilingualism in an African urban space, and second, to the mobility of languages of migrants and refugees and how such "mobile languages" survive and gain or lose currency in the transition to a new context. One widely established assumption on which this study builds relates to the view that being competent in the dominant language(s) of a community has instrumental value in assuring upward social mobility (cf. Oakes & Warren, 2007; Toscano, 2011; UNESCO World Report, 2009). Education and employment opportunities often depend on fluency in the language of the school or the workplace. This is a sociolinguistic study that elicits information from recently urbanised Namibian as well as other African citizens who represent a global pattern of migration from politically and economically insecure regions into urban areas that offer improved life chances.

The L1s of the mobile communities in Windhoek add to the complexity of an already highly linguistically diverse African city and bring new forms of linguistic interaction that to date have been minimally investigated. The respondents selected for this study are either of foreign African origin or from rural and relatively isolated regions within Namibia. The study investigates the linguistic experiences and accompanying perceptions regarding the value of languages in a mobile community of both internal and external migrants into the Namibian capital. It not only documents the distribution and communicative value of various languages in the newly arrived

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population; it also relies on instruments of discourse analysis, thematic analysis and postcolonial theory to determine the relation between language and mobility as this is articulated by members of the migrant community itself.

Endemic migration of large numbers of people from one African country to another has been well documented (cf. Betts, 2013; Glick Schiller & Salazar, 2013). Referring specifically to Windhoek’s situation, Frayne and Pendleton (2002) and the Namibia Statistics Agency (2015) state that rural-urban migration in Namibia is increasing. Added to this are growing numbers of migrants from other African countries. Consequently, the population in Windhoek is growing at an unprecedented rate; the Namibia Statistics Agency (2015) estimates an overall influx of migrants at roughly 2 000 annually. Official statistics indeed calculate the possibility of large numbers of undocumented foreigners who are unaccounted for in regular processes; even so, numbers cited by government agencies are probably conservative in relation to real numbers.

A typical feature of African migration and urbanisation is that indigenous people from low-resourced rural areas make their way to the capital city in search of improved life chances (Freire, Lall & Leipziger, 2014). What is often overlooked in migration studies, both within the country’s borders as well as across borders is the role of language in the ability of migrants to settle and find a stable income within the cities. This study addresses various linguistic factors that could assist in making the role and functions of language in migration less opaque.

Existing studies of African migration confirm that many come with dreams of a better quality of life, which are eventually not realised (Appleton, 2011; Burdick, 2012). In the majority of cases, migration implies some form of language change: the dominant language in the receiving community differs from the strongest languages of the mobile community. Although African communities are typically extremely linguistically diverse, the range of languages in the receiving communities' repertoires are not matched to those of the migrants’ communities of origin. In migration studies, this is at times only fleetingly referred to as a potential difficulty (Brachet et al., 2011), while it needs much more scholarly attention.

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Namibia, according to the Ethnologue (2015), has 27 languages across the population. As the only official language since 1990, English has become the strongest lingua franca in the country; however, other widely distributed languages such as Afrikaans, German or Oshiwambo also function as lingua franca in certain domains and specific regions. For migrants, the status of various languages becomes important in that a rural Namibian who is a first language (L1) speaker of Damara, for example, but who is not proficient in English, may find integrating and settling in Windhoek more difficult than a Zimbabwean L1 speaker of Shona who is proficient in English.

Migrants with limited qualifications may find that their employment possibilities are limited due to inadequate skills, but also due to the kinds of language competence they exhibit. Similarly, even those with relatively good qualifications but poor proficiency in the local lingua franca are likely to find it difficult to improve their life chances. Limited language proficiencies do not necessarily exclude migrants from positions of low status such as informal trading, working as security guards, or in home care positions; however, for those who aspire to improve their social circumstances the issue of language is important.

Frayne and Pendleton (2002), Namibia Statistics Agency (2015) and the National Planning Commission (2003) report on gender divisions among migrants to Windhoek, showing that there are significantly more males than females among registered external and internal migrants. Information about migrant families and their children in Namibia is scant. Where families with children migrate, questions of languages for education arise.

The abovementioned social variables of the place of origin, education, certified skills and gender in one way or another have an impact on the ways in which people learn and use their languages in Windhoek.

1.2 PROBLEM STATEMENT

The problem this study addresses relates to the fact that limited knowledge of the linguistic resources of the identified groups of migrants obscures how such resources affect the life choices and chances of mobile communities. Particularly, it

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is a problem that very little is known about the extent of linguistic diversity and vibrancy of languages among migrants in Windhoek, whether they have migrated from other parts of the country or from further afield. Another problem is that most studies on African migration draw information from official records that rarely allow migrants’ own voices as legitimate sources of knowledge. The experiences and narratives of Windhoek’s migrants as they relate to linguistic diversity in the 21st century have only been investigated and documented very limitedly (see e.g. Mlambo, 2017).

It is problematic that there is currently little or no research that verifies why migrants have chosen Windhoek as their destination city, whether or not they have gained the opportunities they anticipated, and then specifically how their linguistic resources count in their favour or not, when they are finding their feet in the city. The vitality of languages in a multilingual city such as Windhoek is uncertain. The value of linguistic repertoires of migrants for achieving success in day to day struggles of settling (finding accommodation), securing a livelihood (finding employment) and taking responsibility for dependents (caring for their family) is unknown and needs to be investigated. Addressing these problems could eventually be a means of assuring informed decisions on the management of multilingualism and multilingual communities within African cities such as the Namibian capital.

A study of the kind of linguistic variety encountered in Windhoek provides important insight into the enabling and disenabling role of linguistic competences within a vulnerable but growing section of this urban community.

This study is structured around two kinds of questions of which the first is to find answers regarding the nature and the value of linguistic repertoires of migrants, and the second refers to discourses of a number of mobile inhabitants of Windhoek, considering particularly the reported impact of linguistic repertoire on respondents' mobile trajectories and their opportunities to settle in this largest urban centre of the country. These are articulated as four objectives.

1.3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

The objectives of this study are:

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1. To establish what the linguistic repertoires of a selected number of recent migrants to Windhoek are. 2. To analyse how the linguistic repertoires of the selected migrants may or may not help them to settle and secure employment in Windhoek. 3. To explore, according to their own perceptions, how migrants' repertoires need or need not to be extended in order to improve their opportunities regarding settlement and employment. 4. To analyse, discuss and, in terms of postcolonial theory, interpret migrants’ discourses of mobility in relation to their language biographies and linguistic repertoires after their arrival in Windhoek.

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

Considering the established enquiry, four questions related to the objectives of the study have been formulated, namely:

1. What are the linguistic repertoires of a selected set of migrants in Windhoek? 2. What according to migrants own narratives, is the value of their personal repertoire in settling and securing employment. 3. How are migrants’ repertoires extended – or how do they need to be extended – in order to improve their opportunities regarding settlement and employment? 4. What are the themes and features of the discourses of mobility that a selected set of migrants produce in narrative, specifically in interviews on the relation between language and the migrant experience. How are these to be interpreted from a critical linguistic and post-colonial perspective?

1.5 STRUCTURE OF THE STUDY

The report on this study has been structured across seven chapters, divided and thematised as follows:

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Chapter 1: Introduction

The first chapter introduces the study by giving a brief introduction on the background of the study. It briefly explains the rationale for the study, mentions the kind of methodology it makes use of, and states the research problem, the objectives and the research questions.

Chapter 2: Contextualisation

This chapter contextualises the research by providing a brief introduction to the social and historical background in which the research is positioned. It provides a synthesised and integrated review of the history of Namibia and of Windhoek in particular, consulting also literature on the recent reception of migrants in Windhoek and on the Namibian linguistic landscape.

Chapter 3: Literature review and theoretical framework

Literature from various research areas that focus on multilingualism and linguistic repertoires of migrants, on language biographies and on linguistic identity is surveyed and reviewed in this chapter. In explicating the theoretical approaches that will inform the study, relevant literature on postcolonial theory will be dealt with. To assure appropriate application of methods of critical discourse analysis, foundational work on these analytic approaches will also be introduced.

Chapter 4: Research methodology

In this chapter the methods the researcher employed to obtain the data are explained in detail. The research design is explained and information is provided on the population of respondents, selection of the two samples of respondents, the research instruments and the procedures that were followed in collecting the data. Also, the procedures followed in assuring that ethical standards are maintained are outlined.

Chapter 5: Questionnaire data: broad profiles of migrants to Windhoek

This chapter presents the data from the questionnaire that was administered as a first instrument for data collection. Specifically, it presents demographic information

6 | Page CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION OF THE STUDY that also provides a linguistic profile of the study population and of individual respondents’ educational background, linguistic repertoires and migration trajectories. The information elicited by the questionnaires is mapped in various ways to provide insight into the biographies and linguistic competences of a group of 440 subjects with recent histories of migration. Two groups of migrants are distinguished, namely a larger group (377) of Namibians who recently migrated from rural areas to the city, and a smaller group (63) who recently migrated from other African countries.

Chapter 6: Interview data: detailed information on selected respondents

This chapter attends to data collected through recorded interviews. The main themes that interviewees highlighted in narrative form are drawn from the transcribed texts. The chapter is organised based on the emerging themes as they relate to the interview questions, referring (i) to the value of various languages and (ii) to how interviewees’ migration trajectory contributed to enabling or frustrating their linguistic needs as well as their ability to integrate into the host country. Finally, four case studies are discussed to illustrate how various kinds of linguistic repertoires demonstrate the vibrancy of multilingual repertoires at an individualised level, and how different respondents manage in the city using the linguistic repertoires at their disposal.

Chapter 7: Interpretation and discussion of results, conclusion and recommendations

In this chapter, the recorded interview data is connected and interpreted in relation to the questionnaire data. In bringing the two sets of data and the kinds of information they provided together, the research problem, research objectives and specific research questions this study addresses are revisited in an attempt to provide a scientific response to these. The literature reviewed in chapters two and three, and the theoretical framework outlined in chapter three directs the interpretation presented here. This section draws together the interpretation and original objectives of the study. Conclusions are drawn from the research findings, and some recommendations are made for language practices in a city with high levels of mobility. In this chapter the limitations of the study are also outlined and suggestion

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are made on how research matters that require further exploration could be addressed.

1.6 ORIGINAL CONTRIBUTION TO SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE

Currently there is limited systematic research on the role of language in facilitating integration and settlement of migrants in Windhoek. Therefore, the findings intend to provide new information on language and mobility of the new migrants in Windhoek. The study seeks to add to the body of existing literature on multilingualism and language use in urban areas, specifically in the capital city of Namibia. The study may document the linguistic experiences of recent migrants to the urban settlements in Windhoek. The findings may assist decision makers to make informed decisions on redressing language inequalities that exist due to past colonialism as well as more recent linguistic dispensations, and may play a role in developing communicative practices in post-independence Namibia that will assist policy makers in developing language policy that may benefit everybody, including the new migrants – especially those who did not go far in education and thus did not develop a sufficient command of the official language, English, to integrate in the multilingual informal settlement of Windhoek. From a scholarly perspective, knowledge gained from this research is vital to improving our insight into crucial aspects of language and African mobility; it may also eventually contribute to improving the social, economic and educational welfare of local and migrant communities.

1.7 CONCLUSION

Chapter one introduced the study, describe the problem statement, providing the research objectives and research questions, as well as explained the structure of this written report of the study and its contribution to scientific knowledge. The next chapter will contextualise the study by providing information about the linguistic diversity of Namibia as it is recorded in a variety of official documents and prior research.

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2.1 INTRODUCTION

The setting of the study first needs to be sketched to understand the issue of mobility, the linguistic repertoires and trajectories of Windhoek's new migrants, Therefore, this chapter introduces Namibia as a country where the study is situated. Namibia's history of colonialism, mobility patterns, geographical location and the languages of Namibia are explained. Also, Windhoek, as the actual setting where the study was undertaken, is expounded in terms of its population, establishment, political history, mobility, informal trading, migrants and its linguistic landscapes.

The aim of this chapter is to provide the background information that may assist the readers in understanding the linguistic dispensation related to patterns of migration in Windhoek. This will make clear why discourses of mobility in Windhoek are worth investigating. Thus, this chapter prepares the ground for analyses that will answer the research questions, as given in chapters 5 and 6.

2.2 CONTEXTUALISATION: NAMIBIA

Situated in Southern Africa, Namibia borders South Africa, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Zambia, Angola and the Atlantic Ocean. Namibia is the least populated country in southern Africa; the population of Namibia was 1.8 million people in 2001, and it drastically increased to 2.1 million people in 2011 (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012). Bearing in mind that ethnic divisions are sometimes constructed rather than scientifically founded, but that we still do categorise multilingual national communities in these terms, the population is taken to be made up of nine ethnic groups, namely Oshiwambo, Kavango, Herero, Himba, Damara, Nama, San, Zambezian, Tswana, Coloured/Baster and the German/Portuguese/white population. Each ethnic group has a language; as a result, Namibia is a multicultural and multilingual country (Schioldborg, 2014). Moreover, Namibia is a politically stable country with a strong GDP growth, which leads to the rise in the overall income (Miller & Kim, 2017). However, the country still faces social problems such as

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unemployment, poverty and social inequality, especially in rural areas (cf. Mwinga, 2012; Namibia’s National Planning Commission, 2012).

2.3 HISTORY OF MOBILITY IN NAMIBIA

The first wave of migration in Namibia occurred during the German colonial occupation of Windhoek from 1890 onwards and only Herero and Damara from the central and southern part of Namibia were part of that migration to Windhoek. The 1903 to 1907 German, Damara/Nama and Herero revolt left many people either dead or dislocated and displaced. The majority of the latter tribes were killed; at the end of that war only around 16 000 Herero people were alive, of which 14 000 were left in concentration camps. The majority of the Herero people who survived fled the country to Botswana, where most of them stayed in refugee camps, until 1995 when those who were willing to return to Namibia were repatriated, and those who were not willing are still living in Botswana to date. On the other hand, many Damara/Nama people were also killed; approximately 40% of the Herero people were slayed. The German administration mostly focused on the central and southern parts of Namibia, therefore there was not much conflict between Owambo people and other tribes in the northern part of the country because the northern part of the country was not part of German colonial administration (cf. Frayne & Pendleton, 2002; Hull, 2008; Muschalek, 2014).

After the First World War (WWI), when Germany was defeated, all the former German colonies, including Namibia, were confiscated through an international intervention. Namibia was placed under South African administration by the League of Nations in 1915 so that South Africa could prepare Namibia for her independence, but contrary to the initial purpose, South Africa made Namibia her 5th province, and started colonising her. To make it worse, South Africa introduced the policy of segregation (Frayne & Pendleton, 2002:4; Du Pisani, 2000; Katjavivi, 1988). The colonial situation in Namibia in the hands of South Africa became unbearable when the National Party won the election in South Africa in 1948 and apartheid was introduced both in South Africa and Namibia. However, it is believed that apartheid in Namibia was worse than in South Africa due to the population size of Namibia and the remoteness of the country (Frayne & Pendleton, 2002).

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Furthermore, in 1964, on the Odendaal commission’s recommendation, Namibia was divided into geographical and administrative regions known as homelands, which were based on race, ethnicity and language (Biesele & Hitchcock, 2013; Kössler, 2000). During this time, many white South Africans moved to Namibia to set up commercial farms, which covered 40% of the province. The areas that were not commercially farmed were known as communal areas, where black Namibians were permitted to live and to practise subsistence farming. The communal areas were mostly assigned on infertile land compared to commercial farm areas. These communal areas received little “commercial or social investment”, a situation that forced many black Namibians to migrate to urban areas to find jobs (Frayne & Pendleton, 2002: 4). Only a small number of black people lived on commercial farms to work as labourers, where their living conditions were mostly poor.

Many laws were passed to control the movement of people mainly from communal areas to towns. A veterinary line was established at Oshivelo in the Oshikoto region to split the communal area from the commercial area. The commercial area was also known as the police zones. The veterinary point (red line) was established in the late 19th century to prevent animal diseases from communal areas spreading into commercial areas (Miescher, 2012), but it ended up controlling the movement of people from communal areas to commercial farms. During the 1900s, many traditional authorities in Namibia sent young men to commercial areas to work, as there was a growing demand for people to work on the farms, mines and railways; in return the young men brought gifts to the traditional authorities who sent them there (Becker, 1995).

In 1926, the mobility of young men to commercial areas was controlled and managed by the Southern and Northern Labour Organisation (SLO and NLO). Moreover, later in 1946, due to the demand of migrant labourers in the police zones, the NLO was transformed into a recruiting agency known as the South West Africa Native Labour Association (SWANLA). SWANLA was responsible for controlling the labour migration of people from northern communal areas to work in the mines, farms and towns by issuing them with employment contracts. Many young men were recruited through SWANLA, and the traditional authorities were given the task to identify men in their communities who were physically fit and healthy for SWANLA.

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SWANLA lasted until 1972 (Botes, 2013). Mobility during the contract labour system mostly involved men; they were not allowed to migrate with their families. They had to leave their wives and children behind in the villages in the communal areas.

The contract labour system exploited its labourers. The labourers were distanced for many months or even years from their wives and children in their villages in communal areas. They were paid meagre wages, and they lived in contracted labour houses where the services were inadequate. The latter situation triggered the formation of the Owamboland People Organisation (OPO). Its core aim was to fight for improved conditions of the migrant workers. Later, OPO was converted into SWAPO, with the principal aim to resist the South African government and force their administration to leave Namibia so that Namibians could attain self-government. On 26 August 1956, SWAPO declared war against the South African colonial government, which led to an extended conflict that lasted 23 years. During this time, many people, young and old, migrated into exile to undergo military training. About 40 000 were exiled mostly in Angola, Zambia, Europe, Cuba and North America for military training and schooling, so that they could be equipped with the necessary skills to govern the country, Namibia, after independence (Frayne & Pendleton, 2002).

The conflict was concentrated mainly along the Namibian-Angolan border, and left many people dislocated. The conflict lasted long, which prompted the United Nations to pass Resolution 435 with the request to South Africa to conduct free and fair elections in Namibia. As a result, SWAPO emerged as the victors. Namibia gained independence on 21 March 1990, and a wave of mobility was again recorded as many Namibian people who went into exile returned. There is no proper record of migration data of Namibia before independence as Namibia was regarded a part of South Africa. However, very little is known about the history of internal migration, which was mostly rural-urban migration as a result of the political events that are recorded. The problem remains that much is not known about migration of foreign nationals from African countries into Namibia before independence. Much more information is available on those who migrated from Germany and South Africa for political reasons, and who have since been identified as colonialists with little concern for the interests of indigenous peoples (Frayne & Pendleton, 2002).

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2.4 NAMIBIAN LANGUAGES

Most Namibian people speak Bantu languages as their first language, for example Oshiwambo, Otjiherero, etc. Others speak Khoisan languages, namely Nama/Damara and other Bushman languages; and a smaller percentage of people have Indo-European languages such as English, Afrikaans and German as their first language (Cluver, 1992). Afrikaans was a language of broader communication before independence; however, it is still mostly used in south, west and central Namibia (Maho, 1998).

The 28 languages of Namibia are Afrikaans, Diriku, English, German standard, Hai//om, Herero, Ju/’hoan, Khoekhoe, Khwe, Kuhane, Kung-Ekoka, Oshikwambi, Wambi, Kwangari, Oshikwanyama, Lozi, Sifwe, Mashi, Mbalantu, Mbukushu, Namibian sign language, Naro, Oshindonga, Northwestern !kungu, Tswana, !xoo, Yeyi and Zemba (Ethnologue, 2015). Twenty-three of these languages are indigenous, while the other five languages are non-indigenous. All these languages are living languages, although some are endangered, especially the Khoisan languages. Also, 60% of the Namibian population speaks Oshiwambo (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012).

After independence, the Constitution declared English as the only official language, replacing Afrikaans, the aim of which was to reverse the effect of the colonial regime’s language policy (Haacke, 1994). However, some space was allowed for the other Namibian languages to be used together with English, but to a lesser extent.

English was quick to replace Afrikaans in all the public and social spheres of society at the expense of all the indigenous Namibian languages (cf. Stell & Dragojevic, 2017; Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012; National Planning Commission, 2003). Most Namibian languages are not sufficiently known beyond the speakers’ ethnic boundaries, e.g. Oshiwambo-speaking people cannot speak the Khoekhoegowab language, except for a few Oshiwambo people who grew up in urban areas (Harlech- Jones, 2001; Tötemeyer, 2010). On the other hand, English is not commonly known in rural areas in Namibia and thus the majority of the monolingual people are found in rural areas. Given this background, it is vital to investigate the value of migrants' linguistic repertoires as well as to determine whether their linguistic repertoires were

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helpful or not during their social and economic integration in the capital city, Windhoek.

2.5 SETTING THE SCENE: WINDHOEK

Situated in the east of the Khomas Plateau in the Khomas region, in the central part of Namibia, Windhoek is the capital city of Namibia (see Figure 2.1). The first inhabitants of Windhoek were the Nama and Herero, under the leadership of Jan Jonker Afrikaner, who settled there in 1840. An immigrant from the Cape who settled in Windhoek towards the end of 1840 gave Windhoek its name. The name Windhoek literary means “windy corner” in Afrikaans and its origin is the Winterhoek – a mountain range in the Western Cape behind Jan Jonker’s home town (Kotzé, 1990; Simon, 1995). However, early black inhabitants of Windhoek (Nama and Herero) had their own local names for Windhoek; to be specific, the Herero people called Windhoek “Otjomuise” (steaming place), while the Nama called Windhoek “/Ae//gams” (hot spring). Both names were given in reference to the warm springs in Windhoek in the 1950s, which were surrounded by a cloud of evaporation (Heywood & Lau, 1993:19). Windhoek was abandoned due to the conflict between the Nama and Herero in the late 19th century (Lau, 1986).

2.5.1 Windhoek during the German government

In 1890, Windhoek was re-established when the German occupying force known as Schutztruppe under the leadership of Curt von François arrived in Windhoek and set up a military base (Hartmann, 2007). The Germans declared Windhoek the capital city of the new colony, and the influx of many settlers from Germany started. The population of Windhoek was 600 in 1893, and in 1894, the population of Windhoek comprised 85 white civilians, approximately 500 members of the Schutztruppe as well as 300 to 400 black people. In 1909, the population of Windhoek was 2 700 people, a population that increased gradually to 10 000 people in 1909. Although the cause of such an increase is not known, it is mostly attributed to early migration of the Nama and the Herero to Windhoek (Pendleton, 1996).

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Figure 2.1: Suburbs and townships in Windhoek Source: Pendleton, 2005 [Note: The thick black line divides the suburbs from the townships in Katutura.]

In 1912, when Namibia was under South African rule, the Windhoek town council enforced a policy of racial segregation. Windhoek locations were divided according to race. To begin with, Windhoek city and its suburbs were for the whites, Khomasdal was for the Coloured population whose language was Afrikaans, and Katutura was for the blacks who spoke various Namibian indigenous languages (see Figure 2.1 above). Katutura was further divided according to the ethnic groups. For instance, there was the Wambo location for the Oshiwambo people, the Herero location for Otjiherero people, the Damara location for Damara people, etc. Contract labourers were also accommodated in compounds in Katutura at Single Quarters in small dormitories. Although these racial divisions ended in 1979, these past segregations are still visible in many areas of Windhoek (Friedman, 2000).

2.5.2 Windhoek during the South African government

The South African administration had many laws to control human movement in the country, including migration into Windhoek. However, the population of the city still increased, mainly due to labour migration and natural growth (Crush, Williams & Peberdy, 2005). To illustrate, in 1936, the population of Windhoek was 10 651, of

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whom 4 812 were white. The population continued to increase, so that by 1975 the population counted 74 349, of whom 33 180 (44.6%) were white people, and the remaining 45.4% were representative of the various indigenous tribes (see Table 2.1). In 1981, Windhoek’s population was 96 057, of which the majority of new inhabitants was black, due to the apartheid migration control laws being less stringently applied than before.

Table 2.1: Population growth of Windhoek from 1936 to 1991 1936 1946 1951 1960 1968 1970 1975 No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % Coloured 1448 13.7 1353 9.1 1208 5.9 2738 7.6 5929 11.7 8411 13.6 9057 12.2 Black 4385 41.1 6591 44.1 9080 44.1 13935 38.7 19369 38.2 25945 42.1 33180 44.6 White 4812 45.2 6985 46.8 10310 50 19378 53.7 25417 50.1 27351 44.3 32112 43.2 Total 10651 100 14929 100 20598 100 36051 100 50711 100 61707 100 74349 100

1981 % 1991 % Khomasdal 17380 18.1 18900 12.8

Katutura 44003 45.8 86640 59.0 Windhoek 31305 32.6 41515 28.2 Total 96057 100 147057 100

Source: City of Windhoek reports; Population Censuses, 1981, 1991

After independence, migration started to increase drastically due to different factors. First, the end of apartheid which controlled the movement of people in Namibia afforded people the freedom to travel inside and outside the country (cf. Indongo, 2015; Nickanor, 2013). Secondly, in 1989 Namibia adopted a constitution which grants the Namibian people the freedom of movement in the country. This led to an influx of local people to towns and cities in Namibia. Likewise, the formation of SADC which encourages cooperation among member states led to an increase in documented and undocumented international mobility. Furthermore, Namibia's connection to the global economy resulted in all kinds of mobility that are connected to globalisation (Crush et al., 2005).

The inequality between rural and urban areas in Namibia, as well as limited economic growth in most African countries, led to rural-urban mobility as well as cross-border mobility. Also, war and civil unrest in some African countries such as Angola and Zimbabwe led to cross-border mobility of refugees and asylum seekers to nearby countries like Namibia (Crush et al., 2005). All these different kinds of

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mobility have contributed to the population increase of Windhoek – as Niikondo (2011) states: mobility is the major contributor to Windhoek’s population.

Figure 2.2: Windhoek population and constituency map Source: Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015

Modern-day Windhoek is divided into eight constituencies (see Figure 2.2 above). The majority of Windhoek's population lives in Windhoek West, and the least populated constituency is John A. Pandeni – the smallest in area size (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015:15). Windhoek West constituency and Windhoek East, which are situated in the suburbs, take up the most substantial part of the land, and they host mostly the high-income population, including educated and appropriately employed migrants. These constituencies host the majority of the shopping complexes, offices and proper housing. Windhoek rural and the Khomasdal constituency, which also form part of the suburbs, are mostly occupied by middle-income people. The remaining constituencies, namely Tobias Hainyeko,

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Katutura central, John A. Pandeni and Moses //Garoeb are situated in the greater Katutura township. Katatura largely houses low-income people and those dependent on grants for their livelihood. Many of these are migrants with early-exit schooling and no tertiary qualifications. The current population growth, estimated to be at 5% or more in 2011, is mostly in Samora Machel, Moses //Garoeb and Khomasdal (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015:25), and is mainly ascribed to migration. However, most of the migrants in the latter three constituencies do not have the necessary “education and skill” to enable them to penetrate the job industry of Windhoek (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015:25). The latest unemployment figure measured for Windhoek was in 2015, when it stood at 21%. However, since then the unemployment rate of Namibia overall has increased, which most possibly indicates that the figure for Windhoek has also increased. The constituencies that host the majority of unemployed people, in the order of those with the highest numbers, are Moses //Garoeb, Tobias Hainyeko, Katutura east and Samora Machel – all informal settlements in Katutura. The concentration of informal trading, the most prominent means of income for the unemployed, is high in the latter areas. Unsurprisingly, the level of poverty is equally high (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015:15).

Windhoek is the most attractive destination for many migrants in the country (Pendleton, Nickanor & Pomuti, 2012; Nickanor, 2013) because before independence the South African government invested substantially in Windhoek’s infrastructure in comparison to other towns. This development caused Windhoek to stand out in terms of facilities such as education, health care, electricity, employment opportunities, housing, medical care and sanitation. Furthermore, most public and private entities have their headquarters in Windhoek, where many people find employment. Windhoek is the engine of the country as it hosts all economic, manufacturing and political activities of the country (Pendleton, Crush & Nickanor, 2014; Pendleton et al., 2012; Frayne & Pendleton, 2002). When it comes to budget allocation to towns and settlements in Namibia, Windhoek receives the highest portion of the budget as it is the capital city, which is constantly being developed, attracting people from the outlying areas and from neighbouring countries (National Planning Commission, 2017).

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Furthermore, operating a business in Windhoek is better than operating it in other urban areas in the country due to its high population. Therefore, many people, both Namibians and foreigners, who have limited education and thus cannot easily secure formal employment in the city, end up being street vendors, taxi drivers and waiters in restaurants, to mention but a few in Windhoek. Also, just like life in any other big city, Windhoek dwellers, especially migrants, face many challenges of different natures, including linguistic problems. These linguistic challenges force migrants to employ different adaptation mechanics, as stated by Mc Laughlin (2009:2): “the many unique, creative, and often brilliant cultural adaptations to urban life that are applauded in contemporary scholarship on African cities are, it must be recognised, created more often out of necessity than choice”. The adaptation mechanisms that new migrants employ may be linguistic and/or social.

After independence, the population of Windhoek increased drastically. In 1991, its population was 147 056 people, which increased to 23 3529 in 2001 and to 325 858 in 2011 (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2015). Windhoek accommodates 16% of the total population of Namibia. It is further estimated that the population of Windhoek will reach 480 136 by 2020 (Namibia Statistic Agency, 2018), mainly due to rural- urban migration from the northern part of Namibia (Pendleton & Frayne, 1998). Furthermore, according to the Namibia 2011 Population and Housing Census Main Report (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012), Windhoek is the fastest-growing city in Namibia and it is the city with the highest number of people, followed by the coastal town of Walvis Bay. The population of Windhoek is double the population in most Namibian towns (Niikondo, 2011; City of Windhoek, 1996).

About 60% of the population of Windhoek was not born in Windhoek; they are migrants (cf. Niikondo, 2011; Pendleton et al., 2014). The internal migration patterns of Namibia after independence are well documented (cf. Pendleton et al., 2012; Pendleton et al., 2014; Pendleton, 1996; Frayne & Pendleton, 2002). As described by the latter authors, rural-urban migration – migrants from the northern part of Namibia – made up 35% of the total population of Windhoek in 2011, and 58% of the total migrants' population of Windhoek. The rural-urban migration is further divided into various categories. There are the migrants from north-central regions, which includes areas of Ohangwena region, Oshana region, Omusati region and Oshikoto

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region. North-Central migration accounts for 49% of the total migrants' population of Windhoek. Another category is of the migrants from the Zambezi region (former Caprivi region), Kavango west and east regions, as well as the Kunene region, which account for 10%. The second pattern of migration includes internal migrants from central Namibia – the areas around Omaheke regions – which accounts for 17% of Windhoek’s migrant population. The third pattern of migration to Windhoek is urban- urban migration, which consists of migrants from the southern parts of the country from the //Karas region. This last group of migrants only makes up 11% of Windhoek's migrant population. The last pattern of migration to Windhoek is cross- border migration, which accounts for 14% of the migrant population (see Figure 2.2 below).

Most migrants live in Katutura, at the northern and north-western edge of Katutura, because it is easy to set up a shack in Katutura compared to the established suburbs where strict procedures have to be followed to own a house, and it is costly even to rent a house. Most of the areas at the edges of Katutura, such as parts of Okuryangava, Havana, Hakahana and Goreagab, are not yet formalised (cf. Pendleton et al., 2014; Frayne & Pendleton, 2002; Crush & Frayne, 2010; Niikondo, 2011) (see Figure 2.1 for Katutura townships). Katutura is situated in the north- western parts of Windhoek. The most substantial part of Windhoek’s population growth occurs at the edge of Katutura, the north-western side, due to the massive number of migrants who settle on land that is not yet serviced and prepared for human occupation (Schioldborg, 2014). Although the illegal places that migrants occupy are in named sections, they are generally referred to as Katutura (Nangombe & Ackermann, 2012). Upon arrival in Windhoek, new migrants settle in different areas depending on the part of the country they came from, as most of the migrants at first live with friends or relatives (Pendleton et al., 2012). Many new migrants from the northern regions (Oshikoto, Omusati, Ohangwena and Oshana) tend to live in the north and north-west of Katutura in the constituencies Tobias Hainyeko, Moses //Garoëb, and Samora Machel (see Figure 2.3). People from the central regions are distributed across Khomasdal North, Samora Machel, and Central Katutura. Those from the southern regions head for Windhoek West and Khomasdal North. Due to the influx of people in informal areas in the north-west and east of Katutura, the population of those areas is increasing; Katutura hosts the majority of the

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Windhoek’s population on 20% of the land (Pendleton et al., 2012). For instance, in 1991, the population of the north and the north-western areas (Katutura) of Windhoek was approximately 91 000 (Pomuti & Tvedten, 1998); in 2011, the population grew drastically in the latter areas to almost 200 000 people (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012).

Figure 2.3: Location of Windhoek with arrows indicating recent migration flows both internal and cross-border to Windhoek Source: Namibia, Central Bureau of Statistics 2005

The study on migration, as conducted by the Namibia Statistics Agency, reveals that unemployment is the major reason for migrants to leave their area of birth and go to Windhoek (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012). Furthermore, most migrants from rural areas lack formal academic qualifications. As a result, they do not qualify for most of the employment opportunities in the city of Windhoek (Khomas Regional

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Development Profile, 2015; Schioldborg, 2014). For most migrants, both internal and foreign, reality often hits them once they arrive in Windhoek; especially those without university qualifications struggle to secure employment and/or housing.

Although new migrants experience hardship daily, starting up a business remains the most viable option for many migrants without any university qualification. They create their own jobs by becoming self-employed in order to support themselves and their families (Thanh, Nguyen & Luongo, 2014). In Windhoek, it seems that most migrants without university qualifications enter the informal sector because it is easy to set up a business as it does not require much start-up capital, and it requires little skill to set up a business in the informal sector (Guha-Khasnobis & Kanbur, 2006). Most migrants live in Katutura, and most Katutura residents receive their income to sustain their families from informal trading (Indongo, 2015; Niikondo, 2011; Nickanor, 2013).

2.6 LINGUISTIC SETUP OF WINDHOEK: SETTING THE SCENE

Urban multilingualism is a common phenomenon in Africa (Ouane, 2009), and generally in the whole world (cf. Siemund et al., 2013; Edwards, 1994) and Windhoek’s situation is therefore not unique.

Windhoek has undergone linguistic transformation shortly after the country's independence in 1990. One of the most notable transformations is the increase in the number of speakers of different languages in Windhoek, especially the Oshiwambo-speaking people from the northern regions in the country and the rise of English as prestige language replacing Afrikaans as the language that was previously in wider use in the government (Stell, 2014).

Both Namibian and foreign languages are spoken in Windhoek, in addition to English, which is the country’s lingua franca, as already mentioned. Apart from the information on the Namibian languages, there is a dearth of information on which foreign languages are present in Windhoek, especially in the informal settlements. Obviously, with such a magnitude of migrants in Windhoek, it is clear that Windhoek is a linguistically diverse city in constant flux – a meeting point of migrants from remote areas of the country and from other foreign countries. To be specific, the Namibia 2011 Population and Housing Census Main Report identifies Oshiwambo,

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Afrikaans, Khoekhoegowab (Nama/Damara) and Herero as the languages spoken in Windhoek (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012). However, with the constant convergence of several language groups, Windhoek is likely to be a highly diverse linguistic city. The current linguistic setup, in terms of languages spoken in Windhoek, might be different from the 2011 Census findings, as Namibia has more than 20 languages which are likely to have speakers in Windhoek due to constant movement of both foreigners and Namibians who speak different languages.

Many migrants from different language groups adopt different accommodation strategies, such as speaking English, because although most of the Namibian languages are Bantu languages, they are not mutually intelligible: the indigenous languages are phonologically different and do not have similar vocabularies. As a result, speakers hardly speak any other language than their own community language (Stell & Dragojevic, 2017). However, the situation may be different for monolingual people who may struggle with communication, especially if those they aspire to communicate with do not speak their language. It is also important to mention that Namibians based in urban areas such as Windhoek are better in English than those from rural areas. This explains why some migrants from rural areas are still monolingual in the multilingual society of Windhoek.

The Namibian Statistics Agency (2012) explains that 41% of Windhoek's population speaks Oshiwambo – the largest population group in the capital city (cf. Niikondo, 2011). However, it is not known whether knowing Oshiwambo is sufficient for new migrants to integrate into the city. Although Oshiwambo has the majority of speakers, it still holds low economic status in the city. Furthermore, the Herero, Damaras and Nama make up 22% of the inhabitants. The White and Coloured population together make up 19% of Windhoek’s population, which places them in a weak demographic position (Namibia Statistic Agency, 2012). Edwards (1994) states that census information is always limited in certain ways. The Namibia Statistics Agency (2012) does not elaborate on how knowledge of English as the official language helps migrants with limited education to integrate into society and the labour market.

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2.7 CONCLUSION

This chapter presented the context of the study by describing Namibia as a country and by focusing more specifically on its capital, Windhoek, as the actual setting of the study. It began by giving a brief geographical description of Namibia, her history of colonialism and mobility, as well as the current linguistic landscape of Namibia. The languages of Namibia and her ethnic groups were also explained. The chapter further presented the history of the establishment of Windhoek, mobility figures, and past and recent population figures. Furthermore, a number of reasons were given why most local and international migrants prefer Windhoek as their destination over other cities or towns in the country, as presented by different scholars. Also, information was presented on Windhoek's informal trading, the concentration of migrants without tertiary qualifications in the city, as well as on the places where the data for this particular study were collected. Finally, the linguistic landscape of Windhoek was clarified. The next chapter, Chapter 3, will present a review of the literature related to multilingualism in urban context, language and identity, linguistic repertoires as well as present various authors’ arguments on postcolonial theory and critical discourse analysis, which will be used to guide the discussions on the study’s findings to be presented in the chapters to follow.

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CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

3.1 INTRODUCTION

Relevant existing literature is reviewed in this chapter to understand the nature of multilingualism in a city such as Windhoek, the contributing factors to such multilingualism, and whether resources facilitate or inhibit the integration of new migrants in this city. This chapter presents a review of prior studies that were conducted on multilingualism in urban contexts. The fundamental concepts of this study, namely language choice, linguistic repertoire and linguistic biographies, are given specific attention. In gaining insight regarding language biographies and linguistic repertoires through migrants' narratives, the data for this study necessarily contains discourses on migrations. To do justice to such narratives, the study takes a closer look at the sections on respondents' trajectories from their home countries to Windhoek, paying attention to the role of language in directing and possibly determining the journeys and destinations. For this part of the study, the researcher turns to postcolonial theory and critical discourse analysis to provide the instruments of analysis and this is also the lens through which the discourses will be viewed. Therefore, the scholarly contribution of postcolonial theory and critical discourse analysis (CDA) will also be reviewed in the following sections of the chapter. The latter theories provide the theoretical basis for the analysis and interpretation of data and therefore also inform the conclusions of this study.

3.2 MULTILINGUALISM

Multilingualism is a practice in many countries around the world (Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015). In some countries, such as South Africa or Swaziland, multilingualism is officially recognised in that various languages are constitutionally entrenched. In other countries, such as Namibia, the multilingualism of the population is not officially recognised in that the Constitution does not recognise all the indigenous community languages as official languages. Some authors claim that it is difficult to define multilingualism as the concept means more than just knowing “two or more languages” (Jessner, 2008:18; cf. Philibane, 2014). The latter is true because the

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concept of multilingualism is approached differently by different scholars in different areas of study depending on the phenomena they are investigating. According to Heller (2007) and Pennycook (2010), the difficulty in finding an accurate definition lies in the fact that the concept refers to the varying sets of practices directed by the context and time rather than a static linguistic issue that can be applied to different situations every time. The same sentiment is shared by Banda (2013), who explains that the notion of multilingualism is influenced by the concept of language as a social practice, which implies that the context and the time do not limit the speakers' linguistic resources and how the language is used, but that it has static domain boundaries. Cruz-Ferreira (2010:6) refers to multilingualism as complex. As a result, it cannot be handled as a single phenomenon; it has to be contextualised if one is to have a valid study (cf. Aronin & Singleton, 2010). The aspects of multilingualism to be investigated in this study are focused on Windhoek migrants’ linguistic repertoires, and in particular on the values migrant respondents highlighted as useful in facilitating their integration.

There are many definitions of multilingualism put forward by various authors. However, this study followed the approach taken by Mc Laughlin (2009). Mc Laughlin (2009:5) explains that multilingualism has two different meanings. First, there is societal multilingualism, which refers to the coexistence of many languages in the community at the same time; however, it does not imply that everybody can speak all the languages. Second, multilingualism can exist at an individual level, which refers to a person's ability to speak two or more languages. Knowledge of two languages is referred to as bilingualism and knowledge of three languages is known as trilingualism (cf. Okal, 2014). However, for the purpose of this study the researcher will deliberately avoid the number of languages migrants speak and refer to knowledge of two or more languages as multilingualism, following Edwards (1994:33) and Okal (2014). These authors use the term multilingualism inclusively to cover the use of more than one language by individuals or in society. An individual's multilingual skill does not exist at the same level, as a typical multilingual person has different levels of command, ranging from knowing only certain expressions such as greetings or politeness conventions to native-like command in certain languages (Edwards, 1994; Sridhar, 1996:50 in Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015:84). However, Okal (2014:223) maintains that multilingualism is the ability to speak various languages

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“competently”. Therefore, in this study, those who know various languages to the extent of being able to use them even when they do not display native-like competence in the language, are regarded as multilingual.

Ninõ-Murcia and Rothman (2008:21) postulate that multilingualism does not entail speaking more than two languages. As long as a person can understand many other languages spoken in the community, even though they cannot speak those languages, they are regarded as multilingual. Thus, multilingualism can also involve "passive competence". Passive competence is evident when a person can understand the language but cannot actively produce (i.e. speak) the language. As mentioned previously, passive competence is not considered when determining the migrants who are multilingual in Windhoek. In the context of this study, only active competence in a language is taken as knowing a language, as passive competence is difficult to measure and is open for many loopholes as everyone may end up claiming to know various languages in which they cannot necessarily converse.

Different authors agree that multilingualism is a resource, and not a problem (Heugh, 1995; LANGTAG, 1996; Schuring, 1991). However, Peirce and Ridge (1997:177) claim that when many languages coincide in one environment, certain languages replace the use of others, which can eventually lead to the formation of a unilingual situation. As there is no research available to ascertain whether the latter can also be said about the languages in Windhoek, the fact remains that Windhoek is a multilingual city. Moreover, many languages are continually being used in the city due to human mobility. Therefore, this research investigates whether languages in Windhoek have formed a "unilingual" situation, or not.

In early studies of multilingualism, scholars such as Stewart (1968:531) have claimed that multilingualism has led to communication problems in many places. As a result, policy makers were forced to initiate remedial programmes to deal with the problems that arose. In an educational study various scholar observed the predicaments of minority languages in multilingual context, to mention one, Romain (1995:394) referring to the Quechua speakers in Peru, mentioned that they regarded their language Quechua as a community or home language while Spanish is the language of the public discourses. She further explained that some children change their surnames in their vernacular languages to Spanish when they move to the city

27 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK to avoid being discriminated against as being multilingual was perceived as negative (Romain 1995: 288). Romaine (1994, 1995) indicates that in multilingual schools the prestigious languages are followed, a situation which forces the speakers of the minority languages to abandon their L1s and use prestigious languages such as Spanish. Although the latter was found in the context of education, it might also be true in the migrants' situations. In Windhoek, for example, many living languages are spoken and it is impossible for them all to be equally used and dominant in such a multilingual setting. Therefore, the study is interested in whether migrants who are speakers of non-dominant languages are indirectly forced to abandon their languages in the process of securing employment or accommodation in Windhoek. The study is also interested in knowing which languages, if any, the situation forces the migrants to learn. At this juncture, the researcher can neither differ nor agree with Stewart’s claim. However, it should be emphasised that as much as multilingualism creates communication problems, monolingual language policies may even be worse, especially in the 21st century where human mobility is at the order of the day, resulting in many people of different languages coming into contact and forming multilingual communities. Although this study does not focus on the cognitive aspects of migrants when it comes to migrants' discourses, one could mention Wright’s (2013) research in education, that multilingualism correlates with slower cognitive development in learners as they have to simultaneously learn the subject and the language to express their knowledge of the subject. Migrants possibly experience similar difficulties, as instead of attending to innovative ways to advance their business or seek employment, they have to deal with linguistic diversity. Those who are not competent in the dominant community language are distracted (and limited) by efforts to advance their language proficiency to the level required for securing a job and enabling more mobility within the city.

3.2.1 Contextualising the history of mobility in the multilingual context

Human mobility is not a new concept. It has been part of human history since the earliest times. The notion of “homo migration” started during the era of “homo sapiens” (Luthi, 2010:1). The event featured in the Old Testament of the Bible. People have continuously been migrating to and from different places – in the book of Exodus it is even noted that at some points Jesus migrated from Egypt to Cairo.

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O'Reilly (2007 in O'Reilly, 2013:111) even claims that "during the last few decades, the intensity of migration has converted from an exceptional social phenomenon into a norm". Human mobility is a lifestyle, and it has caused a significant shift in various aspects of society, including the linguistic setup of many communities (Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015; O'Reilly, 2013). Therefore, the linguistic transformation that human movement causes to various communities makes it an issue that demands linguistic scholarly attention.

The society becomes multilingual as various people travel from different parts of the world to societies that are either monolingual or already multilingual, adding to the existing language(s), which results in a society becoming multilingual or more multilingual (Spolsky, 2006:52). To exemplify, before the industrial revolution, Europe was monolingual; however, due to human mobility, which was industrially motivated, various languages were added. Contrary to the latter, some people move to societies that are already multilingual, adding to the number of languages already spoken in such societies. Human displacement, which is currently happening worldwide, has resulted in people meeting people from other parts of the world, which ultimately produces multilingual individuals or societies and/or the formation of new languages and dialects (Heller, 2007; Higgins, 2009).

When it comes to the history of African mobility, the African labour trade moved many African language speakers to America, Europe and India, a situation that resulted in the formation of creoles and pidgins in that part of the world. In the 20th century, “newly independent post-Soviet countries were faced with challenging multilingual problems” (Spolsky, 2006:52). Mostly, they had communication problems as many migrant labourers could not speak the languages of recipient communities. Even some leaders had problems learning the new languages (Spolsky, 2006) of the labourers. It could be that Windhoek migrants are battling linguistic barriers that arose from the meeting of different language speakers, or there might be many other issues that hinder the new migrants to fully integrate into Windhoek, either by securing employment or accommodation. Therefore, the study of the narratives of the migrants may foreground all the linguistic-related dilemmas faced by the migrants daily in Windhoek.

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Voluntary migration has changed the linguistic environment of many countries. The United States of America (USA) received large numbers of immigrants in the latter half of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century. This resulted in the USA rapidly growing into a multilingual society. Previously, a “melting pot” policy had facilitated the integration of a large number of multilingual immigrants speaking languages such as German, Norwegian, Greek, Italian, Yiddish, Ukrainian, Japanese, various Chinese languages and Spanish into a once largely monolingual English society (Spolsky, 2006:53). The question is whether Windhoek has the linguistic measures in place to help the migrants who battle linguistically, especially those migrants who do not have a university degree, as language may be one of the resources they have at their disposal to advance their lives in the city. Spolsky (2006) states that most immigrants in the USA were also forced to abandon their own languages and encouraged to use the dominant language, which was English. Again, in the context of Windhoek, a place where both Namibian and foreign migrants are constantly in flux, it is not known whether there is a particular language that the situation forces the new migrants to (temporarily) learn and use. This is an area that is explored in this study.

In the 21st century, the influx of people to big cities and urban centres from villages and small towns in the country contributed to the growth of many cities in developing countries such as Namibia (cf. Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012), and in the process these towns become highly multilingual (Spolsky, 2006). This migration trend created “huge megalopolises, conurbations with populations in millions, attracting complex patterns of multilingualism, and producing major problems for social, economic, and political development” (Spolsky, 2006:53). It is not known how human mobility altered the already multilingual Windhoek; neither are the problems known that arose due to people coming in.

Mobility yields different trends of multilingualism – some are permanent, while others are temporary, depending on how the languages are maintained in the host society. Also, multilingualism can lead to language conflict, as in most cases there is a dominant language and speakers of the different languages are often forced to speak that language. The latter situation leads to a language shift and, ultimately, to language death in the third generation of immigrants. However, in Namibia the

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dominant language among the migrant communities needs to be discovered, if there is such a language, and provision needs to be made to ensure that the migrants continue to use their language to avoid language death in the future. Therefore, this research investigates whether the vitality and existence of some languages in Windhoek are threatened (Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015).

3.2.2 Multilingual communities

Astonishingly, not everybody embraces linguistic diversity that comes with living in a multilingual place, and some people attempt to manage linguistic diversity by segregating speakers of different languages. They devise particular division tactics to keep those people who speak one language away from those who do not speak the same language, instead of finding ways to ensure that everyone lives in harmony despite their linguistic orientations and backgrounds (Ngefac, 2010). Different linguistic division tactics are employed that cause wider divisions in society. Some of those division tactics are (i) refusing to employ people who do not know certain languages, (ii) labelling speakers of certain languages by attaching stereotypes to specific languages, or (iii) threatening and penalising speakers for using a certain language, etc. (cf. Alobwede, 1998; Anchimbe, 2007:71). It could be that there are specific division tactics used against the speakers of a particular language who are migrants. This matter needs to be investigated, and will be explored through analysis of the language biographies of the migrants who participated in this study.

Urban areas attract people from different linguistic backgrounds. Consequently, it can be claimed that urban areas constitute the meeting points of language contact (Simpson, 2017). Apart from birth, mobility is mostly responsible for the linguistic diversity observable in many urban societies at present. Due to the inviting atmosphere in urban areas of many African countries, these areas are becoming highly linguistically diverse because of the influx of people from rural areas, who speak minority languages, adding their languages to the already existing linguistic resources of the towns and cities (Britain & Cheshire 2003; Mc Laughlin, 2009). Therefore, multilingualism is more intense in urban areas as they are centres where people speaking different languages meet (Mc Laughlin, 2009).

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Language contact in urban areas causes people to learn various languages, but they also get to know which languages to use in which context (Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015) as different languages vary in status and value in terms of gaining employment or becoming integrated in a community. “Multilingualism has nonetheless become an expectation and increasingly a prestigious part of urban culture across the world” (Wardhaugh & Fuller, 2015:84). In some cases, in the long run, an urban vernacular develops as a language of communication in the urban area (Mc Laughlin, 2009). It is not known yet if there is an urban vernacular in Windhoek. The 21st-century distinction between rural and urban areas is not only visible in the political, economic and social spheres of society, but also in the linguistic structures of the communities. Usually, urban dwellers can be differentiated from their rural counterparts by the way they articulate; normally they tend to mix the languages as a marker of living in a diverse community (Mc Laughlin, 2009).

Mbembe (1997) claims that knowing an urban language is an indication of one's integration in urban life. In urban areas where a certain language (such as English or Oshiwambo) dominates, the "newcomers will add that language to their repertoires because it provides them access to the city and is a prerequisite for integration into urban life" (Mc Laughlin, 2009:3). At the moment, besides the domination of English as the official language of Namibia, and Oshiwambo as the most widely used indigenous language, no language is formally accepted as the “urban language” of Windhoek. In the study conducted by De Waele and Nakano (2013) on how people in multilingual environments feel when using their L2 or L3, the authors found that people report feeling less coherent, more insincere or even “fake” when using an L2 or L3. However, contrary to their findings, Anchimbe (2007) states that in many postcolonial multilingual settings people prefer to speak colonial languages instead of speaking their vernaculars, which reflect their sociocultural identity, and thus mark them as outsiders. The question is, in which categories are the majority migrants' community of Windhoek likely to fall? This is also explored in this study.

3.2.3 Multilingualism in Africa

Africa has always been multilingual, even before colonialism came to Africa (cf. wa Thiong’o, 1986), and even if policy follows colonial mindsets in not recognizing or supporting the kind of multilingualism that exists in the urban community, the

32 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK communicative practices in most African cities show the resilience of local languages. Urban contexts such as the one in Windhoek give us an opportunity to see multilingualism at work in ways that can be very enlightening.

The presence of trans-tribal business and the presence of related and non-related languages before colonialisation besieged Africa is a signal that multilingualism is not a new concept in Africa (Banda, 2009, 2010). However, the fact that globalisation and human mobility caused the already existing multilingual practice to become more complex cannot be ignored.

There is no single country in Africa that can claim to be monolingual, and as such multilingualism is a distinctive feature of all African countries (Chimhundu, 2002; Lodhi, 1993; Mc Laughlin, 2009). Out of the estimated 6 200 languages of the world, 2 582 are spoken in Africa (Lodhi, 1993:79; Mc Laughlin, 2009). Some countries have many languages spoken within their borders. For instance, Nigeria has approximately 400 languages (Okal, 2014). Some languages have many speakers, such as Swahili, which is spoken widely in East African countries. The speakers of some languages are spread across different countries, which can either be attributed to the fact that certain languages are naturally spreading and used in more than one country; for example, Oshiwambo is spoken in Angola and Namibia, or it can be attributed to the movement of speakers to different countries. Some languages are not geographically spread and thus spoken in only one country. The latter situation is rarer as languages are found at unexpected places (Pennycook, 2012) due to human movements. Therefore, with the independence of African countries, there was a need for African leaders to produce creative language policies that cater for the aspects of "multilingualism and multi-ethnicity" of their countries (Peirce & Ridge, 1997:171) as a strategy to avoid clashes. Non-inclusive language policies can lead to severe conflicts, such as the Soweto uprising of 1976, which saw students rising up against the use of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction in their schools (Ndlovu, 2006).

English has powerful status as a language used for broader communication in most African countries, with a few exceptions such as Angola and Mozambique, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, etc. (Peirce & Ridge, 1997), where Portuguese and French are used respectively. Despite the extensive use of English in Africa, the fact

33 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK remains that many other local languages are used alongside English, with most of those local languages not known outside their native countries' borders. Given this background and with the widespread movement of many international migrants who find their way to Windhoek, it is important to investigate their linguistic repertoires, which are essential to their integration in the Namibian capital.

3.2.4 The benefits of multilingualism

The presence of various languages in a community was once viewed as a negative phenomenon (Spolsky, 2006) – a viewpoint that has changed substantially. Stein- Smith (2018), on multilingualism as an advantage to globalising communities, explains that being multilingual is beneficial at both personal and professional levels. Speakers who possess specific kinds of knowledge can often only effectively access such knowledge through a particular language they know well. Therefore, different languages have different functions to facilitate communication in various domains, which could require migrants to acquire new linguistic skills to be suitably versatile in their new context. In such circumstances, knowledge of various languages can be beneficial, as a multilingual person has access to various reservoirs of wisdom and knowledge (Webb & Kembo-Sure, 2000).

Multilingualism is a competitive skill in the job market besides academic credentials (Martín Rojo, 2018). When people lack academic skills, employers rely on linguistic abilities to assess applicants and to hire them. Employers prefer to employ workers who are proficient in different languages. According to a survey done by the American Council on Education (ACE), being multilingual is competitive in the global economy (Basara, 2005). In some countries, such as Canada, multilingual employees earn good salaries; in 1981, the Quebec employees who were monolingual earned lower salaries compared to their multilingual counterparts (Chiswick & Miller, 2007; cf. Martín Rojo, 2018; Relaño-Pastor, 2015).

Annury (2017) explains that multilingualism helps to unify a nation. In a society where people are multilingual and can speak other languages besides their indigenous languages, people tend to feel unified, and they tend to identify themselves with the nation where they belong rather than with their languages. The latter is beneficial as it prevents linguistic or ethnic-related discrimination and conflict.

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Regardless of many benefits that multilingualism holds for individuals and societies, Mastin (2011) explains that English is the language that is most important to know in the multilingual global society as it is widely used in mass media, entertainment and social networking. Mastin’s (2011) study also revealed that English is the language that the migrants need to know to operate in the informal sector of Windhoek, because a majority of the residents use it in daily personal interaction and in mass communication. In terms of employment and social status, at least superficially, it seems there is little benefit in using indigenous languages.

Explaining how language is applied to context and time, Wardhaugh (2015:83) explains that multilingualism is a necessity in most societies as "people speak several languages: perhaps one or more at home, another in the village, still another for purposes of trade, and yet another for contact with outside world of wider social or political organisation". The latter example not only explains how linguistic values vary in different contexts, but it also validates the point that multilingualism demands the use of various linguistic skills in a particular environment and at a particular time. This study will give insight into the value of languages in different, informal sectors within Windhoek, as narrated by newly arrived migrants (see chapters 5 and 6).

3.2.5 Multilingualism and Inclusivity

A question that needs to be asked in a linguistic migration study such as this one, is how speakers of so many local and foreign languages, are integrated and given experiences of inclusivity, in this multilingual society which is governed by a monolingual language policy. When the migrants from rural areas or other countries arrive in the destination areas, they receive social support from people that they know, who introduce and so include them in the host community regardless of which languages they speak. Relations of kinship or of others who hail from the same places of origin, bring newcomers into touch with those who speak their L1s. Therefore, when such people arrive in the host community, family and friends not only give them social support to integrate in the community, but they also offer the linguistic support of a shared language. In such settlement processes they are able to maintain their community languages (cf. Deumert, Inder & Maitra, 2005).

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In an urban multilingual society, inclusivity of all languages on a formal level, starts with the language policy. The language policy guides and stipulates the use of languages in the community, and thus a language policy which ignores the languages of all the citizens can contribute to economic, social and political exclusion of large numbers of people (Desai, 2001:309). When people are excluded, they become marginalised and disadvantaged in not be able to access all the necessary social services such as medicine and education. Language and communication then become an additional barrier. The Namibian language policy which is as applicable in Windhoek as elsewhere, was designed to ignore the uses of all the languages of the country’s citizens. This indirectly translates into economic hardships for both internal and international migrants, particularly those who end up in the informal sector and are struggling to find their feet.

In an attempt to promote inclusivity in the multilingual setting, Maracz and Adamo (2017:1) explained that attempts to spread the adoption of universal norms and standards to protect the cultural and linguistic identity of the mobile community, are increasing. However, the latter does not apply in the context of Windhoek, as there is no state support in place to help speakers of the various native languages maintain their language and identity. This responsibility has been left in the hands of the minoritized groups to find their own means of surviving in the capital. Maracz and Adamo (2017) also emphasise that one-language policies should be discouraged, and policies sipporting more than one official language must be promoted. However, in a study of the languages of rural-urban migrants in Cape Town, Deumert, et al. (2005:309) found that despite the recognition of many languages in the language policy of South Africa, the use of English is dominant and expanding. This indicates that the exclusion of languages in the city cannot solely be blamed on a monolingual language policy. A language policy can be inclusive, as in South Africa, but if the speakers of the languages do not make sure that their languages are promoted and extensively in use, and without practical governmental support, there will be no language inclusivity.

3.3 LINGUA FRANCA

When people do not share an L1 in multilingual settings such as Windhoek, they find a language in which they can communicate with each other despite their varying L1s

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(Wardhaugh, 2006; Okal, 2014). Stell’s (2014) study conducted in the education sector reveals that English and Afrikaans are the two lingua francas for students in Windhoek as students are hardly competent in indigenous languages that are not their L1s. This study will show that English is the most prominent lingua franca of the migrant community in informal sectors in Windhoek.

Various notions are used to talk about lingua franca. To be specific, Samarin (1968:661) outlines four areas to which the term lingua franca can apply, namely in referring to a “trade language, contact language, international language and auxiliary language”. Thus, the uses of the lingua franca are implied: a common language is often used as a language for trade, developed in contact between speakers of mutually unintelligible L1s, for international communication and/or for auxiliary purposes such as in the workplace to enable productive collaboration. This study will document what the lingua franca(s) are used in Windhoek and what they are used for. A lingua franca, according to Mauranen (2010), is a language that makes communication possible despite the differences in indigenous languages. Thus, the presence of a lingua franca demonstrates how linguistically diverse the place is (Bayiga, 2016). English is not only found to be a lingua franca among the students in Windhoek, but it is a lingua franca in many different parts of the world. Across the world, English is used to facilitate “trade, travel, commerce and international relations” between people who do not share a language (Wardhaugh, 2006:60).

Usually, and inevitably, a lingua franca is influenced by other languages in terms of structure and style. Often new vocabulary may enter the lingua franca, and a different version of English which is in some respects different from the English spoken by native speakers, emerges. As English is spreading and used as an international lingua franca, different versions of English emerge, such as Nigerian English, Indian English etc. (see Bhowmik, 2015 on world Englishes). One area worth exploring is to determine whether there is a new (or different) version of English in the informal sector of Windhoek.

3.4 LINGUISTIC REPERTOIRES, MULTILINGUAL AND TRAJECTORIES

The notion of linguistic repertoire has recently gained attention in the field of sociolinguistics. Gumperz (1964), based on the research he conducted in two rural

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areas in India, introduces the notion of “linguistic repertoire”. His view of linguistic repertoire is based on the speech community, which he defines as a community that has interacted over a long period. He defines linguistic repertoires as all the acknowledged ways of conveying a message, which includes but is not limited to the language, register, styles, codes and routines that are involved in every conversation. He believes that the decision lies with the speaker to decide which language to use. However, both grammatical and social constraints determine such decisions. "The social etiquette of language choice is learned along with grammatical rules and once internalised it becomes part of our linguistic equipment" (Gumperz, 1964:139). Therefore, Gumperz’s notion of linguistic repertoire contradicts a different and currently more commonly held view of linguistic repertoire as referring to the range of languages to which speakers have access, and ways of speaking based on the geographical area and social groups to which speakers belong (Busch, 2015).

Gumperz’s notion of linguistic repertoires attracted much attention from linguists in the 1960s to 1980s. Many linguists have since criticised his notion, finding that it has become outdated as it was formulated on an understanding of speech communities as stable entities. Currently, due to globalisation and more complex interactional patterns, there is evidence that speech communities are constantly in flux. Thus, our understanding of the notion ‘speech community’ has been updated to represent the linguistic processes which emerge as a result of human mobility and globalisation (Busch, 2015; Blackledge & Creese, 2010; Wei, 2011).

Busch (2015) suggests that there is a need for linguistic repertoire to be viewed beyond the boundaries of a speech community, and rather to take a biographical approach, which will link repertoires to individual trajectories; an approach that was used by scholars such as Blommaert (2008) and Blommaert and Backus (2013). Blommaert (2008) in his study on the Rwandan refugees in the UK (United Kingdom) claims that linguistic repertoires do not only give information about the speakers' birthplace, but also about their life trajectories. Therefore, with the latter view, the linguistic repertoires of the migrants under study will be used to explain their journeys in life.

Contributing to the debate, Pennycook and Otsuji (2014:166) conceptualise the notion of “spatial repertoire”, which “links the repertoires formed through individual

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life trajectories to the available linguistic resources in particular places” (Pennycook & Otsuji, 2014:166). The latter linkage clarifies whether the person’s linguistic repertoires are useful in the place where they are currently finding themselves. In the case of Windhoek migrants, the migrants may struggle to settle in the society if their linguistic resources do not match the resource(s) found in Windhoek as they will struggle to communicate in their attempts to secure jobs and accommodation.

Linguistic repertoires in the multilingual context involve the application of various linguistic resources in a different context and the way the linguistic resources are combined to form a unitary system of communication (cf. Heller, 2007; Makoni & Pennycook, 2007; Aronin & Singleton, 2008; Higgins, 2009). The study investigates the set of linguistic resources that migrants utilise to enable them to communicate their business to customers or to seek employment opportunities (See §1.1). The linguistic repertoires in the multilingual context entail the use of various resources ranging from language varieties with different kinds of status, such as official, national, majority, minority languages to non-standard varieties, and mixed languages, and relates this to domains of use such as home, school and work stations (Jessner, 2008). Linguistic repertoire also entails all levels of language knowledge and skills. In Africa, people typically have elaborate linguistic repertoires as they rarely rely on a single language (Banda, 2009:110). The study is interested in ascertaining which linguistic resources migrants employ in their daily communication and how the migrants' repertoires change with their changing and intricate trajectories.

As language plays a vital role in the social integration of new migrants in the host society, it can either facilitate or inhibit their integration and settlement. As already mentioned, migrants who are fluent in the official language of the host society appear to adapt and assimilate more easily. However, a migrant who is not proficient in the dominant language(s) of the host society may experience difficulties in settling and in finding a means of survival in terms of employment in that society (Esser, 2006; Craig, 2014). Since Windhoek is home to both internal and external migrants, and English is the only official language in Namibia, the question of proficiency in English is essential in all scenarios.

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Craig (2014) agrees with Esser (2006) and Pfeffer and Para (2009) that proficiency in the language of the host community is a vital element of many migrants’ settlement patterns as the migrants need to communicate with members of the local community to arrange for accommodation, to find employment and even to find schools for their children. The migrants who share language resources with host community members will more easily achieve social integration and gain social capital.

3.5 TRANSLANGUAGING

The term “translanguaging” was coined by William (1994) as a pedagogical practice of using all the languages at one’s disposal to communicate (Canagarajah, 2011). William observed the practice in Welsh revitalisation programmes whereby the teachers taught in English, and the learners reply in Welsh (Baker, 2001:281). The focus of translanguaging as a pedagogical practice was more on "problem solving and knowledge construction" instead of language itself, and in this way, the students felt empowered because they were free to interact in any language at their disposal and that they felt comfortable to use (Wei, 2018). The concept of translanguaging is relevant in this study because as cited and explained in chapter 6, mainly section 6.2.3, the migrants mainly break linguistic barriers by drawing on all the languages they know when confronted with their lack of quick access to appropriate or correct words to communicate in their business. Grammaticality, or ‘correctness’ is not a strong consideration in the language they employ; they use what they have to hand, referring to all the languages at their disposal.

The concept of translanguaging was extended by Garcia (2009) to describe how multilinguals use different languages at their disposal in their everyday social interaction (Mazzaferro, 2018). Similarly, in this study, translanguaging is used in social interaction to discuss the language-related issues that emerge from the narratives of the new migrants. Translanguaging does not only focus on verbal communication, but it also looks at how "speech, gesture, gaze'' and so on are combined to communicate a message (Wei, 2018:4). All the linguistic units, both verbal and non-verbal, that speakers employ to convey a message were observed. Also, in this study, translanguaging was not only investigated from the holistic use of the language of the migrants including both verbal and non-verbal communication.

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Various factors such as human mobility and globalisation (cf. Blommaert, 2010) caused the languages not to be pure and community based, and thus there was a need for an approach such as translanguaging that takes the combined use of languages into account. The elements of translanguaging that emerged from the interviewed are explained below in chapter 7.

3.6 LANGUAGE CHOICE

Since the focus of this study is the role of language in the integration of migrants in Windhoek, it is of the utmost importance to investigate the language choice of the migrants in their daily communication. In multilingual settings such as Windhoek, people often choose which language to use with other interlocutors who are also multilingual (Duranti, 1997; Dweik & Qawar, 2015). According to Gal (1987), the study of language choice remains a crucial area in the field of sociolinguistics. However, it remains a complex and challenging field to explore as there are many factors that influence language choice, and some factors work against each other (Dweik & Qawar, 2015). Therefore, the factors that influence the language choice of Windhoek migrants were explored in this study. An early attempt, which was quantitative, to describe language choices, failed to provide concrete reasons. Therefore, there was a need for a qualitative component to explain why specific languages are used in a particular context and not in all contexts (Gal, 1987).

People’s language choice is triggered by different purposes, which need to be fulfilled in the communication (Fasold, 1990; Coulmas, 1997). The latter sentiment is held by David (2009), who claims that language choice is determined by various factors such as social status, place, topic, media and context. People can adjust their linguistic repertoires such as word choices, registers and styles to fit different situations in the communication (Dweik & Qawar, 2015). The study is interested in finding how the migrants adjust their linguistic resources to fit their communication needs.

Furthermore, language choice is likely to be influenced by the dominant language. Interlocutors are likely to use prestigious languages because of their popularity. The dominant language provides migrants/minority language speakers with a broader audience, economic benefits, solidarity, wider social belonging as well as many other

41 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK advantages (Ferrer & Sankoff, 2004; Pillai, 2006; Piller, 2004; Managan, 2004). In contrast, Holmes (2008) claims that the use of a dominant language reduces the use of the minority languages; as a result, speakers of the minority languages who persist in using their L1s become socially distanced from those who speak the dominant language. This position Holmes refers to, emphasises the point that findings on language choices and what motivates them can be complex; hence cannot be generalised as every community and context is unique. Therefore, specific research needs to be conducted to uncover the factors that influence language choices in communities of interest. The factors that appear to trigger language choice among the new migrants' community in Windhoek’s informal sector were investigated in this study.

As Foucault (2009) advocates, people in government control others’ behaviour, including the language they are likely to use by attaching economic, social and political benefit to it. At the moment, Namibian languages do not provide any economic benefit. As a result, people are likely to choose English. Therefore, those in authority should create and support the creation of conditions for the use of indigenous Namibian languages among migrants by attaching some economic and social benefits to acquiring and using these languages (Foucault, 1980; Martín Rojo, 2018).

3.7 LANGUAGE BIOGRAPHY

A language biography method of narrative enquiry is used to study the verbal accounts of the migrants' community in Windhoek because, as Verschik (2002) claims, quantitative methods (i.e. census) are not enough to explain multilingual circumstances, such as the role of language in the integration of migrants in Windhoek. Nekvapil (2003) defines language biography as personal accounts in which the narrator uses language or languages as a subject to narrate how they learned the language and the experiences of that time when they were learning a language. Tracing the language biography is an appropriate research method as it investigates the linguistics-related issues of language acquisition in depth (Tammekänd, 2017). The biographies collected for this study were used to uncover different kinds of linguistic information, which would have been difficult to collect if the migrants did not give it through story telling.

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A language biography was first used successfully with German-speaking people in Czechoslovakia to describe the critical aspect of languages in their society, such as language choice and multilingualism (Nekvapil, 2003 & Barkhuizen et al, 2013). Tracing a linguistic biography is a research method that involves the use of interviews on life histories and trajectories, biographical narratives that concentrate on multilingual languages, linguistic repertoires and how the languages were acquired or learned (Pavlenko, 2007).

A language biography is not only collected through oral interviews, as it is done in this study, but can also be collected from written diaries, memoirs or biographies (Verschik, 2002; Pavlenko, 2007). Nekvapil (2003:2) explains that “a language is not merely a private matter; an individual learns it from someone (inside and outside the family)” and as a result language biography accounts include other people, who were part of the community where the narrator acquired the language. In this way a language biography provides a linguistic picture of the whole community.

Busch (2010:5) defines language biographies as “personal stories of language” and “life course narrative”, which are subjective and thus cannot be measured in terms of truth that can be verified. However, personal accounts (language biography) have been used in interesting and successful studies before. To name but a few, the language biography method was used by Daubney (2014) to investigate the language shift from isiXhosa to Afrikaans in the Northern Cape, South Africa. The respondents’ biographies revealed how the shift took place. Furthermore, Kliuchnikova (2015:V) uses language biography to investigate the role of linguistic practices, language attitudes and language discourse in cultural integration of post- Soviet Russian-speaking people in the UK. The study discovered that knowing “Russophonism" helped the migrants to feel like part of the host society. Therefore, due to these successful studies, which used the language biography method, the biography method was also used to study the linguistic discourses of the new migrants in Windhoek, Namibia.

3.8 CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS (CDA)

In studying the linguistic repertoires and discourses of migrants within a postcolonial framework, critical discourse analysis was used to carry out the study. Edley

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(2001:189) points out that there is no single definition of CDA since it is an “umbrella term for a wide variety of analytic principles and practices”. Of the many definitions, Chamberlain’s (2013:7) is useful for this study: for him discourse analysis is “the examination of language and its associated culturally grounded assumptions and meanings, which act to structure the ways of talking about a topic, in order to reveal the socio-political functions discourses serve”. The analytic procedures of CDA as developed by Fairclough (1992, 1995) and Wodak (1989, 1996) were explicitly invoked. CDA relies heavily on the social-philosophical work of Michel Foucault, as has also been emphasised by Parker (1999) and Alldred and Burman (2005). CDA helped in disclosing the historical context of the mobile communities in Windhoek, as well as how everyday power relationships are often linguistically determined.

CDA is the analytical approach that studies the way “social power, dominance and inequality” are reflected in the social or political constructed content, which might be in the form of text or speech. In analysing issues, CDA takes a neutral approach to understand and expose any form of social or political inequality reflected in texts (van Dijk, 2001:352). For Cheek (2004:1144), the "text" to be analysed refers to observations, interview transcripts, field notes, documents, pictures or "any representation of aspects of reality". Following Cheek, this study used interview transcripts and field notes as "texts" that were related to and interpreted in view of the meta-data that provides personal information of respondents regarding the social variables of nationality, age, gender, education, employment, migrants' trajectory, and so forth.

The objective of CDA is political; hence the concept “critical” relates to “critical theory” developed in the 1940s. Specifically, it does not take a neutral stand in showing the nature of relationships and the often hidden causes of speakers’ actions that a critical analysis can disclose. In denying the possibility of scientific objectivity, CDA is explicit about its support to those who are dominated (Fairclough, 1992:9). To supplement, postcolonial theory will be used to guide interpretation of the discourses of migrants in Windhoek.

The central tenets of CDA as summarised by Fairclough and Wodak (1997:258-284) are as follows:

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• CDA addresses social problems. It takes a problem-oriented approach rather than being a purely linguistic method of analysis.

• Power relations are discursive. CDA is interested in the power dominance imposed on those at the bottom level of the society by those on top.

• Discourse constitutes society and culture. The social structure forms the basis for explaining the discourses.

• Discourse does ideological work. It uses primary data to explore the matter being investigated for further analysis and theory formulation. Both the data and theory are investigated simultaneously as the data are used to explain the theory.

• Discourse is historical. The approach considers the historical context of the text and the discourses.

• The link between text and society is mediated. The approach is flexible and involves constant consultation and comparison of the theory and the first-hand data.

• Discourse analysis is interpretative and explanatory. The methods and theories of CDA are heterogeneous. Both the methods and theory are joined to explain the matter being investigated.

• Discourse is a form of social action. CDA aims to change the social problems that affect a particular community.

CDA takes an engaging approach as opposed to being objective and dispassionate (Fairclough & Wodak, 1997:297). It is due to this explicit engagement with matters of power distribution and social manipulation that it is an appropriate linguistic approach for considering language use in the postcolonial context, and therefore also in referring to postcolonial theory. Fairclough (2001) explains that CDA is not a single method, but an approach, which is made up of different perspectives and different methods for studying the relationship between the use of language and social constructs. CDA does not study the text in isolation; it is meant to study the text as a whole by showing the connection between the text and the social context of the text.

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This study uses postcolonial theory to critique the issues related to language and power in their historical context as they emerged from the text.

CDA analysts usually encounter problems in identifying the social processes as they are not standardised (Hodge & Kress, 1993:210). Edley (2001:189) claims that CDA is a broad concept that includes different methods of investigation. As a result, analysts propose a close and systematic approach to study the social practices in the discourses by examining the individual and institutional practice with the focus on the topic of power, domination, conceptual operation, social change, conflict, discrimination and race (Fairclough, 1989:67; Wodak, 1996:224, Van Dijk, 1997:77). In other words, CDA critically studies the language of the text to reveal how the issue of “dominance, inequality and social power” in the society (Wodak, 2001:2) manifests.

Simpson (2010:51) states that the word “critical” signals "a departure from a more descriptive goal of discourse analysis where the focus is more on describing and detailing linguistic features than why and how these features are produced…". This means CDA focuses on critiquing an issue in the context instead of pointing out the linguistic elements. Therefore, CDA is a helpful tool to uncover the linguistic injustice that migrants may experience daily in the process of integrating into Windhoek. CDA “pays more attention to ‘top-down’ relations of dominance than to ‘bottom-up’ relations of resistance, compliance and acceptance”. Power and abuse are not forced on the other group, but it is “jointly” produced. Usually, the dominated group is made to believe that dominance is part of life and acceptable. As a result, the dominated group accepts the conduct without resisting such abuse of power. Therefore, the CDA analyst mostly concentrates on the "elites and their discursive strategies for maintenance of inequality" (Wodak, 1997:250) as well as opening the eyes of those who are abused by the system.

Furthermore, in Fairclough's (1995) view, CDA's focus should be on contemporary circumstances to change the discursive practices as part of the broad processes and attempts to change social and cultural practices. Wodak and Meyer (2001:10) state that CDA habitually selects the angle of those who suffer from sociocultural and linguistic inequality, and critically analyses how the elements of suffering are reflected in the discourses. Fairclough emphasises that those in power are the

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causes of social inequality, and thus they are responsible for the existence of disparities; it is not known whether the latter could be said in the context of Windhoek's migrants; hence, the need for this particular study. He further argues that only those in power have the means to advance circumstances; and thus, the critique should be directed to them (those in power). In this research, the weak ones are the migrants, and those in power are linguistic planners in the country because they have the power to influence and change the linguistic situation so as to assist the new migrants with limited education to integrate into Windhoek, Namibia.

The aim of CDA is not to make contributions to the theories, schools of thought or models, but to investigate the pressing social discrepancies as well as to provide an explanation that will enhance the understanding of the social issues of the oppressed. Social problems such as societal dominance and inequality are complex and therefore, according to Wodak (1997:252), they require an approach that is multidisciplinary, and where “the distinctions between theory, description and application become less relevant". However, this does not defy the need to apply theory when studying a particular social problem; theory is important as it explains the problem, which helps to improve understanding of the problem at hand (Wodak, 1997). Also, CDA aims to bring the required change through a critical understanding of the problem. The critical discourse analyst sympathises with those who fall victim to social inequality and dominance such as the new migrants. These inequalities can be linguistic; thus, there is a need to critically look at the languages of the migrants' community of Windhoek. CDA does not focus on a single problem, but rather on all the problems that affect the day-to-day livelihood of the masses rather than those of individuals (Wodak, 1997).

Everyday power relationships are often linguistically determined as CDA covers the repertoires of political position and literacy practices accessible for the study of the way language, discourse, text and image are implicated in sustaining and changing social and economic conditions of people, i.e. migrants in Windhoek (Van Dijk, 1993a). The overall aim of CDA is to reveal the opaque power relations in the discourses and texts and to bring them to the fore for the inquiry. At present, the linguistic disparities among migrants are not known. Therefore, the study will uncover the issue of power relations in the migrants' discourses and scrutinise such

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power relations while in the process, creating awareness and consciousness of the migrant’s situation to both the policy formulators and the migrants themselves.

Furthermore, Van Dijk (1996) and Wodak (2001) state that language is the starting point to transform societal inequality (cf. Litosseliti, 2010). Language use can reflect the social inequalities within a community such as that of Windhoek. Again, Janks (1993:iii) argues that if CDA "enables people to use their awareness to contest the practices which disempower them, and to use language as an act not to disempower others, then it can contribute to the struggle for human emancipation". Therefore, CDA provides tools and practices to investigate and challenge the legitimacy and common-sense nature of language and social practices, which leads to linguistic, class, racial and gender inequalities in society.

The central focus of CDA is “ideology”, “power” and “history” (Wodak & Meyer, 2001:3). According to Kress and Hodge (1979; quoted in Wodak & Meyer, 2001:3), the effects of power and ideology in the production of meaning are unnoticed and attain steady and natural practices; they are taken as a set. CDA considers power as an essential condition in social life, a relation of differences in social structures (Wodak & Meyer, 2001). History, in this case, refers to the sociocultural context, and this study is based more on the sociocultural status of languages and how they impact on the integration of migrants.

Said (1978:5-6) states that the beliefs, cultures, languages, and histories cannot holistically be understood without their associations to either the current or the past power ideology. CDA is combined with postcolonial theory to explain the historical context of power dominance. The latter approach is essential for a country like Namibia that has a history of colonial operations. Some elements of inequality and abuse of power in the discourses of Windhoek's migrants, if there are any, might be rooted in the history of colonial operation; which is something CDA may not thoroughly uncover and explain on its own if not combined with a theory that explains the legacy of past colonial power in contemporary social practices.

Fairclough (1989) argues that to understand the discourses we need to examine the language and societal practices. Language constitutes elements of social structures and processes within which individuals or groups create meaning in their

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interactions. Additionally, Fairclough and Wodak (1997) believe that sociocultural and socio-historical circumstances influence how the language is used in society and at the same time language can affect those circumstances.

CDA is a helpful analytical approach in illuminating the current situation in the sense that it can expose suffering which is of the result of power differences. The findings given in chapters 5 to 7 rely on a critical analysis of power discourses which often obscure how language differences have an effect on the livelihood of new migrants trying to settle in Windhoek.

3.9 POSTCOLONIAL THEORY

Language issues in Namibia, especially those experienced by new migrants in Windhoek, cannot be discussed in isolation without referring to “social forces which made it an issue demanding our attention and a problem calling for a solution” (wa Thiong’o, 1986:4). The “social force” referred to is the issue of colonial operation that affected all the various spheres of the country, including its linguistic landscape; therefore, the root problem in the linguistic situation of the migrants' community cannot be fully discovered if the present situation is not linked to what transpired in the country's political history. The latter is clearly emphasised by Thomas and Kaufman (1988) who explain that the history of the language depicts the function of its people. Moreover, colonialism did not only affect the people, but their languages too; therefore, to fully understand the current linguistic inequality experienced by new migrants one should pay attention to the past political orientation of Namibia, the approach that is taken in this study, by using the postcolonial theory.

The concept of “postcolonial (postcolonialism) theory” was coined by a group of historians after the Second World War (WWII) to refer to the "post-colonial state". The prefix "post" clearly implies the period after colonialism; however, from late 1970, the term has been used by literary critics to discuss various aftermaths of colonialism in the post-colonial era (Pourjafari & Vahidpour, 2014:67). In their own words, Ashcroft, Griffiths and Tiffin (1989:2) use the term “postcolonial theory” to refer to "all the cultures affected by the imperial process from the moment of colonialism to the present day". Again, the latter quoted authors confirm that postcolonial theory explains the effects of colonialism in society as well as how

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colonialism shapes the societies. Pennycook (2001:66) defines postcolonialism as "a political and cultural movement that seeks to challenge the received histories and ideologies of the former colonial nations and to open a space for insurgent knowledge to emerge". Colonial legacies continue to haunt most African countries, including Namibia. Although not yet confirmed, it could be that many of the linguistically related predicaments that continue to hinder the integration of migrants today are a result of the colonial legacy that is still present in the linguistic landscape of the country. Therefore, as suggested by Pennycook above, postcolonial theory is used to critique the linguistic quandaries that continuously affect new migrants. The respondents’ narratives illustrate such difficulties and also assist the researcher in suggesting required change(s).

3.9.1 Theoretical contribution of postcolonial theory

Various scholars have contributed to postcolonial theory; however, in this study only scholars whose works most significantly belong to the postcolonial theory are reviewed. The postcolonial authors call for the need to regain the precolonial languages, linguistic status and cultures of the colonised nations (cf. Fanon, 1967; wa Thiong’o, 1989). The common belief was and still is that the languages and cultures of the imperialists are still dominant and superior in Africa among African nations (Phillipson, 1992:365). It is entirely possible to do away with the language and cultures that are regarded as of the coloniser, however, maybe the focus should be how to use the present situation of the Namibian languages and culture so that they can be at the same status as those of colonial language and culture.

Edward Said, one of the postcolonial theorists, coined the term “Orientalism" in 1978, which entails the negative representation of Eastern cultures, and all non-European cultures, by the Western cultures. Culture includes languages. The belief among many Namibian people that the Western languages, specifically English, are better than the Namibian languages is on the increase. Namibia is a multilingual country. However, those in power choose English over all other Namibian languages as the only official language, a situation that is currently affecting those who did not go far in education to master English. Thus, they solely depend on their linguistic skill to secure employment. This is the case with the new migrants who are respondents in this study. In Said's own words Orientalism is a "Western style for dominating,

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restructuring, and having authority over the Orient" (1978:3). Said uses two binary ideas to explain his idea of "Orientalism" – the occident to represent the West, and the Orient to represent the Middle East. The "Orientals were regarded as backward, degenerate, uncivilised, the poor; Orientals were rarely seen or looked at, they were seen through, analysed not as citizens, or even people, but as problems to be solved or confined" (Said, 1978:207). Although Namibia is independent, the linguistic predicament in which most migrants find themselves could be compared to those of the Orient, as described by Said above. The predicament for the Namibian people is that they are entrusted with the responsibility to affect positive changes in the country, but the linguistic situation makes things difficult for the less educated new migrants who cannot appropriately articulate themselves in a required language to secure employment, and this language is mostly English.

Ashcroft et al. (1995:2) claim that postcolonial theory is "migration, slavery, suppression, resistance, representation, difference, race, gender, place, and responses to the influential master discourses of imperial Europe […] and the fundamental experiences of speaking and writing by which all these come into being''. The latter implies that postcolonial theory is a transition of previously colonised people to find their voices and to make their voices heard in an attempt to find alternatives to dominant voices.

Most African countries were colonised at some points by Western countries, such as Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Spain; during the colonialisation process, many African countries were made to believe that their education, politics, systems and languages are inferior to those of their colonisers; colonialists imposed their languages on the colony and degraded their languages (Fanon, 1967). Colonialists considered African people, their culture and languages as primitive and uncivilised, and people were ignored in the regulatory domain when speaking languages other than those of colonisers (Rubagumya, 1991). Although many African countries gained independence in the 1960s, the effects of colonialism are continuously evident in Africa (Curtin, 2005; Lunga, 2008; Osai, 2010; Pashby, 2012). For example, the English language – a Western language – continues to dominate African languages in African schools and public domains, and globalisation spearheads the continuous effect of colonialism in current Africa. Globalisation

51 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK brought the need for many African states to know Western languages, to follow educational practices and to implement political systems in order to economically survive in the contemporary world. In so doing, African systems continue to be weak and dependent.

Kayira (2015:16) explains postcolonial theory as focusing on "rethinking the conceptual, institutional, cultural, legal and other boundaries that are taken for granted and assumed to be universal but have their origins in the Western ideologies and act as structural barriers". As English is a language of power in Namibia, those who are proficient in English may stand a better chance of securing employment than those who are not. The high status of English in Namibia is co-determined by a long colonial history in which German, English and Afrikaans competed in various ways with the languages of the indigenous communities. Postcolonial theory will assist in considering how the inherited status of English plays a role in the settlement of migrants in terms of finding accommodation, employment and social acceptance in Windhoek.

The mobility of European countries through a system that resulted in a scramble for Africa has changed the linguistic landscape of many African countries. The European authorities set up boundaries for many countries to form their empire, a practice that led to the division of many language speakers. As a result, speakers of similar languages were split in different countries and grouped with speakers of other languages, which led to a situation that made Africa more multilingual (cf. wa Thiong’o, 1986; Anchimbe, 2007; Ngefac, 2010). Also, the same colonial powers then provided opportunities for their languages (Western languages) to be used as lingua francas in the countries under their control. Consequently, many countries are still struggling with complex language policy decisions that are inherited from the past.

Postcolonial theory is a critical theoretical framework that deliberately moves away from dominant discourses by creating space for disregarded groups to speak out and provide substitutions to dominant discourses (cf. Bhabha, 1994; wa Thiong’o, 1993). Although Namibia was never an English colony, through the long history of governance by South Africa with its pre-1994 policy of two official languages (English and Afrikaans), Namibia was introduced to English as a language of communication.

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The acceptance of one language only as an official language after independence in 1990 has assured that English gained ground as a dominant language in Windhoek. The linguistic repertoires of new migrants may reveal processes of linguistic shift into which the critical perspective of postcolonial theory could give helpful insight. To add, postcolonial theory appeals to all role players to unlearn a mode of thinking that privileges the Western (colonial) position, and imposes a deficit perspective on formerly colonised peoples as well as those who after colonisation are still unsettled nationally as well as linguistically (Lavia, 2007; Leonardo, 2005). Without first-hand and recent information on the ostensibly changing identities within the urban community, sensible suggestions on the integration of internal and external migrants in Windhoek are hardly possible. Postcolonial theory portrays what the Western colonisers did to the indigenous languages and culture of the colonised nations, and it advocates for the sufferings of the colonised nations (Abrahamsen, 2003).

This study adopted postcolonial theory because it is not only limited to the aftermaths of colonialism in nations, but is also seeking social and linguistic transformation (Ashcroft et al., 1989); and this study aims to understand the role of language in the integration of Windhoek migrants and to suggest linguistic transformation thereafter. Postcolonial theory provides an important model for understanding the place of the local languages, culture and traits in the increasingly globalised world (Pennycook, 2001). Windhoek, just like any other city in the world, is also affected by cultural and economic forces that operate worldwide (Ashcroft et al., 2000).

Young (2009) states that culture (including the language) and one’s social belonging determine the types of treatment one will receive throughout one’s life. New migrants who form part of this study lack tertiary qualifications and some required oral skills, rendering them vulnerable members of society. Colonialism introduced the concept of “divide and rule”, which the vulnerable members of society such as new migrants continue to experience. Although Namibia is an independent country and the people are not directly subjected to the kind of colonial treatment many experienced before independence, the fact remains that social and linguistic exclusion dictate their suffering. Therefore, postcolonial theory speaks on behalf of those who cannot

53 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK speak for themselves because their languages and status seem not to matter; thus, their suffering continues.

3.9.2 Multilingualism and identity in the postcolonial context

To discuss the issue of identity in the postcolonial multilingual African context, two approaches to language and identity were reviewed: that of Ngungi wa Thiong’o and that of Chinua Achebe. These two approaches were taken because of the binaries in terms of which they think. Despite both authors being African writers and intellectual thinkers, they have contrasting ideas.

Wa thiongo (1994) shuns Western identity and promotes African identity; he claims that colonialism affects how Africans perceive themselves, their languages and culture as primitive and lacking (wa Thiong’o, 1994). Wa Thiong’o claims that even though colonial rule over African countries is over, colonial languages such as English and French are still used as tools to control the minds of the African and to suppress all that is African, including languages, culture and identity (1994). He questions why African people should claim other people's languages while they are reluctant to claim and develop their own (wa Thiong’o, 1994). Wa Thiong’o is disturbed by the fact that all that is white and Western is praised in Africa, while all that is black and African is regarded as backward. He gives an example of the school he went to in Kenya where students were punished for speaking Gikuyu, and those who achieved in English were applauded, whilst those who excelled in African languages were ignored (Wa thiong’o, 1986). To Wa Thiong’o, the issue of controlling people's culture and languages translates to controlling people's identity and how they view and define themselves in relation to others (Wa Thiong’o, 1994; cf. Shakib, 2011). Wa Thiong’o (1986) uses the concept of "decolonising the mind" about practices of confronting and rejecting colonial and Western ways of looking at things. His work will inform the interpretation of the migrants' narratives from a perspective informed by relatively recent histories of colonialism in African countries. Crossley and Tikly (2004) point out that postcolonial perspectives challenge us to look at continuing consequences of Western colonialisation also in recognising the footprints – also the linguistic footprints – left by the colonial regime in Windhoek.

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Contrary to Wa Thiongo’s beliefs of language and identity in postcolonial spaces, Achebe (1973:617) argues that although English came to Africa as part of the colonial package, that should not be used to reject it. Colonialism is not to be blamed for the rising status of the English language in Africa at the expense of the African languages, thereby replacing African identity. He suggests that the blame should instead be put on human mobility, which created the presence of so many languages in the same places making interlinguistic communication difficult. Being proficient in both English (in Nigeria) and Igbo (his first language), he was able to benefit from both languages. He suggests that the realistic stance with regard to the status of English in Africa is to value it for its role to enable communication among people of different ethnic and linguistic backgrounds (Achebe, 2006:268). Therefore, he suggests that African people should adopt a hybrid identity that embraces both indigenous and European languages without losing themselves. The issue that needs to be investigated in this study is how to create a hybrid language identity in Windhoek.

Martín Rojo (2018), in discussing the educational opportunities of migrant students, mentions that parents prefer their children to be multilingual, but they rather prefer their children to be multilingual in the language with international languages included in their linguistic repertoires rather than including local indigenous languages. Being multilingual is vital, but does knowledge of all languages carry the same weight when it comes to new migrants securing the opportunities? Indigenous languages do not contribute to migrants' mobility in the global market (Tembe & Norton, 2008). As a result, some parents discourage the use of African languages in their homes, whilst encouraging the use of English (Campbell & Walsh, 2010; Jones & Barkhuizen, 2011). African people allow the Western way of life and this includes allowing Western languages to demean theirs. Wa thiongo (1986) despises the notion that colonial languages such as English unite people in all spheres of life despite their first languages, as English created more division among people, especially in Namibia. Those who are proficient in English belong to the class of elites, while those who only know indigenous languages belong to the vulnerable members of society (Krishnamurthy & Nanub, 2011; Bekett Mount, 1999) as they are always linguistically excluded from national discourses. People without qualifications mostly depend on their linguistic abilities to secure employment. Employment opportunities

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are secured based on how well one masters a European language such as German, or English. In this way, English did not unite people, but is a new colonial factor disallowing people access to opportunities. The independence of many African nations, including Namibia, which grants people the freedom to migrate within and outside the country, to some extent depends on English continuing to be the only language that unlocks economic opportunities in Namibia. In the presence of many lesser-used Namibian indigenous languages access to English can be helpful; even so, this tends to marginalise the indigenous languages and to exclude many of their L1 speakers.

In independent Namibia, the vulnerable members of society, such as migrants, are economically struggling because they failed to meet the educational pass criteria, which are based on an educational system that follows Western models. Moreover, migrants’ linguistic competence, especially in the official language, renders them more vulnerable because most did not go far in the Western-based education system in Namibia, which means they were not afforded opportunities to become fully proficient in English. In this way, the Namibian government is using a colonial education system in post-colonial Namibia, and the one-language policy then controls the behaviour of people when it comes to opportunities. The latter situation attests to the fact that politically Namibia is independent, but a new form of colonialism has emerged in the form of controlling the distribution and application of languages and culture (cf. Sewant, 2011; Young, 2009; wa Thiong’o, 1986). Foucault’s (1980:194) concept of “governmentality” refers to various forms of social control. In the context of this study the latter concept is countered by Phephani (2018), in her study of languages in education, where she suggests that one way to elevate the status of African languages is to include them in the basic education curriculum so that children can be fully developed in their L1s, as well as realise the importance of knowing African languages while they are young.

According to Mühleisen (2011), all postcolonial societies are multilingual as many languages are used interchangeably in different societal discourses. Although Windhoek is a multilingual city, 20 years after independence it appears that English dominates when it comes to the use of language in public spaces in the city. The

56 | Page CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK study investigates whether being multilingual is advantageous when it comes to migrants settling in Windhoek.

3.10 The relevance of postcolonial theory in this study

The theory of postcolonialism was introduced by Fanon in the field of Psychology during the 1950s, claiming that colonialism affects the psyches of people many years after it has ended. Also, founding post-colonialist, Said, who was a scholar in literary studies, emphasized the relationship between certain kinds of knowledge and power as from the late 1970s. Since then, postcolonial theory was further developed in many more fields than this study can refer to. All these studies depart from the original claims by Fanon and Said, that colonialism has a systemic effect which has to be acknowledged in order to be addressed. This study takes the view that linguistic aspects of Windhoek can be understood holistically if the findings are viewed with the lenses of post-colonialism, since Namibia is currently an independent state having to deal with typically post-colonial effects.

To begin with, the postcolonial state did not develop rural areas (Read § 2.5.2 about developments during the colonial era in Namibia) formally known as ‘communal areas’, as they concentrated on urban areas, which were referred to as ‘commercial areas’. Also, after independence the postcolonial state did not develop the rural areas, as a result of which development in rural areas lags far behind the urban areas. The latter has resulted in an influx of people from rural to urban area. Simply put, the colonial government concentrated mostly on developing Windhoek as a capital city and the postcolonial government continues to do so. As a result, Windhoek has become more attractive due to its infrastructure and increasing job opportunities which have resulted in high numbers of people from rural areas moving to the city. High numbers of people migrating from poorer countries to other countries that are doing better, is a typical post-colonial phenomenon.

3.11 CONCLUSION

This chapter discussed the literature that covers themes that are relevant to the research questions and the data collected through questionnaires and interviews on the discourses of new migrants. The specific linguistic themes that were elaborated,

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include multilingualism, translanguaging, language choice, linguistic repertoire, language and discrimination, and language biography studies. Also, the chapter has provided an overview of pertinent aspects of CDA and postcolonial theory as set out by various authors. This framework was selected as Namibia, with its capital Windhoek, is a country currently under post-colonial rule, and is dealing with sociolinguistic themes that cannot be fully understood without linking them to the colonial history of Namibia. Remote and recent histories have affected many different aspects of people’s lives. CDA literature was reviewed as the study takes a critical approach to analysing and interpreting the discourses of new migrants in Windhoek.

The next chapter will provide an overview of the research methodology before turning to the different kinds of data and presenting analyses and an interpretation that will assist in answering the research questions.

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CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

4.1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter outlines the methods that were used to gather the data for this study. It also describes the procedures used to prepare, analyse and interpret this data and to arrive at the conclusions. This chapter provides details of the research design, the population and sample, the research instruments, as well as an explanation of the ethical considerations that were taken into account in this study.

4.2 RESEARCH DESIGN

The research was designed to provide answers to the research questions as formulated in Chapter One. The various steps taken to gain useful data, and to develop insight into the selected interesting phenomena have shaped the research design. In Kothari’s (2004:30) words, research design “… is the conceptual structure within which research is conducted; it constitutes the blueprint for the collection, measurement and analysis of data”. Johnson and Christensen (2004) similarly refer to research design as a blueprint setting out the structure of a research project. It determines the approach that is used in carrying out the research (Bui, 2014). This study on the narratives of recently arrived migrants in Windhoek, as articulated by the migrants themselves, has taken a qualitative approach. Although a relatively large set of questionnaires was used to provide an overview of the kinds of linguistic repertoires exhibited in two different kinds of migrant communities (identified as Namibian and foreign migrants), it does not work quantitatively in that it has not controlled for the statistical representativeness of the sample, nor has it systematically correlated various variables to provide statistics on which combinations of features count as more significant than others. Rather, this study has been designed to gain a thorough overview of the linguistic profiles of recently arrived migrants to Windhoek, and its interest is in the voices of the migrants themselves as they articulate, in more and less detail, how their languages have been shaped and used in their migratory trajectories. Thus, instead of using numbers as an instrument of interpretation, this study uses “inductive reasoning” to make

59 | Page CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY sense of the data gathered from the questionnaires and interviews and as a basis for drawing conclusions (Bui, 2014:14).

4.3 QUALITATIVE APPROACH

The kinds of questions asked, the nature of the data used to answer the research questions and the manner in which the data for the study is collected, usually dictates the research approach to be followed in a specific study. As this study draws information from "empirical material" collected from a limited number of respondents, it counts as qualitative research (Punch, 2012:134). Although a short questionnaire was used to collect meta-data and brief statements from a relatively large number of respondents (n=440), a subset of 25 respondents was interviewed and required to discuss and explain their linguistic experiences in their natural surroundings, with little attention to numerical information (Bui, 2014). Typically, the focus of the qualitative research approach is the respondents themselves, which was the case in this study as respondents were provided an opportunity to define and interpret their own linguistic experiences. The researchers' role is to study the experiences of the respondents, as presented by the respondents (Kalof, Dan & Dietz, 2008; Merriam & Tisdell, 2015).

Cresswell and Poth (2017) explain that qualitative research is a method of investigation that seeks to build a complete understanding of social or cultural phenomena. This study undertook exactly that: it followed a qualitative approach to get a broad understanding of the linguistic repertoires of migrants as well as their linguistic experiences, as narrated by themselves.

The qualitative approach is not representative of the full community where the sample was drawn, as it is not numerically significant of the full complement of the groups from which respondents come. Nevertheless, the sample was purposively selected to exemplify the profiles of people from a number of migrant communities in fine detail. The qualitative approach is authentic and reliable because the sample is studied in the "natural settings" of the respondents, and not in isolation (Amora, 2010; Cresswell & Poth, 2017; Marriam & Tisdell, 2015). The linguistic repertoires and patterns of language use of Windhoek’s migrants were studied in the context where they currently live and work, often with family members and colleagues in

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close proximity. Therefore, the possibility of the data being manipulated was small. Bui (2014:14) mentions that qualitative researchers "… collect data through extensive or detailed field notes, observations, interviews or focus groups with respondents …" This description fits the design and procedures followed in this study well. The study surveyed a large number of respondents by means of questionnaires. Also, interviews were conducted to collect more detailed information than could be gathered with questionnaires alone.

Qualitative research can produce a larger and more finely detailed amount of data than a quantitative approach because the respondents provide narrations and use deductive reasoning, which assures that the data is huge (Punch, 2012). In this study, the research data were obtained from multiple sources, both primary and secondary. The respondents themselves were the primary sources; secondary sources that assisted in interpreting the data were reports and documents as well as existing studies on migrants in Windhoek, Namibia. Since the information was obtained from multiple sources, it provides a broader spectrum on the role of languages in the integration of migrants in Windhoek.

The sample from which information is drawn in a qualitative study is typically small (Bui, 2014). Although 440 respondents answered questionnaires in this project, the sample of respondents from whom detailed information came, was indeed small, consisting of only 25 respondents. The sample was purposely limited to allow the researcher time and opportunity for extensive interaction with each respondent during interview sessions. This research method has allowed the researcher "… to investigate the topic in depth, to interpret the outcomes based on the respondents’, not the researcher's, perspectives; and has created a holistic picture of the situation" (Bui, 2014:15).

4.4 SOURCES

The primary sources in this study were first, the data on language profiles of migrants collected from 440 respondents by means of questionnaires, and second, the data from the follow-up personal interviews with 25 respondents who were purposively selected based on the information they provided in the first phase, i.e. in the questionnaire.

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Furthermore, any other elaborative document on multilingualism in urban settings, census data from the Namibia Statistic Agency on migration, documents on language and mobility, ethnologue data on Namibian languages as well as literature on postcolonial theory and CDA were used as secondary sources to shed more light on the discourses of migrants in Windhoek.

4.5 POPULATION AND SAMPLE

According to Bless, Higson-Smith and Sithole (2013), a research population “… is the entire set of objects or people which is the focus of the research and about which the researcher wants to determine some characteristics”. When the population of a study is identified, a smaller sample is drawn from it to participate in the study, because it is costly and time consuming – in fact mostly also impracticable – for the whole population to participate in the study. However, the results of the study can then be generalised to the whole population (Somekh & Lewin, 2011; Neuman, 2011; Bui, 2014). A research population and sample are characterised by similar traits (Kalof et al., 2008). According to Creswell (2013:42), “(a) sample of the study is a target population or a group of individuals with some common defining characteristics that the researcher can identify and study”.

4.5.1 Population

The population selected for this project was made up of Namibian and foreign migrants, who have been in Windhoek for less than two years. Specifically, the study focused on migrants who have no tertiary education qualification, as it is assumed that their employment opportunities would be less than otherwise (cf. Kumar, 2019). The hypothesis here is that with limited formal qualifications, respondents’ linguistic resources, i.e. their proficiency in different languages, are likely to be a currency that has more and less value, depending on which specific languages they have at their disposal. Unemployment correlates with levels of education in the city because usually the "migrants lack necessary skills and education to be easily absorbed in the job market leading to a high unemployment rate'' (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015:25).

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Windhoek was chosen as the setting of the research because it is the fastest- growing city in Namibia and has the highest number of migrants compared to other towns in the country (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012).

4.5.2 Sample

As mentioned, the first sample of the study was a set of 440 respondents, purposively selected to complete a questionnaire providing a brief overview of their patterns of migration to the city, as well as information on their language repertoires and educational profiles.

After collecting information on the language biographies and linguistic repertoires of an extensive number of respondents (n=440) by means of a questionnaire, a second, smaller sample was drawn from the first set of respondents. The questionnaires were distributed, administered and collected by 45 undergraduate students whose assignment was to approach internal and/or international respondents who had recently migrated to Windhoek. A subset of 25 people was selected from those who delivered questionnaires, and they were invited to personal interviews. The larger sample was taken to assist in gaining a reasonable impression of how multilingual the migrant community is and, generally, how varied the linguistic repertoires of newcomers to Windhoek are. The smaller sample consisted specifically of respondents who are either unemployed or working in informal trading, as street vendors, taxi drivers, security guards, cleaners and in the service and hospitality industry, to mention but a few, i.e. in contexts where many migrants typically find work. Respondents who have a tertiary qualification from a country where English is the language of higher education were excluded from the smaller sample as the interest of the study is directed at the experiences of those less proficient in the dominant language of public communication in the city.

For the questionnaires purposive sampling was used to select the respondents for the study, i.e. they were selected because they met the inclusion criteria. In this case a suitable respondent would a person (1) who is a migrant, (2) who has not stayed in Windhoek for more than two years, and (3) who does not have a university qualification (Bui, 2014; Silverman, 2016; Flick, 2015). In addition to the latter criteria, those invited for interviews were selected on the basis of an additional

63 | Page CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY criterion, namely that in the questionnaires, they gave rich information in terms of the languages in their repertoires and their trajectory history.

4.6 RESEARCH INSTRUMENTS

Research instruments used to obtain the data from the respondents, in this case, were a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. Language and linguistics studies investigate subjects that are dynamic and contextualised. Thus, Frels and Onwuegbuzie (2013) discourage the use of questionnaires as the only instrument to gather data. This study employed both a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews to supplement the findings of each. The instruments were chosen to fit the objectives of the study. Questionnaires were used to get a comprehensive sample of migrants’ linguistic profiles and language biography information, while interviews were used to obtain rich, detailed information on migrants’ mobility and experiences and how these relate to their linguistic repertoires.

4.6.1 Questionnaire

In the first phase of the study, a questionnaire was designed to elicit meta-data of each respondent, i.e. their name, age, gender, place of origin, level of education, language repertoires and migration trajectories (see Appendix A). Here the researcher followed McMillan and Schumacher (2001), who state that questionnaires are a trustworthy data collection instrument when carefully designed, as they can deliver reliable responses in an easily accessible and comparable manner. The questionnaires were widely distributed making use of the assistance of trained students in linguistics. The surveyors went around different suburbs in Windhoek, especially where informal trading takes place, explaining the aim of the study and enquiring who had not been living in Windhoek for more than two years. The field work did not proceed without problems as some migrants were scared to participate at the beginning. Also, some of the foreign migrants who did not have the necessary residence permits were scared that maybe the surveyor was sent by the police to trace them. However, after the aim of the study was explained to them and the surveyors presented their student cards to prove that they are students, they were much more willing to cooperate. A total of 500 questionnaires were collected, however, after data cleaning, only 440 questionnaires were found useful to be

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recorded for the study. To ensure that the respondents were new migrants and met the inclusion criteria, the respondents were asked to provide their names and cell phone numbers for the researcher to contact them and verify their information whenever doubtful information or duplication were found during the data cleaning process.

The questionnaire for this study was piloted first to determine whether it was easily understandable, as well as to ascertain how long it would take, on average, to be completed. The questionnaire included both open-ended and closed questions. Data collected in this survey were entered into an electronic database, specifically in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, which enabled the limited number of calculations that was needed for an integration of results. While entering the data, the researcher scrutinised the questionnaires to select a smaller sample of respondents.

4.6.2 Interview

The instrument that was used in the second phase of data collection was a semi- structured interview. After the questionnaire information had been obtained, 25 respondents who provided rich information in the questionnaire were invited to one- on-one personal interviews, conducted according to an interview schedule (see Appendix B). These respondents were called on the basis of the interesting information they had given on the languages they know and/or their trajectory histories. They were informed that the interviewer would like to talk to them further about the information they had provided in the questionnaires. The researcher again, explained the objectives of the study and the benefits that the study could have for the community and for people in informal trading, when it comes to language related issues. All the participants agreed to take part in the study. Among the respondents who were interviewed, only six were interviewed in the office, the rest were interviewed at their business premises.

Those approached to be interviewed at their business premises were interviewed there because an important part of this kind of qualitative research is to study subjects in their natural settings. As the researcher, I could gain access and trust due not only to how my request was conveyed, but also to racial identification with the migrants and to speaking L1 Oshiwambo, a vernacular language widely used in

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Windhoek. My personal identity facilitated the interview process in that it gave me access to all sections in Katutura. The respondents were willing to entrust me with their personal stories, perhaps more than would have been the case if the social and cultural distance had been bigger.

In the interviews, the respondents were asked to elaborate further on the information they gave in their questionnaire. Punch (2013:168) finds an interview “is a good way of accessing people’s perceptions, meanings, definitions, and construction of reality”. To add, semi-structured interviews allow active involvement of the respondents to engage with data on their languages, mobility and experiences as there was only a list of topics to be covered instead of specific questions; such involvement helped the researcher to get a full understanding of respondents’ linguistic situations. Semi- structured interviews were used in this study to assure that similar topics and similar kinds of information would be discussed by all interviewees, regarding migrants’ experiences, trajectories and narratives. Besides structuring the topics broadly, respondents were given the freedom to direct the course of the interviews, to provide deeper insight into how Windhoek’s migrants understand their linguistic situation, without the researcher imposing ideas or questions on them, which in a way could have limited the discussions (Punch, 2013; Bui, 2014).

To ensure that the 25 respondents selected for the interviews were representative in terms of linguistic and migratory backgrounds, five of the respondents were Namibians of different L1s (one Oshiwambo, two Sifwe, one Thimbukushu and one Khoekhoegowab); another five respondents were Namibian monolinguals (three Oshiwambo and two Nyemba). Another five respondents were Angolan by nationality; five were Zimbabweans by nationality and five were Congolese nationals. The interview sample was sufficiently representative, although the majority of the respondents were Oshiwambo L1 speakers (this is because there are many Oshiwambo L1 speakers in Windhoek). Thus, the criterion of trajectory histories was used to determine the Namibian interview respondents, rather than their languages.

Furthermore, interviews provided the opportunity for the researcher to have face-to- face contact with the respondent, which made observation possible so that the respondents’ attitudes and body language could become part of the data on their personal experiences and interpretations (Smith & Elger, 2014). In other words, the

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interviews provided rich and valuable information on the linguistic experiences of migrants who could, on the basis of the larger set of data and the entire research population, count as representative of Windhoek’s migrants. The structure of the interviews, broadly, entailed the researcher asking certain initial questions to put the respondent at ease and to introduce the topics prepared before the interview sessions (Punch, 2012; Kalof et al., 2008; Somekh & Lewin, 2011). An interview schedule (see Appendix B) was developed before the sessions, which consisted of the introductory questions and listed topics to be covered in the interview. The interview schedule was informed by the literature review, making sure that the data would answer to important aspects of postcolonial theory and relate indirectly to the literature that was reviewed for this study. The reason for having an interview schedule is to direct the researcher throughout the interviews so that the information gathered would align with the objective of the study, to be specific on issues related to multilingualism, linguistic repertoires, and narratives on trajectories (Easton, 2010; Bui, 2014; Punch, 2012). Finally, the interview schedule afforded the researcher some flexibility to investigate the migrants' linguistic experiences and practices in more detail, without going off topic.

Even though the researcher took care to follow the interview schedule, the interviews took a natural course, which was a normal conversation that flowed according to the respondent’s responses. Often, in discussion, the respondents would elaborate without them specifically being asked to do so. Follow-up questions were usually asked in response to the respondent’s contribution. Thus, the interview structure allowed respondents the flexibility to explore and to elaborate on the topics (Punch, 2012; Bless et al., 2013). Although the researcher had planned and rehearsed a set of questions beforehand, the interview did not cover all the prepared questions in all the interview sessions, as long as all the planned topics had been covered by the end of the interview. Also, natural conversation produced during the interview was followed up to check that the respondents were not providing false information, for the sake of answering all the questions according to what they thought the interviewer might want to hear (Corbetta, 2003; Krale & Brinkmann, 2009). If respondents raised an interesting point themselves, the researcher would follow up by asking them to elaborate. However, throughout the interview sessions the researcher listened attentively so as to determine whether to ask further questions or

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to start another topic. Throughout the interview, the researcher took notes, while also recording the interviews electronically (audio recording) (Bui, 2014; Kalof et al., 2008).

The interviews were two-way communication events where the respondents had the opportunity to ask questions for clarity and better understanding of the questions or for further information. Questions based on the prepared topics that were covered were mostly “broad and flexible”, to enable the researcher to capture more information than the respondents offered themselves. Interviews therefore took the form of a conversation rather than asking a set of questions that the respondents were required to answer (Kalof et al., 2008:13).

Beside the positive aspects of the data collection, interviews were found to be very costly in terms of money and effort, and they were time consuming (Easton, 2010) as for the duration of the data collection, the researcher had to drive long distances to transport the respondents to and from the interview venue, which was the researcher’s office. The average time of an interview session was 40 minutes, with the longest interview taking one hour, i.e. in total the researcher spent more than 25 hours transporting and interviewing respondents. However, the interviews were valuable in that the respondents provided first-hand information on language and mobility, and the researcher was able to gain detailed descriptive and rich data. The interviews were recorded electronically, and notes were taken for comparison and verification against the information recorded on the questionnaires. Finally, the first five recordings were transcribed in order to process the interview data more easily; however, transcribing was found to be very time consuming and therefore the researcher decided to listen to the recordings repeatedly, and then summarise the remaining interview recordings instead of transcribing them.

Most interviews were conducted in English, but a small number of them were in the vernacular languages, Oshiwambo and Nyemba. I am fluent in Qshiwambo, therefore such interviews posed no problem; however, for the interviews conducted in Nyemba, I relied on other vendors for interpreting. Nyemba is a minority language of a Kavango community in the north east corridor of the country, for which there are no trained, professional interpreters. Finally, I gave a short training session to one vendor who I then used as an interpreter because the respondents clearly had

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important information to offer a sociolinguistic study – this could not be left untapped just because of language barriers which people in Katatura are accustomed to overcoming.

4.7 DATA ANALYSIS

Data analysis is “a process of presenting and systematically arranging information from informants in a narrative approach” (Armet, 2013:310). In other words, data analysis is a process of making sense or giving meaning to the data.

To organise the large data collected during the first phase of data collection through questionnaires, the thematic analysis method of coding was used. Coding was used in line with the work of Punch (2012:199), who states that coding involves sorting information into "chunks" before explaining and making the chunks meaningful. First information from the questionnaires was categorised and labelled. The latter stage was the first step to realise the objectives of the study. The data collected from the questionnaires were then summarised using a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to gain an impression of the demographics of the participating population, and of how varied the linguistic biographies and linguistic repertoires of recently arrived migrants are. It also provided an impression of gender distribution, age ranges, family backgrounds and levels of education. This information is likely to signal where linguistic and communicative barriers may be evident in the process of migrants gaining accommodation and employment.

Second, after the data from the questionnaires were summarised and categorised under different labels, and interviews were finalised, the interview recordings were transcribed verbatim. It was ensured that the transcription "represents the whole contribution from the interview, as far as possible including hesitations, pauses, laughs, sighs, coughs and so on" (Easton, 2000:208). The interviews were repeatedly listened to, line by line, to ensure that the transcribed information was correct and fully represents what was said by the interviewee (David & Sutton, 2004). Since the transcribing was extremely time consuming due to the length of the recordings, the researcher later decided to summarise the rest of the recording instead of transcribing verbatim. After the interviews were transcribed and summarised, the discourses were interpreted in terms of various themes from the

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research data, identifying how the topics of settling and employment are addressed and how the discourses of mobility in Windhoek are articulated. Braun and Clarke (2006:10) explain that "(A) theme captures something important about the data in relation to the research question and represents some levels of patterned response or meaning within the data set". The identified themes allowed the researcher to investigate particular themes that re-occur in most of the migrants' discourses (Berg & Lune, 2018), and to understand the effects of language on everyday discourses of mobility in Windhoek. The themes reported in chapter 6, in analysing and interpreting the interviews, are those that were found to recur in most interviews recordings. These themes were also influenced by the literature review on multilingualism, migration and linguistic repertoires.

From the beginning of data analysis, I used memos and fieldnotes, combined with coding (Punch, 2012). A memo can be a sentence or paragraph that a researcher writes down as soon as an idea about the codes and their relationships strikes while analysing the data (Lawrence & Tar, 2013). The memos were notes of vital points about the themes that the researcher thought of while categorising the data. The memos were made to help the researcher not to forget essential points thought of while coding; as the researcher thought of an idea, the researcher paused the coding and noted down the idea (Elliott, 2018). The memos were both theoretical and substantive.

The information collected via the questionnaires are presented in Chapter 5 under different emerging themes using figures and tables, where necessary, while the information from the interviews is presented under emerging themes in Chapter 6. Also, selected narratives from the interviews have been presented as case studies in Chapter 6 to provide detailed insight on how migrants narrated their trajectories to Windhoek, and their daily language-related struggles in their various survival attempts to integrate into the city. Information from the questionnaires and from the interviews is presented in different chapters (Chapter 5 and 6) because they are large sets of data that deal with different themes and therefore too extensive to be presented in a single chapter. After presenting the information from the questionnaires and interviews, I triangulate the information gained via the different instruments, and relate the major findings to the study objectives, as set out in

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chapter 1. Following this, I critically discuss the findings, relying also on insight from postcolonial theory.

4.8 RESEARCH ETHICS

Bui (2014) outlines the necessary procedures that the researcher must follow when conducting research that involves human respondents. The procedures include the need for a researcher to (1) explain the research purpose, objectives and methods to the respondents, (2) to protect respondents’ identity through anonymity, and (3) to keep research files and records secure where confidentiality is involved.

Taking Bui’s procedure into consideration, the aims, objectives and methods of the study were explained to the respondents, and all respondents were asked to provide their informed consent relating to (1) participation in the study, and (2) use of the data they provide. The consent form made it clear to the potential respondents that their participation in the study was voluntary and that they were free at any stage to withdraw from the study or request that all or parts of the information they offered be removed from the dataset. Further, the consent form also assured them that their participation in the study is completely confidential. Anonymity was assured by the researcher by keeping the raw data in a locked filing cabinet and a password- protected computer. No person was expected to participate against their will, nor was any payment offered in exchange for participation (see Appendix C for consent forms). To ensure that the respondents did no simply sign the consent forms without understanding the content, the researcher explained the consent forms, and for those who did not understand English, provision was made to explain the content in languages they did understand well.

Ethical clearance for the study was obtained from the Research and Ethics Committee of the University of Johannesburg.

All the sources used in the study were acknowledged. If the researcher would encounter any situation, which could need the intervention of a psychologist or social worker, the researcher made provision in advance to consult the psychologist at the Namibian Ministry of Gender and Child Welfare and colleagues from the psychological department. However, none of the circumstances that require the latter

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service were encountered during either phase of data collection. Information obtained from respondents was not used for personal gain, but was strictly used for academic purposes.

4.9 CONCLUSION

This chapter has, through various themes, explained the research design, the population and sample, the research instruments, data collection procedures, data analysis and ethical considerations relevant to this study. It has presented the methods that were used to collect and organise the data for the study, confirming that it requires a qualitative approach. Interviews and questionnaires were used to gather the data for the study. The data from the questionnaires were summarised in a Microsoft Excel sheet, and emerging themes were derived using the Microsoft Excel instruments. Large sections of the data from the interview were transcribed, but due to time constraints, some were summarised. Various themes that were derived from the transcribed and summarised data will be introduced in the following two chapters. A critical analysis of the data was informed by various sources discussed in Chapter 3, so that findings could be reviewed through the lens of postcolonial theory, as will be provided in Chapter 6 below.

The next chapter, Chapter 5, outlines the data that were obtained by means of the questionnaires.

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CHAPTER 5: DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS

5.1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter presents the data that were collected by means of the questionnaire, as introduced in Chapter 4. The questionnaires, which collected information on the linguistic profiles of respondents, were administered to 440 respondents from two migrant groups, namely Namibians who have migrated from other parts of the country to Windhoek, and foreign migrants from various other African countries. All the respondents form part of the migrant community operating in the informal sector of Windhoek.

The respondents’ profiles were drawn from the questionnaires to provide an impression of their identities in terms of gender, age, occupation, nationality, country of origin, languages and brief mobility history. As this data comes from a relatively large number of respondents, it could not provide a fine-grained representation or interpretation of histories of language acquisition or migration. Some respondents come from remote and destitute areas. Drawn from the biographies that the migrants themselves wrote up, this data can, however, provide insight into the features of a substantial cross-section of adult migrants living and working in Windhoek. Clearly, 440 respondents do not represent all recent newcomers to Windhoek. Therefore, the study does not claim to be statistically representative. This chapter presents the L1s and L2s, biographical information (gender, education and family), occupations, locations and migration trajectories of the respondents. The aim of providing this information is to show how varied the migrants in Windhoek are in terms of languages and migration trajectories, and also to identify those respondents whose information made them suitable for the interviews. The data for the respondents presented below will be provided according to two categories. First, data collected from Namibian respondents are presented, followed by data from foreign respondents recently relocated from other African countries.

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5.2 NAMIBIAN RESPONDENTS

The group identified as Namibian respondents included all respondents who indicated that they were of Namibian nationality, even if they were not born in Namibia. In Windhoek, there are many with Namibian citizenship who were born to Namibian parents in neighbouring countries such as Angola and Zambia, mostly during the liberation struggle. In total there were 377 Namibian migrants who participated in the study. Thus, this group constitutes the majority of the respondents.

5.2.1 Respondents’ places of origin, and associated L1s and L2s

Information about the place of birth of the recently migrated Namibian respondents was solicited to determine from which regions in the country they come from. As respondents provided the names of their home villages and towns in the questionnaire, the researcher could classify them according to the demarcated geographical and political regions of the country. The latter indicated the parts of the country from which the new inhabitants of the city have relocated from.

Often the region of origin was also an indication of tribal affiliation, and thus also of the specific Namibian language a person was likely to have as L1. Therefore, in this section, the researcher also presents data on the respondents’ L1s and L2s. The respondents did not only list the various languages they know, but also rated themselves on a five-point scale for the given language skills, to indicate how well they assessed their own knowledge of each language. Level 1 means excellent, and five means poor. Many respondents listed more than three languages as the ones they knew in terms of speaking, reading, writing and/or understanding. The mere listing was read as an indication that this was indeed part of a respondent’s repertoire, in that they could in one way or another recognise and sometimes also use it. However, in counting the languages represented as useful in the full set of respondents, only those who rated themselves between 1 and 3 were counted as “knowing” that specific language, because that would indicate they believe they knew it well enough to use it more often and meaningfully than those who rated themselves with a four and a five.

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(i) Oshiwambo as L1

Most respondents in the study were L1 speakers of Oshiwambo – 325 out of the 377 Namibian respondents. This primarily represents the situation on the ground, as it has already been indicated in Chapter 2 that Oshiwambo L1 speakers are the majority in Windhoek (see § 2.3). The Oshiwambo language is a local language originally from the Oshana, Oshikoto, Ohangwena and Omusati regions, where most of the respondents also come from. As shown in Table 5.1 below, Omusati, Oshana and Ohangwena are the regions with the highest number of migrants in Windhoek, which explains why Oshiwambo L1 speakers are the majority among the new migrants in Windhoek.

Table 5.1: Respondents’ regions of origin

Number of Number of Regions Regions respondents respondents Kunene 2 Erongo 6 Omusati 67 Otjozondjupa 7 Oshana 63 Omaheke 5 Ohangwena 124 Khomas 0 Oshikoto 71 Hardap 2 Kavango West 12 ǁKaras 4 Kavango East 10 Zambezi 4

As shown in Table 5.2 below, the Oshiwambo L1 respondents are rarely monolinguals. As Windhoek is home to the largest urban population in the country, this study is interested not only in how many language communities are represented in the city, but also which L2s the Oshiwambo L1 speakers have. The questionnaires indicated that 273 Oshiwambo L1 respondents know English as an L2. Those who know English learned it formally in schools. The majority of migrants indicated that they use English at their businesses to communicate with the customers who do not share any other language with them. Further, 78 Oshiwambo L1 migrants know Afrikaans, a language widely used in urban areas. These speakers also mentioned that they use Afrikaans to communicate with customers at their businesses.

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Table 5.2: First languages and second languages of Namibian migrants Total population English L2 Afrikaans L2 L2 Oshiwambo Otjiherero L2 Silozi L2 Rukwangari L2 Rukavango L2 Portuguese L2 L2 Khoekhoegowab Sifwe L2 L2 Subia L2 French Oshiwambo L1 325 273 78 87 8 1 Otjiherero L1 12 11 8 7 2 Khoekhoegowab L1 6 6 6 Silozi L1 5 5 1 5 5 Subia L1 1 1 1 1 Nyemba L1 4 2 1 1 1 4 4 Thimbukushu L1 1 1 1 1 Afrikaans L1 4 3 3 Himba L1 2 2 2 1 1 Sifwe L1 2 2 2 2 Rukwangari L1 12 8 3 12 Rukavango L1 1 1 1 1 Rumanyo L1 1 1 Otjithamba L1 1 1 1 1 1 Total 377 316 94 11 91 3 15 19 1 6 6 7 1

Additionally, Oshiwambo L1 respondents who indicated that they know Otjiherero as an L2 were more than those who knew Afrikaans. Although the study did not investigate the reasons why more of these respondents know Otjiherero than Afrikaans, one can assume that is mainly because the vocabularies of Otjiherero and Oshiwambo are almost similar, as they are all Bantu languages, making it relatively easy for Oshiwambo L1 speakers to learn. The only other indigenous Namibian language listed by this group of respondents was Rukwangari, of which there are eight L2 speakers. Two European languages were mentioned, namely French (one speaker) and Spanish (two speakers). Two South African languages also featured in this data set, namely Zulu (one speaker) and Xhosa (one speaker) – as is indicated in Table 5.3 below. The respondents reported that they learnt the latter languages from their friends and that they used these languages only to communicate with those few friends who knew it as their L1.

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Figure 5.1: Regions from which Namibian respondents of different L1s migrated

(ii) Otjiherero as L1

Otjiherero is a language mostly spoken in central Namibia. The respondents who listed Otjiherero as their L1 are from the Omaheke, Otjozondjupa and Kunene regions (see Figure 5.1). As shown in Table 5.3, this is the language with the second largest number of L1 respondents, even though it is a considerably lower number (12) than the Oshiwambo L1 respondents. Overall, the relation between Otjiherero L1 and Oshiwambo L1 speakers in Windhoek is not quite as uneven as in this study. The relatively small number could mean that many Otjiherero L1 speakers declined to participate in the study, or that the larger part of the Otjiherero living in Windhoek had been living there for longer (see Chapter 2, § 2.3 on the first occupants of Windhoek), and for that reason they were not eligible to participate in the study. Alternatively, in current migration, those from Otjiherero speaking regions have less reason to move to the city because Herero land, where most Otjiherero speaking

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people settle, is in the Otjozondjupa region, situated on commercial farms where the community’s farming activities are surrounded by various urban centres. As a result, there is more economic activity which may make the many inhabitants less willing to migrate to other parts of the country to search for economic opportunities. This is different to the situation of other language groups such as Oshiwambo that are traditionally from communal lands in rural areas where there are no economic activities. As shown in Table 5.3, the L2s that form part of the repertoires of the Otjiherero L1 speakers are English, Afrikaans, Oshiwambo, and Khoekhoegowab. English is listed as an L2 by 11 people, who had learned it formally at school. They indicated that they use it at their businesses to communicate with customers who do not speak Otjiherero. Seven people know Afrikaans as an L2. All of the latter group grew up in the regions where Afrikaans had been the language of the former South African government, as well as a strong language in education. As a result of the value of Afrikaans in employment and business, the local people learnt Afrikaans and still speak it. Furthermore, seven people indicated that they know Oshiwambo, having learned it informally at their businesses and from people in the streets of Windhoek. Otjiherero L1 speakers generally find Oshiwambo easy to learn because both Otjiherero and Oshiwambo are Bantu languages. Oshiwambo L1 speakers are the majority in Windhoek and there is a possibility of constant daily encounters with Oshiwambo L1 speakers on many occasions. Two of the Otjiherero L1 speakers indicated knowledge of Khoekhoegowab, which is a minority language with few L1 speakers in Windhoek. Both Otjiherero L1 speakers learned Khoekhoegowab L2 informally before they relocated to Windhoek; one respondent learned it from his stepfather at the age of 12 at their home in Okakarara in the Omaheke region, while the other migrant learned it informally from his friends in the streets at the age of 15 in Grootfontein in the Otjozondjupa region. There are many languages spoken in Grootfontein. Grootfontein is not affiliated to a particular ethnic language group because it is a small urban centre that is mostly occupied by migrants of different L1s. Okakarara is a settlement where Otjiherero L1 speakers live.

(iii) Rukwangari, Rukavango, Nyemba, Thimbukushu and Rumanyo as L1s

Rukwangari, Rukavango, Nyemba, Thimbukushu and Rumanyo are local languages spoken in both Kavango East and Kavango West regions. Although the respondents

78 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION declared the latter languages separately as their L1s in the study, they will be discussed together because there are many studies (cf. Lusakalalu, 2007; Brock- Utne, 1997) that state that Nyemba, Thimbukushu, Rumanyo and Rukwangari are different varieties of the same language, Rukavango. However, since this study aimed to present the respondents’ voices without judging or correcting them, the researcher has presented these languages separately in the tables (see tables 5.2 and 5.3), mainly to provide the languages as respondents themselves identified them.

Although Otjiherero was identified above as the language with the second highest number of L1 respondents in this study, considering the varieties of the home communities in the far northeast of the country, i.e. the languages of the Kavango West and East region collectively referred to as Rukavango, this language group (Rukavango) is large. When all the respondents of the Rukwangari, Rukavango, Thimbukushu and Nyemba are combined, 20 respondents from this migrant group participated. Moreover, even if not statistically measured, Rukavango – when all the language varieties are combined – is the second largest L1 language spoken in Windhoek. The Rukavango, Nyemba, Thimbukushu, Rumanyo and Rukwangari L1 speakers have L2s, as shown in Table 5.2. As shown in Table 5.3, the L1 speakers of Rukwangari have three L2s: the English language is the most known L2, known by eight people, which they learned formally in schools, and they use it mostly at their businesses to communicate with customers. Oshiwambo L2 is also known by Rukwangari L1 speakers, who mainly learned it at their businesses from their customers, and they use it to communicate with their customers at their businesses. Also, all the L1 speakers of Rukwangari know Rukavango, which they learned at a very young age. The only respondent whose L1 was Rukavango has three L2s, which are English, which was learned at school, Afrikaans, which was acquired informally from the street, as well as Rukwangari, which the respondent acquired from the streets at an early age. The latter respondent claimed that he uses both languages, English and Afrikaans, at his business and Rukwangari everywhere. The four L1 speakers of Nyemba have five L2s in their repertoires, which are English, which is only known by two people; Rukwangari and Rukavango are known by all four respondents, while Afrikaans, Oshiwambo and Otjiherero are all known by one person each. The L1 speaker of Thimbukushu knows English as an L2, which he

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learned in school; and Rukwangari and Rukavango which he learned at a young age. Also, the only L1 speaker of Rumanyo only knows Rukavango as the only L2. What can be observed from the repertoires of the L1 speakers of Rukwangari, Rumanyo, Rukavango and Nyemba is the fact that they all said they know Rukavango well. The latter confirmed the fact that the four languages are varieties of the Rukavango language. The aim of this study was not to confirm the variety of the Rukavango language; however, the fact came out clearly. The only respondent whose L1 was Thimbukushu has English, Rukwangari, and Rukavango as his L2s.

(iv) Khoekhoegowab as L1

Khoekhoegowab is a language spoken in many regions in the central parts of Namibia. However, the six migrant L1 speakers of Khoekhoegowab were from the //Karas, Erongo and Hardap regions (see Figure 5.1). There are many urban centres in those regions; as a result, people may not need to travel to Windhoek for employment, as most of them are already living in smaller urban centres where they could find employment. Interestingly, all six Khoekhoegowab L1 respondents know English and Afrikaans as their L2s only. The language repertoires of these respondents show a close connection to the repertoires of the Afrikaans L1 group. The Khoekhoegowab language belongs to the Khoisan language family, which could be the reason why these respondents cannot speak some of the languages mostly found in the informal sector of Windhoek, such as Oshiwambo, Rukavango, Otjiherero, etc., because those languages belong to the Bantu language family. There is a major difference in the vocabulary of the Bantu and Khoisan language families.

(v) Afrikaans as L1

The four L1 Afrikaans respondents come from the same region as those who gave Khoekhoegowab as L1, namely from the //Karas and Hardap regions. Three of these L1 Afrikaans speakers know Khoekhoegowab and English as their L2s. The fourth respondent indicated minimal knowledge of English as his L2.

Notably, two of the respondents who indicated that their L1 was Afrikaans have parents who are Khoekhoegowab L1 speakers, which could indicate that they learnt their L2 at a very early age as an L1. However, it is not unusual for children with

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more than one family language to feel that their parents’ L2s are their L1s (Halliday, 1993). These respondents grew up speaking Afrikaans more than Khoekhoegowab because Afrikaans was a dominant community language in their home regions. Also, Khoekhoegowab is not offered as a medium of instruction in schools.

(vi) Silozi, Sifwe and Subia as L1s

These three languages are different, but they are all community languages of the Zambezi region (see Figure 5.1). Overall the number of respondents from this region were relatively low. The Zambezi region is situated in the northeast corridor of Namibia, on the northern side of the red line (communal land) where development is still low because the pre-independence government concentrated on developing the regions that are on the southern side of the red line and the central regions (see Chapter 2, § 2.3). Therefore, it is likely that many people from that region will migrate to better their life chances in the city. The Zambezi region is further away from Windhoek than it is from Zambia. The short distance to Lusaka could then be one of the reasons why people migrate less to Windhoek. As shown in Table 5.3, there are five Silozi L1 respondents, two Sifwe L1 respondents, and only one Subia L1 respondent.

All five L1 speakers of Silozi knew English as an L2, which they learned at school. They are using it everywhere in Windhoek. Similarly, all these speakers report knowing Subia well as it is also a community language of their home region. Only one Silozi L1 respondent also knows Afrikaans, which she learned in the streets and uses only to communicate with her Afrikaans-speaking friends. Furthermore, all the Silozi L1 speakers know both Sifwe and Subia, which they learned from their friends who are L1 speakers of the two languages.

Both the Sifwe L1 speakers know English as an L2, which they learned formally at school. They also know Subia and Silozi as L2s, which they learned informally from their friends in their home region prior to their relocation to Windhoek. In Windhoek, they use Subia and Silozi to communicate with friends.

The only respondent who is a speaker of L1 Subia knows English as his L2, which he learned at school and uses everywhere in Windhoek. The Subia L1 speaker also knows Silozi and Sifwe, which he learned from people in the Zambezi region, and he

81 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION occasionally uses the two languages in Windhoek when speaking to those who know the languages. Notably, all the respondents from the Zambezi region know and learned all three regional languages (Subia, Sifwe and Silozi) before they relocated to Windhoek. The respondent from the Zambezi region does not know other Namibian indigenous languages, which is not surprising because the Zambezi region is geographically far removed from the rest of the regions in Namibia (see the location of the Zambezi region in Figure 5.1).

(vii) Himba and Otjithamba as L1s

Himba is spoken as a community language by the Ovahimba people in the Kunene region (see Figure 5.1). The study only recorded two Himba-speaking respondents. Ovahimba are strongly attached to their culture, often still wearing animal skins, and living a nomadic life (cf. Bollig, 1997 on the lifestyle of Ovahimba). Therefore, it is not surprising that this study recorded few new Ovahimba migrants because of their lifestyle. Even Census 2011 recorded a relatively low number of Ovahimba people who were already settled in Windhoek (see Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012). As shown in Table 5.3, both Ovahimba respondents speak English as an L2, which they learned at school. They use English as a lingua franca with those they do not share any other language with. Also, two Ovahimba respondents indicated that they know Otjiherero as their L2s, which they learned from friends informally in the streets in Windhoek. One Ovahimba respondent also knows Portuguese as an L2, and the other indicated having useful knowledge of Khoekhoegowab. Each learned the latter languages (Portuguese and Khoekhoegowab) from their friends in different towns before they moved to Windhoek.

Otjithamba is a language spoken in the Omusati region towards its border with the Kunene region (see Figure 5.1). The Otjithamba-speaking people also follow a nomadic lifestyle, just like the Ovahimba-speaking people. As shown in Table 5.3, the only Otjithamba L1 respondent speaks English as an L2, which she learned at school, and she uses it everywhere in Windhoek. Also, the Otjithamba respondent has Otjiherero as an L2, which she learned in her region of origin before she relocated to Windhoek (see L2s of respondents in Table 5.3).

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5.2.2 The gender and age of Namibian respondents

As outlined in Table 5.4 below, 191 of the total of 377 Namibian migrants in the informal sector who were surveyed are females and 186 are males. Thus, the study engaged slightly more females than males; however, the difference is so small that it is possible to claim an even distribution of the study population in terms of gender. Earlier studies on migrants had considered gender representation in migration, pointing out that often the migrant population has more men than women (cf. Ionesco, Mokhnacheva & Gemenne, 2016.) Although this study did not focus on the gender representation of respondents, it was interesting to note that many single women moved to Windhoek in search of improved life chances.

Regarding age, as shown in Table 5.4 below, none of the respondents were under the age of 10 when they came to Windhoek as people under the age of 10 are still minors attending school. There is an interesting age-gender distribution in the study’s population as 15 of the respondents are under the age of 20, of which eight were females and seven males. The respondents under the age of 30 are 66 females, while there are 44 male respondents (see Table 5.4). The number of new female migrants is far more than the number of male respondents.

The total number of respondents under the age of 40 for both genders is 138, of which 62 are females and 76 are males. The fact that the majority of new migrants fall in the age group of 40 years is an indication that most people who migrate to the city to venture into new businesses are younger people. People of the latter age group just completed their schooling and look for different survival opportunities, especially in urban areas such as Windhoek. The number of respondents under the age of 50 is 89, of which 40 are female and 49 are male. Only 25 respondents were aged 50 years and above, of which 15 are female and 10 are male. The latter is not surprising as most in that age group are seniors who are already settled in terms of employment and survival means, while some are already retired from their jobs (see Table 5.4 for gender and age distributions).

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Table 5.3: Gender and age of Namibian migrants per L1 Under 20 Under 30 Under 40 Under 50 50+ L1S Population Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male Oshiwambo L1 325 5 6 57 33 53 65 35 47 15 9 Otiherero L1 12 3 1 1 3 1 2 1 Khoekhoegowab L 6 1 4 1 Silozi L1 5 1 1 1 1 1 Subia L1 1 1 Nyemba L1 4 1 1 2 Thimbukushu L1 1 1 Afrikaans L1 4 1 3 1 Dhimba L1 2 1 1 Sifwe L1 2 1 1 Rukwangari L1 12 5 1 5 1 Rukavango L1 1 1 Rumanyo L1 1 1 Otjithamba L1 1 1 Total 377 8 7 66 44 62 76 40 49 15 10

Total females 191 Total Males 186

5.2.3 Geographic location of migrants and their employment

As depicted on the map (Figure 5.2 below), migrants are primarily concentrated on the outskirts of Katutura; only a few migrants who participated in this study live in central Katutura in areas such as Wanaheda, Wambo location, Damara location and Soweto, which is Katutura proper (formal settlement). This information indicates that most of the migrants who were respondents in this study are accommodated in shacks. Importantly, although the respondents mostly live across the various informal settlements, there is little indication that migrants' accommodation is decided by the language or tribal associations related to their places of origin.

As shown by the map below (Figure 5.2), most of the new Namibian migrants live in Katutura. Out of the 325 Oshiwambo L1, only five people live in town suburbs (Rocky Crest, Khomasdal, Windhoek North and Dorado); everyone else lives in informal settlements in Katutura and Otjomuise. Although Otjomuise is not part of Katutura, part of Otjomuise is an informal settlement made up of shacks, just like the shacks in the informal settlements of Havana, Hakahana, Okuryangava and Goreagab and so forth, which are collectively known as Katutura. Some migrants live in Katutura’s formal areas such as those who stay in Donkerhoek, Freedom Land, Katutura Central, Soweto, Damara location, Wanaheda and Wambo location). In

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Katutura formal townships there is proper sanitation, housing and clean water, but there are shacks attached to some houses. As shown in Figure 5.2, the Oshiwambo L1 speakers are scattered all over Katutura, especially in the informal settlements such as Okuryangava, Oshitenda, Eehambodhanehale, Greenwell, Hakahana, Mukwanagombe, Havana, Kilimanjaro, Goreagab, Okahandja Park, Ombili and One Nation.

Informal settlements have no proper housing. People live in shacks made of corrugated iron and/or plastic sheeting. There are only a few toilets that are shared by the whole community, and water for households comes from community taps accessed through pre-paid cards. Most of these informal settlements were formed by migrants occupying the land illegally as they could not afford houses in formal townships and suburbs. Many of the informal settlements are given names of the villages where the migrants originally come from. The names are in the vernacular languages of the migrants and most informal settlements’ names are in Oshiwambo, for instance, Oshitenda (which means “metal”) and Eehambodhanehale (which means “the farm of Nehale”. Nehale was one of the first Oshiwambo kings in Owamboland. Other Oshiwambo settlement names are Mukwanangombe (the name of an Oshiwambo clan meaning “those who own cattle” and Omibili (meaning “peace”). Although it was not investigated in the study, the fact that most of the informal settlements have Oshiwambo names confirms what previous studies discovered, namely that the majority of the people in Katutura are Oshiwambo L1 speakers.

Regarding the distribution of the various L1 groups in Windhoek, as shown in Figure 5.2, most of the Otjiherero L1 speakers live in Katutura and only three Otjiherero L1 respondents live in Otjomuise. Only one Otjiherero respondent lives in Rocky Crest, which is a town suburb. Also, just like Oshiwambo L1 respondents, most of the Otjiherero L1 speakers live in the informal settlements of Katatura, in areas such as Greenwell, Havana, and Okuryangava.

All the Khoekhoegowab L1 respondents live in Katutura in locations such as Havana, Damara 7, Otjomuise and Gemeende. The Afrikaans L1 speakers also live in Katutura, in areas such as Okuryangava, Ben Appotus (formerly a Damara location) and Soweto. Only one of the respondents whose L1 is Afrikaans lives in

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Rocky Crest. The Dhimba L1 respondents live in Katutura informal settlements, specifically in Goreagab and Okuryangava. Furthermore, all the respondents from the Kavango East and West regions, i.e. Thimbukushu, Nyemba, Rukavango, Rukwangari and Rumanyo, live in Katutura in Freedom Land, Okuryangava, Hakahana, Okahandja Park, Goreagab, Havana, Omugulugombashe and Oshitenda. Only one Rukwangari respondent lives in Windhoek West, which is a town suburb. Also, one Nyemba L1 respondent and the Rumanyo L1 respondent live in Otjomuise informal settlement.

Regarding the L1 speakers of Sifwe, Silozi and Subia, the languages from the Zambezi region: All the Sifwe respondents live in Okahandja Park informal settlement. Most of the Silozi speakers live in Okuryangava, Greenwell, Oshitenda and Ombili. However, one Silozi L1 speaker lives in Otjomuise, and another one lives in Rocky Crest (see Figure 5.2).

Figure 5.2: Location of Namibian migrants in Windhoek

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When it comes to the occupations of the migrants, as shown in Table 5.4 below, a total of 25 different occupations emerged from what the Namibian respondents indicated as their occupations. Each dot on the map shown in Figure 5.2 represents one respondent. The majority of respondents are street vendors (189 respondents). Although the study did not set out to investigate why many migrants end up as street vendors, it is not surprising as it is easy for anyone to sell their goods on the street since there is no need for special permission to make a living in this way. The only requirement is some start-up capital for buying the goods to sell on the streets to passers-by.

Interestingly, among the L1 speakers of Mbukushu, Rumanyo, Sifwe, Silozi and Subia there are no street vendors. Although there are relatively small numbers of respondents from these language groups, they are from the geographical regions in the far northeast, the Kavango East and West as well as the Zambezi regions. The fact that among many questionnaires, which were distributed to the vendors randomly in the streets, none of the vendors come from the previous regions, requires further investigation (Table 5.4).

As shown in Table 5.4, the second most widely represented occupation is that of the domestic worker, of which most were Oshiwambo L1 speakers. The latter is quite obvious as most of the respondents are Oshiwambo L1 speakers. Domestic workers are in demand as many established households require such assistance. This occupation often includes looking after the children while both parents are at work. For migrants, this is an attractive option, as one does not need any educational qualification to be employed in such a position.

The third occupation of a sizeable number of respondents, as indicated in Table 5.4, is a waiter/waitress in the hospitality industry. This, again, makes sense because Windhoek has a lively tourist industry in which many restaurants need such services, and on the other hand in informal settlements home cooking is minimal due to a lack of facilities. Therefore, many shack dwellers buy basic meals from eateries along the roadside. Most of the restaurants where the waiter/waitress respondents are employed are based in Katutura next to a concentration of street vendors and/or next to a bus stop. These restaurants do not have formal structures, are not registered with the municipal authorities, are accommodated in temporary structures made of

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corrugated iron, and mainly serve the people who run informal businesses in the same area.

Also depicted in Table 5.4, the fourth occupation of the respondents is that of the security guards, which also makes sense, because where there are many people and high levels of poverty, criminal activities are likely to occur. The need to employ security guards is thus high. As in the other occupations, the security industry does not require a high level of education, as long as the guard can speak English – the official language – and can read and write, they are qualified to be a security guard.

Apart from the four occupations explained above, there is a variety of different occupations mentioned by respondents, as shown in Table 5.4 below. The remaining occupations attracted various numbers of new migrants, such as non-certified welders, assistants in tyre shops, painters, non-certified plumbers, garage mechanics, bus drivers, bartenders and tailors. Regarding welding, fitting car tyres, working as garage mechanics and plumbers, these are occupations that mostly form part of the formal sector and require certification, but those who were recorded doing such jobs in Katutura were not certified and they acquired the skills by themselves without formal instruction. The self-taught artisans are relatively few and extend the same services to the informal sector. However, these occupations are not widely represented among migrants. Also, painting buildings is usually part of the services offered in the construction industry, and therefore the number of respondents who are painters and not employed in the construction industry is low.

Most of the respondents, apart from the security guards, cleaners, construction workers, domestic workers and taxi drivers, are self-employed, working with minimal resources, but maintaining themselves and their families by providing services within the informal settlements – thus also saving transport costs. These include selling groceries and other essential household goods from a home shop or grocery store/open stand (thus they buy in bulk, and sell at a small profit), and barbers or hairdressers in local barber shops or salons. Car wash enterprises, restaurants, salons, daycare centres, garages, and welding and tyre shops, etc. are located in the informal settlements where people live. Although various languages are used, Oshiwambo and English are the main languages that are widely used in the course

89 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION of income-generating activities among these groups of people in the informal sector, mostly located in Katutura and Otjomuise (see Table 5.4 below).

Table 5.4: Occupations of Namibian respondents Oshiwambo Otjiherero Khoekhoegowab Afrikaans Dhimba Thimbukushu Nyemba Rukavango Otjithamba Rukwangari Rumanyo Sifwe Silozi Subia Total Street Vendor 168 4 1 1 2 3 1 1 8 Domestic workers 37 1 1 Waiter/waitress 27 3 1 1 2 Construction 9 1 1 Security guard 13 1 1 1 Salon 8 2 1 1 Grocery stores 12 1 1 Barber 12 Hair dresser 5 Taxi driver 5 1 1 1 1 1 Cleaner 8 1 1 Car was 4 Home shop 5 1 1 1 Day care 2 Printing shop 3 Tailor 1 Bar tender 1 Bus driver 1 Garage 1 Non-certified plumber 1 painter 0 1 Tyre shop 1 Non-certified welder 1 Total 377

5.2.4 Education

Among the Namibian respondents, only one respondent does not have any basic education. This is an indication that primary education is taken seriously in Namibia. The government constitutionally enforces compulsory basic education for all children in the country. The single respondent who does not have primary education is a 64- year-old man who can speak Afrikaans, but not English. He is an adult who was

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supposed to be in primary school before independence, but due to the governmental negligence at the time, the war between 1970 and 1990, and poverty in rural Namibia where he grew up, he was not basically educated. However, he worked on commercial farms that were mostly owned by Afrikaans L1 speakers, and that is why he can speak Afrikaans but not English. He is only one of the many people of his age, i.e. over 60 years old, in rural areas of Namibia who have never attended school.

Regarding secondary education, only two respondents indicated that they had not had any secondary education. One is the 64-year old man mentioned earlier, and the other a 19-year old male respondent. Again, the latter figure indicates that education is taken seriously in Namibia.

When it comes to education or training after school, 294 of the Namibian respondents did not receive any training after school. One cannot read too much into this figure, as this study included only respondents who did not have tertiary qualifications. However, 83 of the respondents received some after-school training. The types of training these people received were mostly courses that run for less than a year in practical occupational areas such as sewing, hairdressing, first aid, bricklaying, etc. These are not university qualifications, the training duration is shorter than those of university degrees, and it is often offered as in-service training.

5.2.5 Migratory trajectory

From the data obtained on the trajectory of migrants, it can be concluded that there are two trends of migration among the Namibian respondents. The first trend was identified as early migration, which involves mostly children and teenagers. This trend is where school-going children were moved from one village or administrative region to another, to be raised by one parent or by other relatives. Since this trend involves school-going children, this means they also changed schools to continue their education somewhere else. Early migration as a trend, detected in this study, mostly took place in rural areas and not from or to larger towns or urban centres. Most of those who indicated being relocated during their earlier years only migrated to other rural areas. Such reported early migration involves mostly respondents from

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the rural areas of Omusati, Oshana and Ohangwena, all of which are regions representing one language only, namely Oshiwambo.

The second trend of migration is after-school migration, which involves adults, and mostly occurs after they have completed Grade 10 or 12. This trend involves the movement of people from their home villages or towns to nearby urban centres or villages, mainly for work. The people who are part of this trend usually mentioned this as their first attempt at finding a job, and in case they did not manage to secure the type of job they desired, they would continue to the next urban centre, until eventually they found themselves in Windhoek. For example, a respondent who started working in Ondangwa town first moved to Walvis Bay, but she now lives in Windhoek. When it comes to migration after having left school, there are also those adults who migrate directly to Windhoek without settling in nearby towns first.

The Namibian respondents had mostly been part of internal migration, i.e. migrating from rural to urban locations inside the country. A few Namibian respondents (less than ten people) had been outside the country, seeking work and spending time in countries such as Nigeria, Angola and South Africa. Some of the details of these trajectories will be elaborated on in the discussion of narratives collected in interviews in Chapter 6.

5.2.6 Family and personal relations

The respondents in this study were asked to provide information about their marital status, whether they stay with their families, and which language(s) they speak at home. A total number of 55 Namibian respondents indicated that they are married. Out of the married respondents, six were not living as a complete family because they left their wives and/or children in their villages or hometowns. However, they send their earnings back to their villages to feed their family members who remain there. All of the married respondents indicated that they used their L1s in their homes, except one respondent who indicated that she spoke both her L1, Oshiwambo, and her L2, Subia, at home.

Two of the Namibian respondents are widows who stay with their children. They are Oshiwambo L1 speakers, who indicated that they speak Oshiwambo in their homes.

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Only one respondent indicated that she is divorced and that she did not stay with her children in Windhoek.

A majority of 322 respondents indicated that they are single. Fourteen of the 322 single respondents are living with their children. All 14 respondents are Oshiwambo L1 speakers who also use their L1 at home. However, only one indicated they speak both Oshiwambo and English at home. The majority of the respondents who are single indicated that they do not stay with their children and speak their L1 in their homes. Furthermore, 42 of the respondents who are single indicated that they stay with their relatives (siblings and/or parents), and only one respondent stays with their employer as she is a domestic worker. It was also found that almost half of the respondents who claimed to be single were cohabiting; however, cohabiting is not recognised as marriage and thus they were classified as single for the purposes of this study.

5.3 RESPONDENTS OF NON-NAMIBIAN ORIGIN

The following section presented the findings of the foreign respondents who were found operating in the informal industry of Windhoek. In total, the study recorded 63 respondents from other African countries, namely from Angola, Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ethiopia.

5.3.1 Respondents’ places of origin, and associated L1s and L2s

As shown in Figure 5.3, the foreign migrants who participated in the study are mainly from four African countries, namely Angola, Zimbabwe, the DRC and Ethiopia. Most of the foreign migrants are from Angola (39 respondents), followed by Zimbabwe with 16 respondents, then the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) with seven respondents and only one respondent from Ethiopia. However, Angola being the country where most foreign respondents come from, does not necessarily reflect that the majority of the foreign population in Windhoek are Angolan or that these (Angola, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and the DRC) are the only countries with foreign migrants operating in the informal sector of Windhoek. Other countries may have more, but the numbers and the countries that are provided are only those of people who participated in the study because they met the inclusion criteria, which included not

93 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION being in Windhoek for more than two years and not having any university qualifications.

FOREIGN RESPONDENTS 45 40

35 30 25 20 15

TOTAL POPULATION 10 5 0 Angola Zimbabwe DRC Ethiopia COUNTRIES

Figure 5.3: Total number of foreign respondents

(i) The L1s of the migrant respondents from Angola

Table 5.5: The L1s of foreign respondents

L1 Total Countries L2 French L2 English Population No English L2 Kimbundu L2 Portuguese L2 Rukwangari L2 Oshiwambo Angola 39 Kimbundu 13 6 2 6 2 Oshiwambo 19 6 10 6 1 Portuguese 6 4 2 2 5 Tjokwe 1 1 Zimbabwe 16 Shona 13 13 Ndebele 2 2 Shona & 1 1 Ndebele DRC 7 Kasayi 2 1 1 2 Kibembe 1 1 Swahili 4 3 7 Ethiopia 1 Amharic 1 1

Most of the Angolan respondents’ level of multilingualism is limited to three languages, although there were also some Angolans who are monolingual. A total of

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13 Angolan respondents have Kimbundu as their L1, and they display varying degrees of multilingualism. Only six Angolan Kimbundu respondents know English well to use it; the rest only know a few words; thus, they did not use it. All the Kimbundu L1 speakers who know English indicated that they learned it informally from their friends or customers, and they mainly use English to communicate with customers, and some continue to use it at home with their school-going children. Also, three of the Kimbundu Angolan respondents do not know a word of English. Thus, they are indicated as having no English at all. The latter groups of Kimbundu respondents, except the one who knows Oshiwambo, find it difficult to communicate during their daily business activities because of the lack of English, Oshiwambo and Afrikaans, which are the dominant languages in the informal sector in Katutura where they are based. Apart from English, only five Kimbundu L1 speakers know Portuguese as an L2, which they learned in Angola from their family members. In Windhoek, they use Portuguese to communicate with other Angolans; also, the two respondents who know Oshiwambo as an L2, learned it informally from their friends and use it to communicate to their customers and friends. Furthermore, as shown in Table 5.7, a total of six respondents are Portuguese L1 speakers who display different levels of multilingualism. Four Portuguese respondents state they know English at L1 level, having learned it informally from their customers at their businesses, and that is also where they use it. Also, two Portuguese L1 speakers did not know any word of English at all. Thus, they were indicated as not having knowledge of English at all.

As shown in Table 5.5, most Angolan respondents are speakers of Oshiwambo as an L1. Oshiwambo is mostly spoken in Namibia in the northern region, but it is also spoken in Angola in the villages and towns that are along the borders between Angola and Namibia. As shown in Table 5.7, 19 Angolan respondents are Oshiwambo L1 speakers, and only five of the Oshiwambo L1 speakers rated themselves as knowing English well enough to use it in conversation, which they acquired informally from other refugees at Osire Refugee Camp before they arrived in Windhoek. Interestingly, ten L1 speakers of Oshiwambo do not know English at all. The latter is mainly because English is not a widely spoken language in Angola, nor is it taught in Angolan schools. Portuguese is a language widely spoken in Angola, but only six Oshiwambo L1 respondents rated themselves as knowing it well

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enough to converse in it, which is not surprising as the migrants explained that in the area near the Namibian borders, where they were from, Portuguese is not widely used or known. As a result, they do not know it because people mostly communicate in Oshiwambo. The Angolan Oshiwambo L1 speakers have a limited level of multilingualism (see Table 5.6). However, they do not struggle with communication in their daily activities as Oshiwambo is one of the languages that is mostly used in the informal sector of Windhoek (see Table 5.5).

Furthermore, two Portuguese L1 respondents know Rukwangari, which they learned in Angola from their friends because Angola is bordered by Kavango East region on one side of Namibia, where Rukwangari is mainly spoken. Therefore, it is possible for some Namibian Rukwangari people who live along the Namibia-Angola border to come in contact with the Angolan people who also live along the borders. Interestingly, five out of six Portuguese L1 speakers know Kimbundu as their L2. Most parents of the L1 speakers of Portuguese are Kimbundu L1 speakers, which the researcher has established after interrogating them further for clarity of their responses in their questionnaires. The latter group of respondents feel that they are Portuguese L1 speakers because that is the language they learned first, and they knew it well because their parents raised them speaking Portuguese even when they were Kimbundu L1 speakers. Since this study aimed to represent the migrants’ voices without judging them, they were presented as Portuguese L1 speakers because that is what they believe they are and that was what they indicated in their questionnaires (see Table 5.5).

Also, as indicated in Table 5.5, only one respondent indicated that she is an L1 speaker of Tjokwe. However, she is a monolingual. Therefore, Kimbundu, Portuguese and Tjokwe are some of the languages from Angola that are actively used in the informal sector of Windhoek since the respondents indicated that they use these languages to communicate to other Angolan customers and/or Namibian customers as well as other vendors who know these languages.

(ii) The L1 of the migrant respondents from Zimbabwe

Furthermore, as shown in Table 5.5, 13 Zimbabwean respondents speak Shona as an L1, followed by two respondents who are L1 speakers of Ndebele, and only one

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respondent who speaks both Ndebele and Shona as L1. These statistics are not sufficiently representative to claim that there are more Shona L1 migrants than the Ndebele L1 migrants in Windhoek. However, the questionnaires were distributed randomly at the market where informal trading takes place, and the majority happened to be Shona speakers, with only a few Ndebele speakers. Also, only one Zimbabwean respondent is believed to have two L1s, which are Shona and Ndebele, because one of his parents is/was Shona while the other parent is/was Ndebele, and she grew up in the house where both languages were used equally. Interestingly, all the Zimbabwean respondents, despite their L1, rated themselves as knowing English well enough to converse in it, which they all learned formally in schools and they continue to use it everywhere in Windhoek. The level of multilingualism of the Zimbabwean respondents is similar as 11 of the respondents know two languages, which are their L1s and English. Only one Shona respondent has two L2s, Ndebele and English. Also, only one male respondent has more than three L2s, which are Tswana, English, and Ndebele. Although a few listed some Namibian languages as part of their repertoires, they do not know them well enough to use them. Thus, they were not counted as L2s. Interestingly, apart from two Shona L1 respondents, most of the Shona L1 respondents do not know Ndebele and vice versa. Shona and Ndebele are the only Zimbabwean indigenous languages recorded in the study, as represented in the informal industry of Windhoek.

(iii) The L1s of the migrant respondents from the Democratic Republic of the Congo

As recorded in Table 5.5, a total number of seven (7) Congolese migrants participated in the study. A fairly large number of DRC respondents were left out of the study because of the number of years they have been living in Windhoek exceeded what the study required. Most respondents have Swahili as an L1 (four respondents). Only three respondents of the Swahili L1 speakers know English well enough to use it in conversation, of which two of them learned it in the DRC, while the other two learned it at Osire Refugee Camp before they came to Windhoek. All the respondents indicated that they use English to communicate with customers during their daily business activities. Furthermore, the Swahili L1 migrants do not know any other Namibian language or other Congolese indigenous languages;

97 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION however, all four respondents know French, which they learned formally at school in the DRC, and they use it with other Congolese people in Windhoek. Furthermore, two of the Congolese migrants indicated that Kasayi is their L1; however, only one of the Kasayi L1 respondents knows English, which she learned informally from customers. The latter respondent also knew Swahili and Chilumba, which she learned before she relocated to Windhoek. Both Kasayi respondents know French as their L2, which they learned formally at school before their relocation to Windhoek. Despite English being a language widely spoken in Namibia, specifically in Windhoek, one of the Kasayi L1 speakers did not know English at all. As a result, she had communication barriers with the customers in Windhoek. Also, only one (1) respondent from the DRC indicated that his L1 language is Kibembe. The last respondent knows Swahili and French as his L2s, which he learned informally from his friends in the DRC. Therefore, from the finding, it can be concluded that four (4) indigenous languages from the DRC, namely Kasayi, Kibembe, Swahili and Chilumba, are present in the informal trading of Windhoek as the respondents mentioned that they use those languages to communicate with other traders and/or customers from the DRC who know the language. Apart from the DRC indigenous languages present in the informal sector of Windhoek, French is another language that is present in the informal sector of Windhoek. The Congolese migrants' level of multilingualism varies; however, their repertoires are mostly made up of French, which is known by all the respondents and some indigenous languages such as Kasayi, Swahili, Kibembe and Chilumba, which are known at different levels.

(iv) The L1s of the migrant respondents from Ethiopia

One foreign migrant was recorded from Ethiopia, whose level of multilingualism is limited as he only knows two languages. His L1 is Amharic, and the only L2 he knows is English, which he learned formally at school in Ethiopia before he relocated to Windhoek. He explained that he uses Amharic in Windhoek with the other migrants from Ethiopia. Therefore, Amharic is another indigenous African language from Ethiopia that found its way to Windhoek through human mobility (see Table 5.5).

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5.3.2 Gender and age of the respondents

Table 5.6: The gender and age distribution of foreign respondents

The respondents were also asked to indicate their gender and age. As shown in Table 5.6 above, most Angolan respondents were males (22 respondents), and only 17 people were females. Twenty-seven Angolan respondents were under the age of 30, five were under 20 years and another five under 40 years. Also, one respondent was under the age of 50 years and one was older than 50 years. It is not surprising that most Angolan migrants were between the ages of 20 and 29 because their education level (see Table 5.8 below) shows that most of them did not go up to secondary education, which explains why they found themselves in Windhoek at an age where they were supposed to attend school or just complete school and work out what to do next.

Furthermore, as shown in Table 5.6, Zimbabwe had more male respondents (14 respondents) and only two females. Most of the Zimbabwean respondents (five in total) were under the age of 40, followed by three respondents under the age of 50, four under the age of 30, and only one under the age of 20. The Zimbabwean migrants are somewhat different from the Angolan respondents when it comes to age because the majority of respondents were mostly between the ages of 30 and 39 years old. The latter is an indication that the Zimbabwean migrants migrate after they complete secondary school, which confirms that most Zimbabweans completed secondary education (see Table 5.8 below).

When it comes to Congolese migrants, as depicted in Table 5.7, most of them were female (four respondents), and only three migrants were male. Although the number

99 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION of males and females differ by only one respondent, it is worth mentioning that the DRC was the only country with most female respondents, when it comes to the gender distribution of foreign countries. Most of the Congolese respondents were under the age of 30, which like in the case of Angola is to be expected as most of the migrants from the DRC left their country before finishing school due to political unrest in the country, and some of them ended up in Namibia at the refugee camp (see § 5.3.4). To continue, two respondents were under the age of 40 and under the age of 50 respectively. Only one male respondent from Ethiopia was under the age of 50.

As shown in Table 5.7, the findings show that there were more male foreign respondents than females, which may be representative of the actual situation because the study selected respondents randomly. Overall, most of the foreign migrants were under the age of 30, which means they were at a youthful age between 20 and 29 years old. Although the research did not solicit the reasons why most of the respondents fall in the latter age group, it can be inferred that younger people are still active and adventurous in finding new opportunities. They are more willing to travel in search of better life chances as opposed to, for example, the older age group (50 years and older) who are already settled when it comes to employment and accommodation.

5.3.3 Foreign respondents’ locations in Windhoek and occupations

Figure 5.4 shows where the foreign migrants stay in Windhoek as they indicated in the questionnaires. The migrants were plotted on the map according to their nationalities instead of their languages because their location largely correlates with their countries of origin. All the Angolan respondents are scattered across the various townships of Katutura, such as Goreagab, Greenwell, Hakahana, Wanaheda, Havana, Okuryangava, Okahandja Park, Ombili, One Nation, Oshandumbala, Oshitenda and Single Quarter. Only two Angolan migrants lived in Otjomuise, and the other two migrants live in town suburbs such as Khomasdal and Windhoek West. As shown by the red dots in Figure 5.4, most Angolans are concentrated on the outskirts of Katutura, which means they live in the slums, especially those who stay in One Nation, Okahandja Park and Havana, Goreagab, Hakahana, Okuryangava, Ombili and Greenwell. From the data on where the Angolan migrants live, it can be concluded that they are not only vulnerable because

100 | Page CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND PRESENTATION they are migrants, but also because they are because they are struggling economically, which is indicated by the fact that most of them live in the slums on the outskirts of Katutura. The cost of living in the informal settlements is relatively low.

As indicated in Figure 5.4, most of the Zimbabwean respondents live in Katutura townships such as Freedom Land, Goreagab, Grysblock, Havana, Katutura Central, Okuyangava, Ombili, Soweto and Wanaheda. Only one Zimbabwean migrant lives in a town suburb, namely Windhoek West. Although this group also live in Katutura, most of the Zimbabwean migrants live in the formal townships such as Soweto, Ombili, Grysblock, Wanaheda and Katutura Central. They do not penetrate further in slums on the furthest edges of Katutura and Otjomuise. This does not mean there are no Zimbabweans in informal settlements. There indeed are, but very few compared to Angolan migrants. The cost of living is relatively cheap in Katutura, which could be the reason why this group of migrants picked Katutura. This will enable them to save some of their earnings to support their families in Zimbabwe.

The Congolese respondents also live in townships in Katutura such as Greenwell, Okuryangava, Damara Location and Katutura Central, except one person who lives in Khomasdal.

The only respondent from Ethiopia also lives in Damara Location, a township in formal Katutura. Again, the low cost of living in Katutura attracts this group of vulnerable migrants because they are refugees who are in financial straits and the types of employment they can find does not earn them enough to afford living in town suburbs (see Figure 5.4).

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Figure 5.4: The locations of foreign respondents in Windhoek

Again, as shown in Table 5.8 below, a total of ten different occupations emerged from what the foreign respondents indicated as their occupation. When it comes to the foreign respondents, most of them are street vendors (47 respondents), followed by three domestic workers. Only one respondent each is occupied as waiter/waitress, security guard, construction worker and car washer, while two respondents are car guards. Further, there is one respondent each in a home shop and a barber shop. The fact that most of the foreigner migrants are street vendors explains that most people resort to selling products people need for daily living, after they failed to secure more formal jobs. It is quite easy for them to become street vendors as they sell their products next to their houses (shacks) or at the open markets in the areas where they live, or they even do business in other streets in Windhoek. A street vendor does not necessarily need an authorised place from the municipality, which might be costly to obtain. As already mentioned, the only need is to have some start-up capital to begin a business as a street vendor and (a) language(s) to communicate with and market their products to customers.

As shown in Table 5.8, the employment profile of Angolan respondents is as follows: there are 31 street vendors, three domestic workers, two construction

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workers, one car washer, one car guard and one worker employed in a home shop. Apart from construction and domestic workers, all other jobs are done in the areas where they live – which helps the migrants to save on transport costs to travel to and from work every day. They also save money on renting business premises as they conduct their business next to their houses or their shacks.

As depicted in Table 5.8, the employment profile of Zimbabwean respondents is quite simple as 15 respondents are street vendors, and only one person is a car guard. Most Zimbabweans come to Namibia with experience of running businesses in various countries where they had been living before they relocated to Windhoek. Most of the Zimbabweans were in other countries prior to coming to Windhoek (see § 5.3.5). Also, most Zimbabweans buy their products in bulk from factories and Chinese shops in South Africa to resell at slightly higher prices in Namibia. Most of the Zimbabwean businesses are mobile, which means they sell on different streets, in different suburbs and at shopping centres, which shows that they have business acumen. They do not wait for customers like their Namibian or Angolan counterparts, who wait for customers next to their houses, but they travel all over Windhoek to find customers.

The employment profile of Congolese respondents, as shown in Table 5.8, comprises two street vendors, two waiters/waitresses, two security guards and one barber. The Congolese street vendors, waiters/waitresses and a barber also operate in the vicinity where they live, which is less costly. The two guards are employed in town and the owner of the security company transports them to and from work daily.

The only respondent from Ethiopia is a street vendor.

Foreign migrants have some of the lowest rewarding occupations, such as car guards, looking after people’s cars in parking areas, and the car owners offer them any amount they prefer or they even opt to not give them anything. The Namibian respondents do not do such work (see Table 5.4). Although this data does not provide an accurate reflection of what happens on the ground, the data reveals how desperate the foreigners are to do any job that would earn them the lowest of income even when there is some forms of exploitation involved. This is the reason why they choose to look after cars, an occupation that sometimes does not earn them a cent.

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They are not guaranteed a fixed income, as guarding cars leaves payment up to the car owners, regardless of the time the car has been guarded.

Table 5.7: Occupations of foreign respondents Occupations Angolan Zimbabwean Congolese Ethiopia Total Street vendor 31 15 2 1 49 Domestic worker 3 3 Waiter/waitress 2 2 Security guard 2 2 Construction worker 2 2 Car washer 1 1 Car guard 1 1 2 Home shop 1 1 Barber 1 1 Total 39 16 7 1 63 5.3.4 Education

Although the study excluded those with university qualifications, the researcher wanted to ensure that the respondents did not have any university qualification and therefore they were asked to indicate both their primary and secondary (matric) education as well as the training they received after secondary school.

As shown in Table 5.8 below, 18 of the Angolan respondents do not have primary education, 27 of them have had no secondary education, and none of the Angolan respondents have had any after-school training. Among the Angolan respondents without primary education, their ages range from 16 to 33 years, which means they are young, except for one respondent who was 53 years old, which is understandable as many adults of that age did not get the opportunity to go to school due to the war. Also, out of the Angolan migrants who have had primary education, five of them attended primary school in Namibia at Osire Refugee Camp. Moreover, among the twenty-seven (27) Angolan respondents who had secondary education, six of them attended secondary school at Osire Refugee Camp in Namibia, which means in total five respondents started their primary schooling and continued up to secondary school in Namibia. Only one respondent came to Namibia with primary education from Angola and continued his secondary education in Namibia. Overall, the level of education of the Angolan migrants is low, which reflects that the Angolan

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education system is somehow not strictly enforced so that everyone attends school. This explains why most of the respondents have had no primary education at all.

When it comes to Zimbabwean migrants, as shown in Table 5.8, all of them have had primary education, except one respondent who is 40 years of age who had never been to school. Furthermore, only two male Zimbabwean respondents have no secondary education. The latter figure includes the 40-year-old man who never attended school and a 28-year-old man who dropped out of school due to economic hardship he endured in Zimbabwe. Furthermore, two migrants attended courses, and one started at university, but he dropped out at an early stage due to financial reasons and poverty. Interestingly, none of the Zimbabwean migrants received schooling in Osire Refugee Camp. Overall it can be concluded that the Zimbabwean respondents are better educated than their foreign counterparts, the Angolans and the Congolese, which is not surprising as Zimbabwe is one of the African countries with a high literacy rate (see Ethnologue, 2015 on the level of literacy in Zimbabwe).

Of the Congolese respondents, only one migrant has not had any primary education, as shown in Table 5.8. However, among those with primary education, three of them attended primary school at Osire Refugee Camp, which means they also did not have primary education before coming to Namibia. Furthermore, two respondents do not have secondary education, while among those with secondary education, four were schooled at Osire Refugee Camp. Also, five of the Congolese respondents do not have after-school training, except two (2) respondents who did hairdressing courses at Osire Refugee Camp. Although the study did not solicit the reason why most Congolese did not receive any primary and secondary education before coming to Namibia, it can be inferred that the political unrest in the DRC was one of the many possible reasons why the migrants did not attend schools in the DRC.

The only respondent from Ethiopia, who was 47 years old, indicated that he had never been to school.

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Table 5.8: Education statistics of foreign migrants

Training Total No Primary Countries No Matric after No Training population Education matric Angola 39 18 27 0 39 Zimbabwe 16 1 2 1 15 Congo 7 1 2 2 5 Ethiopia 1 0 0 0 0 TOTAL 63 20 31 3 59

5.3.5 Migration trajectory

Considering foreign respondents’ migration trajectory, few patterns of migration were observed from the foreign respondents. Among the Angolan respondents, 17 engaged in early migration, meaning they were somewhere else in their early years before coming to Windhoek. Most of the Angolan respondents who were involved in early migration migrated inside their country and/or to villages around the Angolan- Namibian border in Northern Namibia. The reason for early migration was also mainly due to relocation from one family member to another or securing employment as domestic workers or cattle herders, especially for those who migrated to villages in Namibia. Furthermore, 12 respondents were never involved in early migration, which means they came straight from their place of birth to Osire Refugee Camp before they continued to Windhoek. Interestingly, all the Angolan respondents were in Osire Refugee Camp before they headed to Windhoek, which means the civil war, which waged in Angola, was the main reason they came to Namibia, and that is why they were accommodated in a refugee camp for a while.

Early migration was not prevalent among the Zimbabwean respondents as only two respondents were involved in early migration. Furthermore, only one respondent had never been in another country before coming to Namibia. On average, most of the respondents were in countries such as Botswana, Mozambique, Zambia, Tanzania and mostly South Africa before arriving in Namibia. Few of the reasons that the Zimbabwean migrants gave for migrating from one country to another include xenophobia, which occurred in South Africa, and/or lack of business opportunities in other countries. All the Zimbabwean migrants in Namibia indicated that they have

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never settled in other towns in Namibia. They came straight to Windhoek, which means it was the most attractive place to most Zimbabwean migrants who participated in the study.

Also, all the Congolese respondents were accommodated in Osire Refugee Camp at some point in time. Most of the Congolese relocated from one place to another inside their country at an early age due to political unrest. The Congolese migrants travelled to Namibia through Zambia via the Katimamulilo route, and none of them settled in other countries prior to arrival in Namibia.

The only Ethiopian respondent came straight from Ethiopia to Windhoek, and he never migrated earlier in his life.

5.3.6 Family and personal relations

The foreign respondents were also asked to provide information about their families, the languages they speak at home and those they stay with in Windhoek.

From the data obtained, seven Angolan respondents are married; four of the latter respondents speak Oshiwambo L1 at home, while the other two speak Portuguese. Only one respondent speaks English at home. There are more single Angolan respondents: 32 in total. Seven of the single respondents stayed with relatives (uncles, mothers and sisters) and speak Portuguese in their homes. The remaining 24 respondents co-habit with their partners and they live in ghettos. The latter respondents speak mostly Portuguese in their homes. Only one single respondent stays with her employer because she is a domestic worker and they speak English. Overall, most Angolan single respondents have children and speak Portuguese at home.

A total number of 12 Zimbabwean respondents are married. Among the married respondents, three do not live with their family in Windhoek, and they speak English at home with their landlords, while those who live as families speak their L1 at their homes. Also, four Zimbabweans are single, of which two of them speak Shona at home, and the other two speak English at home. All the Zimbabwean migrants are renting places where they stay.

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Among Congolese respondents, only one is married, and he lives with his wife. The latter couple speaks Swahili at home. Furthermore, six Congolese respondents are single, and they all stay alone. The remaining two respondents live with their relatives. Among the single respondents, three speak English in their home, and only one single respondent speaks Kasayi, and another two single respondents speak French.

The only respondent from Ethiopia is married and does not stay with his family in Windhoek. Also, the latter respondent speaks English at home with his landlord.

5.4 SUMMARY OF TRENDS

A total of 440 new migrants completed the questionnaires, of which the majority were Namibian nationals. The majority of those who participated by completing the questionnaires are in the age group between 20 and 29 years. Most of the new migrants are accommodated in informal settlements at the edges of Katutura. English is the language spoken by many of the respondents. Although only four respondents indicated that they were Afrikaans L1 speakers, Afrikaans is the second highest known language by the migrants after English. Most of the new migrants are multilingual because on average most know between two and five languages.

Most of the Namibian respondents are from regions in Owamboland, namely Oshana, Oshikoto, Ohangwena and Omusati. This explains why most respondents are L1 speakers of Oshiwambo. Most respondents, both Namibian and foreigners, did not receive training after attending school, and even those who did, just attended short training courses and not university programmes. Most foreign respondents come from Angola, and they prefer to use Portuguese rather than their L1s for communication and identification. Most of the respondents are single, and the majority came to Windhoek in 2015. Although the new migrants have different jobs, most of them are street vendors. There are many foreign migrants in Windhoek, but they have been in Windhoek for many years; and as a result, they did not qualify to participate in the study.

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CHAPTER 6: PRESENTATION AND INTERPRETATION OF INTERVIEW DATA

6.1 INTRODUCTION

In Chapter 5 the various kinds of recently arrived migrants to Windhoek were described, their profiles that were created from information collected in the questionnaires were presented and interpreted, and research questions 1 and 2 (Chapter 1, section 1.4) of the study were attended to. In chapter 6, more detailed qualitative information on a smaller number of these migrants is provided, drawing on data that were collected during personal interviews with a smaller subset of the larger sample. The purpose is to gain an in-depth understanding of the linguistic biographies and repertoires of respondents in responding to objectives 2, 3 and 4 of this project.

From the larger group of 440 respondents whose profiles were traced, 25 individuals were selected to participate in semi-structured interviews based on their trajectory journey and the richness of the information they provided in the questionnaire, as was explained in Chapter 4. The interviews, conducted by the researcher, were based on an interview schedule (see Appendix B) designed to elicit information on issues of multilingualism, considering the value of the respondents’ repertoires in their integration in Windhoek, as well as their migratory journeys and how language mediated their mobility. The interviewed respondents comprised five Angolans, five Zimbabweans, five Congolese and ten Namibians. The Namibian respondents were divided into two categories, according to the kinds of linguistic repertoire they presented. The first group is made up of five multilinguals who are L1 speakers of Oshiwambo (1), Sifwe (2), Thimbukushu (1) and Khoekhoegowab (1). The second group of Namibian respondents consisted of three migrants who, in conservative linguistic terms, would count as monolinguals and are L1 speakers of Oshiwambo (3) and Nyemba (2). As already indicated in Chapter 3, considering what constitutes a person's linguistic repertoire, and counting passive or only receptive competence of a language as part of such a repertoire, it would be very difficult to identify any

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person living in a multilingual urban area as "monolingual". For example, a person who claims to know only Oshiwambo, but can recognise the difference between Afrikaans and English, and in calculating prices can give amounts in English numerals, might claim rudimentary Afrikaans and English as part of their repertoire. Following this understanding for “linguistic repertoire”, one Nyemba respondent who described herself as not speaking any other language understood some Oshiwambo; therefore she is not totally monolingual. However, she does not know English, which most respondents believed is an important language to know in Windhoek, and for this reason she was categorised with the "monolingual" migrants.

A fair number of foreign respondents emphasised that they often meet people in Katutura who do not know English and that these people do have difficulties when it comes to communication. The sample of 440 respondents eventually included Namibian “monolinguals” who indicated that they know only their L1 and do not know English. These respondents met the general criteria of the study in having recently migrated to Windhoek. They were not excluded on the basis of not being multilingual, as according to the definition of “linguistic repertoire” followed in this study (see Chapter 3, section 3.5, specifically Busch, 2015), their exposure to a variety of other languages in the urban context affords them a linguistic repertoire that includes more languages than only their L1. Hearing such voices, and also documenting them, aligns with the aim of acknowledging migrant voices, as legitimate sources in this study, even if they are minority language voices of those with very limited active knowledge of more than their mother tongue. When respondents used languages other than English, Afrikaans or Oshiwambo, there was a need for an interpreter – and informal interpreters, which was other street vendors who speak any of the latter listed languages, were used. These interpreters do not have formal interpretation training and therefore they are referred to as informal interpreters.

Each of the 25 interviews was audio recorded and prepared for analysis. Some respondents who had consented to take part were at first slightly hesitant due to their unfamiliarity with having their voices recorded and fear that their pronunciation was not "good". Even so, they eventually relaxed, often became animated, and they appeared to enjoy recalling life events related to their trajectory and the languages

110 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION they know. A small number of the recordings were transcribed, but it was soon apparent that the transcription took time given the number of the respondents who participated. Thus, for the larger part, the researcher carefully listened to the recordings a few times, then summarised the content and only jotted down verbatim quotes where respondents touched on material that would be necessary for the analysis. The analysis of interview data was done according to the themes that were identified as of special interest to the study at the outset. Additionally, themes that emerged during the interviews, raised either by the respondent or the researcher, were also recorded and analysed.

6.2 Migrant voices articulated in interviews

For analysis, the researcher listened to the recorded interviews during which she prompted discussion on specific themes, but also allowed respondents to select their own focus. This was done in such a way that their narratives were minimally interrupted, thus allowing them to tell their stories in their own words according to what they themselves chose to highlight. Considering the full corpus of recorded data, seven themes emerged that were present in all interviews, and that varied according to the places of origin and linguistic biographies of the various respondents. These themes will be dealt with one by one in the following sections of the chapter. To break the ice and to give respondents the background against which they had been selected to take part in the study, the researcher asked respondents to elaborate on questionnaire data they had given regarding which languages they know and use confidently. This request for elaboration mostly also referred to where they had been before coming to Windhoek, and what had brought them to the city. The interviews were initiated in this way as the researcher wanted to test her hypothesis that language, and the languages respondents know and can use confidently, has a strong determination of the kinds of employment migrants secure and the kinds of life chances that are eventually afforded to them. Therefore, the first theme to be discussed was related to how newcomers in Windhoek were able to survive, and how language may have been instrumental, or not, in their ability to make a living. The themes highlighted for discussion below are: 6.2.1 The language(s) found to be vital to run a business or secure employment in Windhoek; 6.2.2 The importance of multilingualism; 6.2.3 Discrimination/abuse based on

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languages; 6.2.4 Dealing with monolingual speakers and those who cannot speak English; 6.2.5 Language and identity; 6.2.6 Migratory journeys, and how language facilitated mobility; 6.2.7 Narratives of hardship.

Since this research aims to present the migrants’ own voices, the researcher has cited the respondents’ words exactly as they were captured. In the analysis provided below, respondents’ direct words are directly quoted in the languages they used. If the original is not in English, the translations are provided in standard English; if they are in L2 English, which is not immediately clear, a rendering in standard English is also provided. For ease in following and referring to citations, the quoted accounts are numbered from N1 to N88. The names provided here are not the respondents’ real names.

6.2.1 Language(s) found to be vital to run a business or secure a job in Windhoek

The respondents were asked to indicate, according to their experience in the informal sectors of Windhoek, whether the languages they know had helped them to secure a job or run their business and to explain their responses. Also, if they did find language to be helpful, they were asked to comment on which language(s) and why. The answers they gave are presented below according to the different categories of internal or foreign migrants, as mentioned in the introduction above.

6.2.1.1 Namibian migrants

First, the responses of the multilingual Namibian newcomers to Windhoek who all had given the national language, English, as one of the languages in their repertoire are discussed. Amalia, Penda, Dax, Trophy and Sebastian were interviewed in this category. Amalia and Penda are L1 speakers of Sifwe, and they only know one L2, namely English. Trophy is an L1 speaker of Oshiwambo, and he had Afrikaans and English as his L2s. Dax speaks Khoekhoegowab as his L1, and he also has Afrikaans and English as his L2s. Sebastian's L1 is Thimbukushu, and he knows only English as his L2.

At first, one respondent in this group, a security guard called Amalia, said language did not play any role when she secured her job; however, when the question was

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rephrased to whether she would have secured the job if she could not speak English, she changed her response to:

N1: No! They could not. They do not like to hire people who do not speak English, but for Oshiwambo you will be hired because those people at the offices speak Oshiwambo. Like Wambo they can be hired because they are using their language at the office. Oshiwambo is the language which is (more) helpful than English. Like here in Windhoek the majority are Wambo. (No! they wouldn’t. They didn’t and still don’t hire people who do not speak English. But if you speak Oshiwambo you will be hired because the majority of people at the office are Oshiwambo speakers. The majority of people in Windhoek are Oshiwambo speakers.)

Also, Penda, a taxi driver, did not think language played any role in him securing his first employment in Windhoek. He acknowledged the importance of English, but could not confirm that being multilingual made any difference. In his own words, referring to the value of knowing many languages, he said:

N2: Not really, because at the service station (petrol station) they just wanted people who can speak English.

As a follow-up question, he was asked if he thought he would have been employed if he did not know English, and he replied:

N3: I really didn’t think so, because we had feras (“fellas”) who couldn't speak English. Just wondering how they got the job if they told me they want people who can speak English when others couldn't. (I do not think so, because some fellows were employed even when they could not speak English. I wonder how they got the job, if the employer informed me that they needed someone who could speak English, when others could not had been appointed.)

The latter confirms a general observation of the researcher, even among many not documented in the study, that many inhabitants of multilingual Windhoek do not recognise the direct and important role of language in their daily lives.

Although many did not recognise the importance of language in the process of securing employment, some respondents did understand the value of language. To illustrate, Trophy, who was employed in construction, explained the following:

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N4: … Elaka olafimana unene ngeenge otashiya peembulu opo ile pomunhu keeshi Oshiwambo ndee oushi ashike Oshiwambo? Kandiwete naanawa tomono. Onghee oshafimana okukala ushi omalaka. Oshimbulu no shiingilisa owo ngoo ngawo. (Language is important, especially when it comes to the white employers or to a person on who does not know Oshiwambo; or what if you only know Oshiwambo? I do not think you will be employed. Therefore, it is important to know languages. Afrikaans and English are important languages.) Ame eshi ndaya mo construction omalaka yeeli avali akwafelange oshiingilisa noshimbulu. Ngaashi ngeika paife eembulu diyapu odina ngoo eembepo davo diilile kadhiholewe okupopya Oshiingilisa piilonga vo ovo nee havetupe iilonga ngaashi tse aawambo. Eembulu ohadi longelwa aike kaalaule. (When I was employed in construction there were two languages that helped me, Afrikaans and English. Especially now, white employers have certain behaviours. They do not like speaking English at work, and they are the ones who employ us, the Oshiwambo speakers. White employers only recruit black people.)

As explained by Trophy, not all the region’s languages were necessary for respondents to secure employment. Similar to Amalia (N1 above), she explained one can know various Namibian languages, such as Oshiwambo, Sifwe, Thimbukushu, and so forth, and be regarded as multilingual; however, the knowledge of those languages would not help much to secure employment, because only Afrikaans or English are used in the construction industry and those are the only languages that the employers understand. The latter describes the importance of knowledge of particular languages in Windhoek, just like in most African countries: those who can speak European languages such as English enjoy elite status, while those who can only speak African languages such as Oshiwambo, Sifwe and Thimbukushu are suppressed (wa Thiong’o, 1994) (see § 3.3.2). Therefore, as stated by Tembe and Norton (2008), indigenous languages do not contribute to Windhoek migrants’ success in the global market (see § 3.3.2).

During the course of the interviews, all the respondents in this group, namely Penda, Amalia, Sebastiana, Trophy and Dax, whether employed by someone else or self- employed, agreed that language indeed played a role when they secured their jobs and/or were running their businesses. Two languages emerged as the languages that the migrants felt are most important in the city as a workplace, namely English and Afrikaans. Apart from Trophy who indicated that Afrikaans was the main

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language in construction, Sebastian, Amalia, Dax and Penda felt that English was the only language that helped them to secure employment. Afrikaans was only mentioned by Trophy, who worked in construction. Therefore, one can conclude that even if English was the main language that helped people to secure employment opportunities at different workplaces, as security guards or petrol attendants, or in the construction industry, Afrikaans was more helpful than English because most of the employers in the construction industry are Afrikaans L1 speakers.

Interestingly, it was observed especially by speakers who do not know Oshiwambo (Penda and Amalia) that Oshiwambo also helped people to secure employment despite the companies’ employment requirements, which made English compulsory (see N1 and N2 above). The latter is an indication that misrepresentation is one of the adaptability mechanisms that the migrants employed once faced by linguistic obstacles that prevented them from securing economic opportunities, as explained by Mc Laughlin (2006) in section 2.3. Although employing Oshiwambo speakers with little or no English proficiency is against regulations, and might be labelled a transgression, knowing Oshiwambo, the largest Namibian language and a majority L1 in Windhoek (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012; Niikondo, 2011), might be helpful on its own for someone to do their job even without knowing English. This could be the reason why those who knew Oshiwambo got employed in jobs that required English (see § 2.3.1).

Oshiwambo seems to be a dominant language for street vendors. Therefore, knowledge of Oshiwambo may be helpful to informal traders. To be specific, when Amalia was asked which language she would advise her friends and family in Katima Mulilo, who were planning to come to look for the jobs in Windhoek, to learn she stated the following:

N5: …for her to get a job easier, you have to know Oshiwambo. Even at the police station, wherever you go they will greet you in Oshiwambo. But you ask him why are you greeting me in Oshiwambo while on duty? No, we are using this language here. (For one to get a job they must know Oshiwambo because everywhere people speak Oshiwambo. Even at the police station. When you ask why are you greeting me in Oshiwambo while on duty? They reply that, No! We use Oshiwambo here.)

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Second, interview data from the Namibian newcomers to Windhoek who did not include English in their repertoires, and in fact, came across as monolingual speakers of their L1 only are discussed. The five interviewees in this category were all self-employed, and they ran their small street vendor businesses in different townships in Katutura. Three respondents, namely Nelago, Martha and Justine, are L1 Oshiwambo speakers, and the other two, namely Emily and Anna, are Nyemba L1 speakers, of whom one identified herself as monolingual (Emily). Anna understood Oshiwambo, and at times would use a few Oshiwambo words, although she cannot converse in Oshiwambo, and thus in this study, she was also identified as monolingual, because her knowledge of Oshiwambo is particularly limited.

The migrants in this category fully understood the role that language played in the daily functioning of their businesses. Since they only knew one language well, and they were in one way or another making a living, their L1 patently helped them to run their businesses. Still, Martha, Justine, Emily and Anna all thought English would be very helpful in running a business, as Martha explained:

N6: Andiilongo Oshiingilisa pamwe ndi (takokoma) nditale ngele andi tseya oshiingilisa shaashi opu na aantu kaayeshi yomuhoko gwandje. (I want to learn English because there are people who are not of my tribe.)

The two Nyemba speakers, Anna and Emily, also mentioned that Oshiwambo, in addition to English, would help them to sell their products more efficiently. Emily explained through an interpreter who was another vendor who could speak English, and who sells her products at a stall next to Emily’s:

N7: I want to learn Oshiwambo, to learn Wambo, as many people in the market are Wambo. (Oshiwambo is the language I want to learn because most people in the market speak Oshiwambo.)

They felt that, due to language barriers, they often lose out on attracting some of the customers who speak Oshiwambo.

Nelago, despite knowing only Oshiwambo, did not think language affected the daily operation of her business. She explained:

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N8: Nghiwete elaka lafimana shaashi oha ndilandifa ashike kwaava velaka lange unene. Naava kaaveshi velaka lange ava handi shakeneke oviilonga Oshiwambo. (I do not think language is important because I only sell to those who can speak my language and those who are not Oshiwambo L1 speakers learn Oshiwambo.)

As quoted in N8 above, it is not surprising that Nelago did not see any role that language played in her business because she is an Oshiwambo L1 speaker, which according to the Khomas Regional Development Profile (2015) and the Namibia Statistics Agency (2011) (see § 2.3) is the language of the majority in Katutura where she is situated. However, as quoted in N7, those who are not Oshiwambo speakers, such as Emily, recognised the role that languages played in the daily operation of their business. Having a minority language as L1 made her want to learn Oshiwambo rather than English, even though the latter is an official language. This bears testimony that monolingual speakers and/or those who do not know English, but are L1 speakers of the majority language of the local community, benefit when it comes to running their businesses. In fact, the advantage is seen as equal to that of knowing English. However, when it comes to being employed by a person or institution and working for a salary, for this group it was usually hard to secure employment. English remains the language of most employers in the country. One exception would perhaps be for them to be employed as domestic workers by affluent people who are speakers of the same L1s.

6.2.1.2 Foreign migrants

In the interviews, three groups of migrants were identified, based on the numbers of respondents from three particular communities that had completed questionnaires. The responses from each of the various groups, Angolan, Zimbabwean and Congolese migrants, will be provided separately below.

(i) Angolan migrants

Five Angolan migrants were interviewed, namely Agustinho, Bravo, David, Selma and Valentine. The L1s of all five respondents is Kimbundu, and they all know Portuguese and English as their L2s. In addition, Selma also knows French and Lingala. All the Angolan respondents agreed without needing to be prompted that

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language was important in securing their jobs and helping to run their businesses. They all mentioned that English was the principal language that helped them in the workplace/business; however, apart from English, Agustinho felt despite English being the language that helped him, there were two languages of high status in Windhoek. He explained the following:

N9: The languages I think are most helpful, first, I think is English and then Afrikaans. (I think English is the most helpful language, followed by Afrikaans.)

Also, Bravo, who works in construction, explained that he would advise anyone who was planning to search for employment in Windhoek to learn English. However, giving an example of the linguistic situation at his work, he explained:

N10: My boss, Mr Basson, speak Afrikaans mostly and English only sometimes. (My boss, Mr Basson, mostly speaks Afrikaans and English sometimes.)

Both Agustinho and Bravo do not know Afrikaans, but they believed that in general Afrikaans would be helpful too because in their experience many people who could offer employment in Windhoek, know Afrikaans. The explanation provided by Bravo corresponds with what Trophy, also a construction worker, said in N4, namely that in construction, Afrikaans is the dominant language, ranking even before English, regardless of English being the country's sole official language.

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

As mentioned, five Zimbabwean migrants, namely Kununa, Melvin, Philip, Sam, and Mlambo were also interviewed. All the interviewed respondents speak Shona as their L1 and they all know English as their L2. Mlambo listed quite a few additional L2s that he had learnt along his migratory trajectory, namely Tswana, Ndebele, Portuguese, Afrikaans, Oshiwambo and Otjiherero. Four of these five respondents answered affirmatively to the question of whether language helped them to secure a job and/or run their businesses. Only Melvin, the fifth respondent, answered:

N11: Not really.

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However, he changed his mind when the question was rephrased. In answer to whether he thought he would have secured a job if he did not know English, Melvin replied confidently:

N12: No! Language is very important.

All the other Zimbabwean respondents mentioned without being prompted that language had helped them to run their businesses. Asked to elaborate which languages had been important, Kununa explained:

N13: You will be having more advantage if you speak Afrikaans, especially if you are dealing with those people, Afrikaners. (If you speak Afrikaans, you will have more advantage especially when you deal with Afrikaans-speaking people.)

Still on languages, Sam mentioned:

N14: Iyaa, it plays the biggest role. It means if you cannot understand each other there is a barrier already. You cannot understand what a person wants or sometimes some people do not know money in English. A person speaks in English and you do not understand. It means you lose that customer. Definitely, the person will go. (Language is important. If a vendor does not understand the customers, then there is communication barrier. Some customers only know money in their vernaculars. If a customer speaks in English and you do not understand, you will definitely lose that customer.)

It seemed that language also worked indirectly to help the migrants to run their businesses. As explained by Mlambo:

N15: Normally, what I do to keep my customers close, I speak business language. If you come to me speaking Portuguese, I speak Portuguese. Even Portuguese, I am learning Portuguese a bit. (To keep customers, I speak business languages with them. If a customer approaches me and speaks Portuguese, I will reply in Portuguese. I even know some Portuguese; I am picking up a bit of Portuguese.)

When it came to the Zimbabwean respondents, English topped the list as the most helpful language. This is possible because English is the only Namibian language they know well. English is again followed by Afrikaans as a helpful language. It was not surprising that Kununa finds Afrikaans valuable because he operates in Khomasdal, a community that in previously segregated Namibia, during the during

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apartheid era, had been allocated to the Afrikaans-speaking Coloured people. Another respondent, Philip, to the question which language one needs to know to run a business in Windhoek, explained:

N16: It’s tricky, but me myself, I can say is Oshiwambo because most of the people who cannot speak English, are Oshiwambos. Those who can speak Damara, Afrikaans, most of them are good in English. So, interacting with those is easy. So, I prefer speaking Oshiwambo because most of Oshiwambo people cannot clearly speak English. (I think Oshiwambo is the best language to learn because most people who do not know English are Oshiwambo L1 speakers. The Damara- and Afrikaans-speaking people are good at English. Therefore, it is easy to interact with the latter. I would prefer speaking Oshiwambo because most Oshiwambo L1 speakers cannot clearly speak English.)

Namibia is a sparsely populated country. As a result, the people of different tribes are living far from each other, causing them not to know the ethnic languages of other tribes (Stell & Dragojevic, 2017; Harlech-Jones, 2001; Tötemeyer, 2010). To illustrate, the Oshiwambo people traditionally live in the far northern regions, while the Damara and Afrikaans speakers live in the central regions. In the urban areas, English and Afrikaans are spoken as the “glamorous” (high status) languages. This also explains why the majority of Oshiwambo L1 speakers are said not to know English, as Philip mentioned above in N15 (see § 2.2.3).

In line with these perceptions, in talking about the language he wanted to learn, Sam explained:

N17: Oshiwambo, because it seems like, but I am not sure, two thirds of the population in Windhoek are Oshiwambo. (Oshiwambo, because it seems to me (though I’m not certain) that the majority of the people in Windhoek are Oshiwambo L1 speakers.)

Kununa who operates in Khomasdal, emphasised that he used to sell his products in Katutura, but had stopped operating in Katutura. About the prevalent language in Katutura he explained:

N18: The popular language is Oshiwambo, and it was so difficult to do business in Katutura. Some Oshiwambo people in Katutura, there in deep Hakahana and Havana, some of them do not even understand an English word.

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(The popular language is Oshiwambo. It was difficult for me to operate in Katutura because there are some people, especially in the informal settlements such as Hakahana or Havana, who do not know even a word of English.)

All the respondents explained that English is helpful. However, they also acknowledged that Oshiwambo is very widely established in Katutura. The respondents, Kununa and Melvin, who operate in Khomasdal, added that Afrikaans is also a language that would be helpful in Katutura. Philip, a vendor who moved around Windhoek selling his products, provided a different picture of language in Windhoek. He explained:

N19: What I have noticed here in Namibia is like, aa (thinking), in a certain area they speak one language. If you go to Herero Mall that side of Herero location, they speak their own language. If you go to Damara, mostly they speak Damara. They cannot speak Herero. Someone coming from Katima, I can say 90% of people in Windhoek cannot understand or communicate with him. They relate in English. (What I have noticed in Windhoek is people in different areas speak different languages. In Herero Mall, which is located in the Herero location, people speak Otjiherero. In Damara location people speak Damara. The majority of people in Windhoek may not be able to communicate with a person from Katimamulilo. People of different Namibian languages can only communicate through English.)

What Kununa observed in N19, referring to different languages spoken in different parts of Katutura, reflects the aftermath of a recent history of segregation whereby people were divided according to their ethnic language. As a result, certain language groups are still strongly represented in locations where its speakers were demarcated to live during the apartheid era (Friedman, 2000) (see § 2.3).

(iii) Congolese migrants

Four of the five Congolese respondents reported Swahili as their L1. They were David, a security guard, who also speaks French, English, Chiluba and Lingala as L2s; Eugen, a waitress, who additionally has French and English as L2s; Jean, a security guard, who also knows French and English as L2s; and Mommy, a waitress who, similarly, knows French and English. John, a barber, reported Kibembe as his L1; he also knows French, English and Swahili as his L2s.

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Except for David at first, all four respondents believed English had helped them to secure their jobs. To the question of whether language helped David to secure employment, he answered:

N20: Iyaa, No! Someone who I know and is the one who worked here before me. So, we use to know each other. And then by the time I was looking for the job I find him working at this work and I interested. And then I ask him how can I introduce myself to speak to owner of the company so that I can get job? And he inform me how can I meet the director or secretary. I was just asked whether I can speak Afrikaans, and then I said I can’t speak Afrikaans, Herero and Otjiwambo, and then I just explained to them. (Yes, No! I knew someone who worked here before. So, we knew each other. At the time I was looking for a job, he was working here, and I was interested. Then I asked him how I could meet his boss so that I could introduce myself and get the job. He told me what to do to meet the company’s owner or his secretary. When I met the owner, I was just asked whether I can speak Afrikaans, and then I explained that I couldn’t speak any Afrikaans, Herero and Oshiwambo.) […] Myself, I thought can’t have a job because they can be interested in the language that they ask. They said if you can speak English is good. You can communicate with someone. If you do not know to speak those languages just tell the person, the truth that you cannot speak those languages. (I thought I would not get the job because they were interested in the languages about which they asked me. However, they just said that it is okay if I know English. They said you could communicate with people in English. If someone speaks to you in those languages (Afrikaans, Herero and Oshiwambo), tell them the truth that you cannot speak those languages.)

In N20 David shows his uncertainty about the question by first replying “yes” (Iyaa), and then immediately changing to “no”. His first response indicated that not language, but knowing a connected friend, had secured the job for him. However, on reflection, he explained it became clear that he was employed because he knew English, which his boss believed would enable him to communicate with the clients even when he did not know other local languages. Once more, just like with some Namibian multilinguals such as Amalia and Penda (quoted in N1 and N2), David's narrative indicates that some migrants do not see language as directly instrumental in securing employment opportunities or successfully running their businesses.

John, the Kibembe L1 respondent, understood right away the role of languages in his journey to find employment in Windhoek. He explained:

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N21: Let me say language help. When you know you understand and speak the language, it helps you to get something because I remember myself when I was looking for the job. The first time I went to one meme, she told me “Do you speak English and Afrikaans”? Then I said I only know English and French, and she said “No, our place only speak Afrikaans and English, especially Afrikaans”. And then I say I do not know Afrikaans, only know English. In that way maybe if I knew Afrikaans, I could got a job from them. She said “I will try, if we miss someone, we will call you”. They need someone who speak Afrikaans. (Let me say language can help one (to secure employment). When you can understand and speak the (right) languages, you would more easily be employed. I recall my own job seeking. The first time I went to one “madam” for a job interview, I was asked “Do you speak English and Afrikaans”? I replied that I only know English and French, and she said “No, at our place, they only speak English and Afrikaans, especially Afrikaans”. I then said I do not know Afrikaans, only English. Maybe if I knew Afrikaans, I would have been employed there. The employer just said “Let’s see. If we are short- staffed, we will call you.” They wanted someone who knew Afrikaans.)

As John explained in N21, not knowing Afrikaans adversely affected his chances of being employed as a caretaker at the children's crèche in the inner city. John’s narrative foregrounds the fact that language was applied as a requirement in employing people in the informal sector, especially in jobs that do not require a certified qualification. Candidates like John who do not know the most used local languages often end up missing out on job opportunities.

All the Congolese respondents know only one Namibian language, namely English, and that is the language that helped them most to secure employment in Windhoek. The respondents were asked which language they would advise other migrants to know who were thinking of coming to Windhoek to find opportunities. This interview question aimed at discovering which languages the migrants thought were vital in Windhoek and would be helpful for the vendors in the informal sector. These migrants provided different answers. For instance, David said:

N22: Okiwambo is nice. You can get a job and communicate with the people, because of most of the people, some other areas such as Okuryangava, Goreagab, that side. And, if you come this side of Wambo location, many people are speaking Okiwambo. (Oshiwambo is a good language to know because most people, especially in Okuryangava and Goreagab that side of Katutura, speak Oshiwambo.)

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Again, to the same question, Eugen answered:

N23: They should know English, Wambo especially, and Afrikaans. (They should know English, Afrikaans and mostly Oshiwambo.)

Jean mentioned English and Oshiwambo. John mentioned English only, and Mommy mentioned Afrikaans and Oshiwambo. Interestingly, David and Mommy did not at first recognise English as the most helpful language for themselves to function in Windhoek. They did not recognise the vital role played by English and so did not mention English at all. Also, it is interesting, as quoted in N22 and N23, that the respondents singled out Oshiwambo as an essential language in the informal sector – perhaps more so than English, no matter that it is the official language.

6.2.2 The importance of multilingualism

During the interviews, the respondents were asked to give their opinions about multilingual society such as they came across in Windhoek. The researcher asked them to respond according to their own experience as dwellers in the multilingual Windhoek or to give what they have observed during the time they had been operating in the market. The findings here are again presented under the three categories of migrants introduced earlier, in the introduction of this chapter.

6.2.2.1 Namibian migrants

All the Namibian multilingual L1 speakers of various languages, Trophy, Amalia, Penda, Dax and Sebastian, expressed appreciation of societal and individual multilingualism. They all believed the multilingual society is a good society, and that being a multilingual person is beneficial as it enables one to communicate with many people of various backgrounds. Amalia, as a migrant whose knowledge of languages is limited to two, L1 Sifwe and L2 English, narrated her experience in multilingual Windhoek:

N24: I realise it sometimes; you get in a taxi and the taxi driver is a Wambo. So, you will not be communicating. (I have realised that sometimes you get in the taxi and the driver is an Oshiwambo speaker. So, you are not able to have a conversation.)

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Being multilingual can be beneficial in so many different ways (see § 3.3.5). To be specific, Martín Rojo (2018) claimed that being multilingual is a competitive skill in the job market, but when it comes to the situation of the new migrants in Windhoek it was different because, apart from the communication benefit that migrants of different languages had, it was found that living in a multilingual society can also be challenging if one does not have access to the languages that are spoken by the majority of the people in the community. As explained in N24, the taxi driver could have been a monolingual Oshiwambo, or does not know English as the lingua franca in Windhoek; however, speakers of a majority language do not always recognise the difficulties of those who do not share their language. Also, for purely nationalistic or in-group reasons, they could be reluctant to accommodate customers who are not Oshiwambo speakers.

Still, on being multilingual, Trophy explained that:

N25: Ngeenge oushi omalaka omuhona otadulu kukwiinekela shaashi okushishi kutya nande kepo otadulu kuku lombela sha wulombele yakweni. Ngawo otavulu nokukuthigila po ngele ta di po. (The employers are likely to trust you if you are multilingual, to the extent that even when they are not around, they are likely to leave you with the responsibility to supervise other workers at the site because you understand all the instructions they gave you, and you will also be able to communicate the instructions given to you to your fellow workers in the languages they understand better).

Thus, according to Trophy, those who are multilingual will get entrusted with the responsibility to lead others. Referring to a downside, Penda gave the negative side of multilingualism he had noticed in Windhoek:

N26: … I have heard of people who say Wambo and Damara “close” each other. What I mean by “closing each other”, I mean, let me say I am a Wambo, when I go to rob somebody, I speak Damara to make other people’s tribe language look bad … (I have heard that Oshiwambo- and Damara-speaking people disguise themselves, each pretending to be the other. For example, if I am an Oshiwambo speaking person, when I go to rob people, I disguise myself by speaking Damara, to make the Damara people and their language look bad.)

The five Namibian respondents with very limited multilingual repertoires also understand the benefits that multilingual individuals enjoy in a multilingual city,

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despite them knowing only one language themselves. To be specific, Martha, who is an Oshiwambo L1 speaker, mentioned the following:

N27: opena uupyakadhi okukala movenduka wushi owala elaka limwe. Maara omutse gwandje omukukutu iinima kandiyitseya. (There are difficulties staying in Windhoek while you know only one language; because I’m not gifted in knowing languages, I do not learn things.)

Also, Justine highlighted some of the difficulties she experienced as a result of not being multilingual:

N28: Momayovi gaali nomulongo ondatandelwe omutima ndele aapangi mbayali haakalapo unene pungaye aaDamara. Ndee shaashi kanduuvite ko Oshiingilisa ngaye kanduuviteko oshiAfrikaans, ondakala handi (thinking) ngele onduuvite ndahala ekwatho, ohanduulike ike. Yengiika tadhiladhila ngaa kutya omuntu nguno okuuvite nande uuyehame mpano, nande ontumba. (In 2010, I had an operation, but most of the nurses who used to come to me were Damara. But since I do not understand English or Afrikaans, I used to (thinking) … when I felt like I wanted something, I just pointed and maybe they then guessed that this one felt pain here or something.)

Anna, through an interpreter, also aired the obstacles of being monolingual in multilingual Windhoek:

N29: I lose customers because I cannot speak their language. Right now, I only sell mostly to people who speak my language, Nyemba.

It is likely for one to think that Oshiwambo monolinguals are not likely to experience any language-related problems because the majority of people in Windhoek are Oshiwambo L1 speakers (see § 2.3). However, as quoted in N27 and N28, they also encounter problems as a result of not knowing English, the language that is used as lingua franca in Windhoek. Therefore, as mentioned by Krishnamurthy and Nanub (2011), and Bekett Mount (1999), migrants who do not know English became vulnerable members of society (see § 3.3.2). For example, Anna, quoted in N29, mentioned that she lost customers. Emily expressed the same sentiment of losing out on customers because for translation they mostly depend on other vendors with whom they are competing for customers. In that case, it is natural that the customers may leave those who are struggling with language and rather buy from those they can communicate with directly.

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6.2.2.2 Foreign migrants

(i) Angolan migrants

All five Angolan respondents felt that knowing many languages is beneficial. Sebastian explained:

N30: … in life, when you know a lot of languages it facilitates you to know how to communicate with people. (In life, when you know many languages, it helps you in that you will know how to communicate with people.)

Also, Bravo, who lives in Katutura with neighbours who were speakers of various languages, such as Oshiwambo, English, Afrikaans and Lukavango, talked about the advantages of being multilingual:

N31: Of course, it (being multilingual) is very important, because sometimes you want a job so (pause to think) and the employer cannot speak the language that you know. It can happen that the employer is Portuguese. It can happen the employer is a Wambo. It can happen that the employer is Oshilumbu. It can happen that the employer is Baster. So, if you get an employer who speak Portuguese than you communicate in Portuguese. (Of course multilingualism is very important because at some time you want to be employed, but potential employers do not speak the languages that you know. It is possible that the employer can be a speaker of Portuguese, or the employer could be Oshiwambo, or a white person or a Baster. So, if a potential employer speaks Portuguese, then you speak Portuguese.)

Thus, in N31, Bravo affirms that when it comes to seeking employment, it is beneficial to be multilingual (cf. Okal, 2014; Housen, Sole-Mena & Van Parijs, 2014; Dolgunsöz, 2013). Such a person would be able to speak to many employers as opposed to only knowing English, which would limit that person’s chances to speak to potential employers who know other languages than English.

Bravo demonstrated the benefit of living in a multilingual community by providing his personal experience. With Kimbundu L1 and having grown up in Angola, he had nevertheless learned a little Oshiwambo from the people in his community in Katutura, because most of his neighbours were Oshiwambo L1 speakers. Therefore, living in a multilingual community had helped him to acquire local languages relatively fast.

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Being multilingual in multilingual Windhoek also helped some vendors with languages that are mostly foreign in Windhoek, such as Kimbundu. They gained certain customers who supported their business only because that is the only vendor with whom they would be able to communicate. The latter was experienced by Selma who said the following:

N32: … like in the market where I am selling, most of the people they are Angolan. Some of them, when they come, they say “A! Really, we do not know how to speak English”. They are speaking in Kimbundu. I say “No! I am one of you, you can come”. It help in the market and my business. They say “That one is one of us”! (In the market where I sell, I meet some Angolan people who do not know English. I tell them to come to me because I am one of them. That helps my business in the market, as they say, that one (Selma) is one of us.)

Wardhaugh (2006) claims that in the multilingual settings different languages are used in different places (see § 3.3.5). Therefore, as narrated in N32, the Angolan customers thought English was the language to be used in the market, which they could not speak, and they saw the need to make it clear at the beginning that they do not speak the language of the market. Clearly, if it was not for Selma’s ability to speak Kimbundu, due to the language barrier, Angolan customers would not have received the proper service they deserve as customers; also, on the other hand, Selma managed to attract these customers who, if it had not been for her ability to speak Kimbundu, would have bought from someone else.

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

The Zimbabwean respondents also spoke about living in a multilingual city such as Windhoek. Kununa mentioned:

N33: It is not easy to live in a multilingual city, but if you cope up with it, it will be easier. (It is not easy, but if you cope, it will be easier.)

The “coping” that Kununa was referring to in N33 was to learn and use the local languages and being able to communicate with many Namibian people, even those who spoke only local languages. The majority of the Zimbabwean migrants found it challenging to live in multilingual Windhoek, especially in Katutura because even when they were multilingual, they knew only one Namibian language, namely

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English. Their knowledge of Zimbabwean languages such as Shona and Ndebele was hardly useful as the local Namibians do not know these languages. The local languages, especially Oshiwambo, which they cannot speak, are dominant in the informal sector in Katutura.

Also, four respondents, namely Kununa, Sam, Melvin and Philip concurred with other reviewed authors (see § 3.3.5) by mentioning that being multilingual was beneficial for communication reasons. Philip, for example, mentioned the following:

N34: if you know more than one language, is very good because you interact with everyone and life becomes easy especially to us who are selling you can even sell to every tribe because I have noticed that if you can speak Damara, Damara people will buy, they can say this is one of us. If you can speak Oshiwambo, they will also buy, they will say this is one of us. Therefore, knowing many languages is a big advantage. (If you know more than one language it is good because you will interact with everybody and be able to sell to customers of every tribe. I have noticed that if you speak Damara, Damara-speaking people will buy as they will say this is one of us. If you speak Oshiwambo, Oshiwambo people will also say this is one of us.

Sam also reasoned that communication is the main benefit of being multilingual. He stated the following:

N35: Knowing many languages is a great advantage because of interaction. It will be easy to speak with many people from different tribes. (Knowing many languages is good for interaction with people of many different tribes.)

However, Melvin ranked the advantage of being multilingual in a multilingual society differently. He explained:

N36: The first one is respect because when you know that this people do not like this and this, there is a line of respect, but if you do not know, then you are going to cross the line. Other things like communication and opportunities, they will come after respect. (Respect is more important than being multilingual. If you know what people of certain languages do not like, you know to stay within the boundaries of respect, but if you do not know these boundaries, you will unwittingly cross the line. Other aspects, such as communication and opportunities, will come second, after respect, in a multilingual context.)

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Mlambo raised a different point with regard to the benefit of being multilingual. He said the following:

N37: I speak business language. If you come to my shop, or wherever, and (thinking) … speaking your language, I speak with you your own language. You will understand better and even the help, I will help you with your language; is different than somebody who is speaking English or whatever the language. (In my business, I speak “business language”. If you come into my shop, or wherever else, and … I will speak your language (i.e. the language the customers speak). That way you (the customer) will understand better and even get better service. I will help you by speaking your language; that is different to (i.e. better than) when the service provider is speaking to you in English, or some other language.

Thus, Mlambo articulates one of the benefits of living in a multilingual society as being to speak the language that one knows best, especially one's L1. Speaking the language that you know best helps one to understand things more clearly, both at a personal and professional level, when seeking employment (Okal, 2014; Housen et al., 2014; Dolgunsöz, 2013).

(iii) Congolese migrants

Similar to others already cited, Mommy, Eugen, David and Jean believed that being multilingual is beneficial. However, John felt that it could be both beneficial and problematic. When asked whether it is vital to know various languages in Windhoek, David answered:

N38: Very important. They help you how to communicate with someone and how to meet a business partner. (It is important to know many languages as it will help with communication and it can help one to speak to different people and get business partners.)

Also, Jean felt:

N39: If you want to be a business person, you must know languages.

David and Jean, in N38 and N39, find that the ability to speak various languages helped vendors to achieve success in their business by being able to get business

130 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION partners, and then profiting from that because “two heads in the business are better than one”.

John had a lot to say about being multilingual. He had different views on knowing many languages:

N40: …more than one language it very good, because like, where I come from we did not speak even English; only French and Swahili. But when I come here I find out of that language. I need to learn that language to survive also. To know one language is not good. Is good to know many languages because languages help people, for when you can go you find people looking for example for foreigners. Let me say you find yourself as foreigner because they will get you. They will say this one is a foreigner on the language. One day I was there, let me say Wernhil Park. There is a police officer who come there. He ask me how to greet in Afrikaans. I answer the way they use to speak. They just know that this one is a foreigner when they ask for my ID, but the way I speak, know this one is Namibian. (Where I come from, we speak French and Swahili only. When I arrived in Namibia, I found that other languages count. I needed to learn that language (i.e. English) to survive here. Is not good to know one language only. It is good to know many languages because language identifies you as a foreigner, for example, if people (such as the police) go out looking for foreigners. If you only know one language, they can easily identify you. One day I was at Wernhil Park and the police asked me to greet them in Afrikaans. I answered in the language they spoke. They thought I was Namibian because of how I spoke (i.e. by replying in Afrikaans). They only realised that I am a foreigner when they asked for and got to see my ID.)

John's narrative here emphasised that knowing the various language in a place where many languages are spoken, could help foreign migrants, especially those without valid permits, in that they would not directly be identified as foreigners by the authorities. He referred to a practice of switching easily to the language that people around them were speaking.

Still, on the issue of multilingualism, John further explained:

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N41: When you know a lot of language it make you in danger and it can help you. Here let me say in Namibia they do not want people from … anywhere, somewhere. They do not even want to hear language here. You start speaking that language, they will say this is from … I only know the language, but I am not from there. (Knowing many languages can put a person in danger sometimes and at other times can be helpful. Here, in Namibia, they do not like people from other places. They do not even want to hear some languages. Therefore, if you start to speak that (local) language, people will identify you and say where you come from … I only know the language, but I am not from where the language is spoken.)

Thus, using the local languages can, in given circumstances conceal people's foreign identity and that protects them from the contempt some locals have for foreigners.

6.2.3 Discrimination/abuse based on languages

Annury (2017) postulates that multilingualism unifies people in societies; however, this study found that it could cause division among people who do not share certain languages and/or embrace linguistic diversity. Ngefac (2010), Alobwede (1998) and Anchimbe (2007) touch on certain division tactics that can be employed by those who do not embrace language differences in multilingual settings to discriminate against or to abuse people that they do not share a language with (see § 3.2.3).

The study foregrounds some of the division tactics that were employed against some migrants as a result of not speaking a particular language and/or being a speaker of a specific language in Windhoek. As the migrants were narrating their stories, some of them also touched on instances when they felt discriminated against or abused, either because of the language(s) they speak or of those they did not speak. The excerpts that demonstrate experiences of linguistic discrimination will be presented below.

6.2.3.1 Namibian migrants

One would think that a Namibian living in Namibia would be safe from discrimination on the basis of language, but the data obtained proved otherwise. Some respondents with quite remarkable linguistic repertoires reported instances where they were abused based on their language. Although Trophy and Dax had not

132 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION been discriminated against or abused, there were instances where they felt out of place because they do not know the language that is most widely used. As Dax explained:

N42: Where I was working, iyaa, people are ever speaking Oshiwambo and I feel bad. Are these people gossiping me? (Where I worked my ex-colleagues were always speaking Oshiwambo. I felt bad because I used to think that maybe they were gossiping about me.)

Similarly, Trophy reported in N4 that if one knows only Oshiwambo and seeks to be employed by a non-Oshiwambo speaker, that person will probably not get a job. Although this did not happen to him, it was something that he had observed happening to other people. That on its own was identified as a form of linguistic discrimination because people would be denied employment just because they knew Oshiwambo only, regardless of the fact that they could do the job. If people were not employed in positions that are not linguistically related because they cannot speak English, it shows that, as a country, there is a lack in Namibia when it comes to the emancipation of minds. People should be made to understand that African languages are as important as European languages, and as English (Fanon, 1967; Kayira, 2015; Rubagumya, 1991; wa Thiong’o, 1986). A person’s (in)competence to do the job should not be based on the fact that they do not know European language(s) and/or there should not be an assumption that those who do not know European language(s) cannot do the job. Employers should decolonise their minds and understand that those who can only speak vernacular languages may be as competent as those who can speak English (see § 3.3.1).

Amalia also remarked on discriminatory behaviours on the basis of language. She stated:

N43: … when we are in a truck from our location, they like those things of discrimination. They like those things. They use to call us you are a mbwela. (When we are travelling in a truck from home, they (my colleagues) like saying discriminatory things. The call us foreigners, “mbwela”.)

Calling one a “mbwela” is labelling someone, and labelling is one of the division tactics Alobwede (1998) and Anchimbe (2007) identify used by people of different

133 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION languages against each other (see § 3.3.3). “Aambwela” is a derogatory word that means “poor, black foreigners”. Ironically, white people are never referred to as such, even when they are foreigners. In N43, Oshiwambo was used to discriminate against the non-Oshiwambo speakers, thus also excluding them from participating in the collegial conversation while being transported on their way to work.

The Oshiwambo language seems to be used a lot by its speakers to discriminate against the speakers of some minor indigenous languages. To be specific, in N1 and N3, Amalia and Penda, who are Sifwe L1 speakers, explained how in their previous job it had been a requirement that employees know English to be recruited, but some Oshiwambo speakers were recruited without having English as part of their repertoire. This was pointed out as corruption, but also discriminating against those who were capable of doing the job and knew English, but whose places were now occupied by Oshiwambo speakers who did not meet the linguistic criterion.

Amalia further explained that discrimination based on language was everywhere for those who did not speak Oshiwambo. She said the following:

N44: Even at police station wherever you go, they will greet you in Oshiwambo, but you ask him why you greet in Oshiwambo but you on duty? They will say no, we are using that language here. (At the police station, as at other places, the police officers will greet you in Oshiwambo. When you ask why they are greeting you in Oshiwambo while on duty (as it should be in the official language, English), they will reply that this is the language used there.)

Penda felt done in at his previous job where he was a petrol attendant because he did not know Afrikaans. He said the following:

N45: … there was a time I felt not well treated. My boss uh! What happened … there is this other lady, she came there. She accused me of things I didn't do. Apparently, because she said it in Afrikaans and I didn’t do it and my boss was like you were supposed to do what the customer said. (There was a time I felt treated unjustly by my boss. One customer, a lady, came there and accused me of things I did not do. She had instructed me in Afrikaans, and (as I didn't understand her) I didn’t do as she said. My boss reprimanded me, saying that I should do as the customer had instructed.)

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Also, at Penda’s taxi business, he experienced discrimination because he cannot speak Herero. He explained:

N46: … I got this man and woman from Katutura Pick n Pay, going to Kamberipua there. They told me Kamberipua and it is actually a long street crossing other streets. So, I was like, which side of Kamberipua. So, they were like continuously speaking their language and I have to take a wrong turn. (I met this man and a woman at Katutura Pick n Pay who were going to Kamberipua (as passengers in my taxi). They said “Kamberipua”, and I asked them which side of Kamberipua, because it is a long street that crosses many other streets. They replied speaking in their language (Herero). As a result, I took the wrong turn.)

As narrated in N42, N43, N44, N45 and N46 the migrants had been abused or discriminated against because of unwillingness to accommodate one another when they indicated that they did not understand those languages. In both instances raised by Penda and Amalia, the person who had abused or discriminated against them on the basis of language seemed to know English, but they used their L1s, specifically distinguishing it from English. This indicates a need for improved linguistic awareness that unites all citizens, despite the different ethnic languages (Ngefac, 2010). When people living in one country cannot speak one another’s ethnic languages it can create discord and disunity; people of some ethnic languages may think their language is superior to others. Many Namibian people do not speak and other languages but their ethnic language. This has led to discrimination and language superiority tendencies (see § 3.2.3). Penda suggested the following:

N47: In this country, we need to educate people in languages. You know this story of just because you are in Owamboland you do not learn Silozi; it affects us too much because by the time you go to Katima, for example, and you will hear people speaking Silozi, Sifwe and you will be like lost. So, to everybody, so you go to Katima you do not find people speaking Oshiwambo. So, by the time I go to Owamboland is like I am in another country which is too bad. (In this country we need to educate people about languages. You know the saying that due to living in Owamboland, you do not learn Silozi. It affects us seriously, because if you go to Katima (in the Zambezi region), you find people speaking languages such as Silozi or Sifwe, and (as an Owambo speaker) you will be lost. If you go to Katima, you will not find people speaking Oshiwambo. And by the time I go to Owamboland, it is as if I am in another country, which is too bad.)

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Namibians who do not have a wide range of languages at their disposal provide even more evidence of this kind of discrimination. Elements of discrimination based on languages also featured in the narrations of this group of migrants. Both, Anna and Emily, speakers of Nyemba, a minority language, explained that in most cases the customers walk away when they notice that they do not speak English or the customer’s language. The customers did not waste their time with those who needed others to interpret for them. Also, Anna, through an interpreter, explained:

N48: Even co-sellers sometimes say bad things to me and people laugh, and I keep quiet because I don’t know English. (Sometimes the other vendors bully me, and people laugh, but I just keep quiet because I do not know English.)

As explained in N48, the monolingual migrants not only suffer loss of customers due to language barriers, but they are also verbally abused by other vendors on the basis of not knowing the other language, especially English. Lack of English knowledge makes them outcasts in the eyes of other vendors. The latter is proof that lack of academic qualification is not the only barrier that prevents new migrants from securing economic opportunities (Khomas Regional Development Profile, 2015), but also English is a limiting factor, which requires an immediate solution (wa Thiongo, 1994). The adverse effects of not knowing English follow the monolingual speakers of minority languages through most of their lives. Speaking through an interpreter, Emily mentioned that her neighbours are speakers of Oshiwambo, but when she was asked how she spoke to her neighbours, she explained:

N49: I do not speak to neighbour. Only when my daughter who go to school in Grade 1 is around to translate. (I do not speak to my neighbours unless my daughter who goes to school in Grade 1 is around to interpret.)

Emily was also asked whether she visited the school her daughter attends for parents’ meetings and she answered:

N50: No, because I do not understand English.

As portrayed in N49 and N50, the migrants, especially of minority L1s, who do not know English suffer in many different situations daily because English is widely used in Namibia – it is the only official language in the country and is therefore used in all

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public and private institutions. As the respondents indicated, the difficulties experienced by those who do not know English, carry over to their family members, especially their children. Emily did not attend school meetings at her child's school, even when she may have meaningful contributions to make, just because the meetings are conducted in English. Although this was Emily's story, her situation most likely is representative of experiences many other migrants, who were not part of the study, have. The voices of those who lack English are excluded from public discourses and dialogues. The issue of people being outcasts simply because they cannot speak English calls for the status of Namibian languages to be elevated to the status of English as has been advocated by postcolonial theorists such as Said (1978), wa Thiongo (1986, 1994), Fanon (1967), etc. That is the only way people in the country will understand that all languages and speakers are equal (see § 3.3.1 and 3.3.2).

Justine raised the pain she felt as a result of not knowing English in N50:

N51: Ngaashi, ngaashi naanawa meembanga mono omuntu ohatuvulu kuyamo wahala ngaa okupula epulo lyontumba ndee Oshili aaye. (Like in the banks, we go there wanting to ask certain questions, but we cannot.)

She further related her disappointing experience at the Ministry of Home Affairs:

N52: Otedhimbulukwa oshikando shimwe ndali ndaya ko kombelewa yuumutse, ndee oshili omuntu nguu ndaadheleko esikundo aaye, ndakala ethimbo, andikambadhala ike. Omuntu ngiika aantu ngaambeya, yemwene omuwambo… okwahala owala okutakuma. (I can remember one time when I went to the office where the identification documents are issued, but honestly the person I found that day, no. I stayed for a long time, just trying. The officer was maybe one of those people who prefers to disguise themselves as not being an Oshiwambo speaker. The person is an Oshiwambo speaker, but she insisted on speaking to me in English.)

Martha related how she was ignored at Nampost by the banker who could speak Oshiwambo, simply because she was speaking Oshiwambo:

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N53: Ngaashi kwali ndayako uunambo. Aaa aa mbe Mbeya yeli pee tela inaahala kukwathelandje ndali nda ndali ndakadeposita uuthilinga wandjee ndishi. Inaahalala kukwathelandje ndali ndakadeposita uuthilinga wandje ndishi. Inaahala kukwathelandje, inaahala kukwathelandje. Ngaye andiithana security maara ookavango. Andi tryinga owala okupopya Oshiwambo shaashi osho ndishi. (pause) Inaahala anuwa kupewa eethilinga. (I went to Nampost the previous day to deposit my coins, but the person at the till refused because she does not want to bank coins. I just called the security who is a Rukavango speaker to translate. And I just tried to speak in Oshiwambo because that is the only language I know. (pause) They, apparently, do not want to bank coins.)

Certain government officials have a tendency to expect all their clients to speak English because it is the official language (Haacke, 1994). It is indeed the language that was supposed to be spoken in all official tasks, but this practice does not consider that there are many people who do not know English. This explains why Justine was ignored by an Oshiwambo officer who just wanted to speak English (N52). Also, it could be that the popular use of English within Windhoek caused the officer to feel that her language is of “low status”, and as a result, she resorted to disguising her Oshiwambo identity by pretending as if she does not know Oshiwambo when speaking to clients such as Justine (cf. Danbolt, 2011:par 16). The right to information for migrants who do not know English are regularly violated, as all the offices and/or banks do not have people who speak all the Namibian vernacular languages. As explained in N51, they had questions to ask, especially in banks, but they could not as they do not know English, and the banks do not have interpreters to help clients who do not know English. Additionally, some banks pretended not to speak certain clients’ vernacular just because the official was unhelpful and did not want to help them (N53). Although the discriminatory behaviours related occurred in the bank and a government office, it could be happening in many other places, which is an indication that people who cannot speak English are excluded in many different national discourses (Krishnamurthy & Nanub, 2011; Bekett Mount, 1999) because they lack the language of the national discourse, which is English.

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6.2.3.2 Foreign migrants

(i) Angolan migrants

The Angolan migrants did not tell many stories of direct discrimination and abuse on the basis of language, except for Bravo and Agustinho, who felt that they had not necessarily been discriminated against, but they had at times felt offended by people’s behaviour. As Bravo explained:

N54: Sometimes I do not feel good when speaking a language, I do not understand. I used to feel is the person insulting me or planning to rob me, or what what? Iyaa just like that because normally if you understand a language that is very nice, but if you do not understand or do not speak and you are in a middle of those people, you will feel bad. (Sometimes I feel bad when people around me are speaking a language that I do not understand. I tend to think that maybe the person is insulting me or planning to rob me, or whatever. Yes, it’s like that because if you understand a language its nice; however, when you do not understand the language and you’re surrounded by speakers of this unintelligible language, you feel bad.)

Agustinho also felt that he was never discriminated against directly, but had observed the behaviour of people who speak a certain language, especially Oshiwambo, towards those who do not speak Oshiwambo, and that made him feel bad. He explained:

N55: Normally some of the tribes, yes normally like, Oshiwambo: if you do not speak proper Oshiwambo, they say you are ovambwela, omumbwela something like that, because you do not speak their language. (If you do not speak Oshiwambo properly you are labelled negatively as ovambwela/omumbwela, because you do not speak their language well enough.)

The term “aambwela” carries a very negative connotation, so it makes people feel discriminated against. For the definition of “aambwela”, see § 6.2.3.1 above.

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

Also, the issue of discrimination and abuse based on language emerged in the interviews conducted with the Zimbabwean migrants. Some respondents, such as Philip, Sam and Kununa, felt they had personally experienced discrimination at some points in their lives. As Kununa explained:

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N56: Sometimes, you approach someone speaking English and they reply in Afrikaans, then you clash. The situation does not make me feel bad, I just feel that is business, I have to push hard. (Sometimes you approach a customer speaking English and the customer replies in Afrikaans, and obviously you clash. The situation does not make me feel bad, but it makes me feel that this is business and so I have to push harder.)

Philip also explained his experience:

N57: Some of the people can say that if you cannot speak Afrikaans ‘gaan! gaan’! Some of them you approach them, they are just looking at you like this (quietly). (Some customers tell me that if you cannot speak Afrikaans you can just go. Some do not reply when they are approached by vendors.)

Sam explained that many people had discriminated against him. He gave an example:

N58: A person can just ask you an Apple in Oshiwambo; because you do not understand, you ask what is that? But the person will just turn and go. (Some customers will ask, for example, for an apple in Oshiwambo. When you ask what that is, the customer will turn and go.)

As quoted in N56, N57 and N58, the vendors felt offended by the potential buyers if they could not speak the language that the customer preferred to speak. Some customers even speak in the languages that they know the vendor does not understand as deliberate actions of dismissal, so as to stop the conversation from going ahead.

Not all the respondents reported such language-related discrimination experiences. For instance, Melvin, in response to the question of whether he had ever experienced language-related discrimination, mentioned:

N59: Not really, because me, I was try to understand them or to look for somebody who can interpret for me. (Not really, because I try to understand or to look for someone who can translate.)

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(iii) Congolese migrants

Discrimination and abuse based on language also manifested in the stories of the Congolese migrants. Surprisingly, four of them, David, Jean, John and Mommy, felt while in Windhoek they were never discriminated against based on language. However, John seemed to contradict himself because at an earlier point he explained that he was once not given a job because he could not speak Afrikaans (see N21), despite his knowledge and willingness to do the job.

Eugen explained a personal experience of language discrimination since her trajectory to Windhoek as follows:

N60: That (maltreatment based on language) happen a lot. For example, I was working in Okahandja as a hairdresser. When people come, they expect you to speak Oshiwambo, but because I can’t, they go. They will be like “Aaa! Shike? Leave me alone”. It feels really bad because we are African, we are all blacks. If you come to Congo, I will not treat you the way you treat me. Even here there is a certain situation like you Congolese go back to your country. It hates. you know it hates because I didn’t choose to become a foreigner or refugee. The situation forced me (feeling emotional). (That happened a lot. For example, I used to work in a salon in Okahandja, and when the customers came, they expected me to speak Oshiwambo, but because I cannot speak Oshiwambo they left. They would say pardon. What? Leave me alone. It feels really bad because we are African. We are all blacks. If you come to Congo, I will not treat you the way you treat me. Even here (at the restaurant) some people say, you Congolese must go back to your country. It hurts. You know it hurts because you didn't choose to become a foreigner or refugee. The situation made me very emotional.)

Furthermore, as explained in N60 and N21, local people identify those who are foreigners on the basis of their languages as well as their inability to speak a Namibian language. Locals then discriminate against them based on fact that they are foreigners presumed to be infringing on Namibians’ opportunities.

6.2.4 Dealing with monolingual speakers and those who cannot speak English

From the questionnaire data it is very clear that most migrants know English, and they seem to rely on English to communicate at their business or workplace. Also, from the questionnaire data it is clear that there are some migrants who are

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monolingual speakers of an indigenous Namibian language and/or do not know English, but they are also participating in informal trading in Windhoek as vendors or sometimes as buyers. Thus, from a research perspective, it is important to contrast the experiences of the multilinguals with those of the monolinguals and of those who do not know English, considering which linguistic repertoires they rely on to communicate with each other and in the workplace.

6.2.4.1 Namibian migrants

The Namibian multilingual respondents had different views on the possible experiences of monolinguals and/or people who do not know English. Dax and Amalia mentioned that they had never met monolingual people because they are based at the university where students are educated and know English in addition to their L1.

Trophy and Sebastian also mentioned that they had never met a monolingual or someone who did not know English. The fifth respondent, Penda, who is a Sifwe L1 speaker and a taxi driver, mentioned that he met such people a lot, and he explained:

N61: The funny part is I speak in English and they speak in Oshiwambo and they understand. And the other things I ask other customers. (It is funny because I speak in English and they reply in Oshiwambo. Other things that I do not understand I ask the other customers.)

Penda also pointed out another aspect that could be helpful to a monolingual and those who do not know English, by referring to the types of language used in the taxi industry:

N62: We run like, I come to Poly library. I find you standing there. I will just say “Where to?” Why? You know we run with time, especially in taxi business time count, if I ask you where are you going that is a long thing. (We operate, like, if I find you standing at Poly library, I will just say “Where to?” Why? [So I use clipped sentences.] Because time counts in the taxi business. If I say, “Where are you going?” that is a long sentence and it will waste time.)

As explained in N62, the type of language they use in their industry is often not full sentences. They keep sentence constructions simple, relying mostly on content

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words, clipped phrases, and incomplete sentences to save time. Using just one- or two-word utterances makes it easy for the monolingual and those who do not know English. They memorise and recognise the words that they hear often when they are using taxis, and so are able to use them again. This agrees with what Penda said in N61 that even if he speaks to such passengers in English, they understand. The linguistic mechanism of using simplified language in the taxi business, as explained, is similar to the ways in which language is simplified in language contact situations (cf. Thomason, 1997) or even in “motherese”, the language parents and caregivers use with infants and small children (cf. Steinberg & Sciarini, 2013). The taxi driver’s explanation of “saving time” is therefore only a part of the reason for using abbreviated utterances.

Interestingly, Penda stated that there were some taxi drivers who could not speak English, regardless of it being an official language of Namibia. However, being in a country where English was widely used, he doubted the effectiveness of their business, as he explained:

N63: It (the business) can run, but it is not going to be successful as it supposed to be. When you speak Oshiwambo and then you do not understand each other, some people will jump out, you know! (The taxi business can run, but it is not going to be as successful as it was supposed to be. For instance, when the driver speaks Oshiwambo and he and the customer do not understand each other, some customers will leave the taxi, you know!)

The monolingual Namibian respondents’ voices on their limited linguistic repertoire and its effect on communication in a multilingual setting is also important. Different mechanisms emerged from the narratives provided by this group of people. Nelago mentioned that she avoided those who cannot speak Oshiwambo; in contrast, Justine, Martha, Anna and Emily mentioned that they relied on interpreters. Anna and Emily mentioned that other vendors interpret for them, while Justine used a friend and a security guard. Martha also used a security officer to interpret, as has already been indicated when she narrated her experience of wanting to make a payment at the post office (N53). Although the security officer is a Lukavango L1 and not an Oshiwambo L1 speaker, he understands Oshiwambo, which is the only language that Martha knows.

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Martha explained one of the strategies she uses at her business:

N64: … Pokatala ondatulapo aike uuplakata … Opena ngaa kutya mpano opena ingapi, mpano opena shike, mpano opena shike. (I put posters at the business stall. They display what goods are here, and how much they cost: here there is this and here there is that.)

In her narrative Justine also related how she communicated with customers of different languages:

N65: Aantu mbo ohatu (thinking) oteya tuulike owala shaa ahala oshiima. Ngaye otanduulike owala o price. Owushi kutya piinima yandje ohandi kala nale ndanyolapo omwaalu gwiinima? … Ohandi nyolapo aike eenumba. (Those people come pointing at what they want. And I also point back at the price. You know, at my stall I have already displayed the prices in writing. I have already written the amounts.)

The strategy of displaying the goods and the amount they cost, as narrated in N64 and N65, was reported as “best practice”, as it minimised the need for verbal engagement between the vendor with limited linguistic skills and the customers.

Nelago noted that she just mentioned the price and the name of the product. For example, she would say:

N66: Kapana, five dollars. (Grilled meat costs five dollars.)

Such communication in N66 is similar to the language used in the taxi business, as explained in N62. Penda explained the practice of clipped utterances as motivated by wanting to save time; however, the vendors such as Nelago used such shorthand due to limited knowledge of English grammar.

Furthermore, Anna, who is a Nyemba L1 speaker, knows a few Oshiwambo words, but does not know English. Through an interpreter she explained:

N67: I try speak to customers in few Oshiwambo words I know because most customers speaks Wambo.

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(I try to speak to the customers in a few Oshiwambo words that I know because most of the customers are Oshiwambo speakers.)

6.2.4.2 Foreign migrants

(i) Angolan migrants

During the interviews, the researcher further tried to elicit information from the Angolan respondents on how they dealt with those who were monolingual and/or did not understand English. Valentine, Bravo and David mentioned that they had never met monolingual people; however, Agustinho and Selma had. They explained how they interacted with them. Agustinho stated:

N68: Normally they are a lot, especially those people who come straight from the north. The majority of them do not know English. Even when you are talking English is just like you are insulting him or her … I have to struggle how to talk to them in Oshiwambo because Oshiwambo I just learn with my neighbours, they teach me like here is like this, here is like this. (There are many of them, especially people who came straight from the north. The majority do not know English, so that if you speak English with them, it is as if you are insulting them. I find it difficult talking to them in Oshiwambo because what little Oshiwambo I know, I learnt from my neighbours. They taught me, like, this thing is this, and that thing is that.)

One important issue raised by Agustinho in N68 is the fact that most of the people who do not know English are people who came “straight from the north”, meaning they had not settled in another urban centre before, where other languages such as Afrikaans, Khoekhoegowab, etc. are spoken. Not knowing English up north is not surprising because all the people who live in the villages in the northern part of Namibia (Oshana, Oshikoto, Ohangwena and Omusati) are L1 speakers of Oshiwambo and no other languages are spoken there frequently. The people in the northern region who did not complete a high level of schooling and spent most of their time in the village, did not acquire new languages such as English. This was true not only of Namibian customers with a monolingual language profile; even some Angolans had similar communication barriers due to limited opportunities for language learning. As explained by Selma, for her there is the advantage that those who have recently come in directly from Angola speak only Kimbundu and then are pleased to recognise her as “one of us”:

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N69: Like in the market where I am selling, most of people they come there, they are Angolan. Some of them when they come, they say “Ah! Really, we do not know how to speak English”. They are speaking in Kimbundu. I say “No! I am one of you. You can come”. (In the market where I sell, most Angolan customers come there. Some Angolan people come speaking in Kimbundu saying they really do not know English. I tell them that no! I am also a Kimbundu speaker, you can come.)

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

Apart from Mlambo, the Zimbabwean migrants Kununa, Melvin, Philip and Sam also agreed that they had encountered monolingual customers and newcomers who do not know English. To be specific, on the language one needs to know in order to do business in Windhoek, Sam explained:

N70: If you go to low density suburbs, majority of those people knows English but if you come to high density suburbs that is where you find majority who are illiterate, who speak Oshiwambo. (If you go to town suburbs, the majority of the people know English, but if you come to township suburbs (Katutura and Otjomuise), that is where you will find people who are illiterate and cannot speak English.)

The low-density suburbs that Sam refers to in N70 are the areas around town where proper housing and sanitation are to be found, while the high-density suburbs are the areas at the edges of Katutura and Otjomuise. Those are the areas where people stay in squatter camps and there is no proper sanitation, thus where living conditions are harsh and opportunities for social mobility are limited. The high-density suburbs are areas where the majority do not have secondary or tertiary qualifications, nor are they properly employment and salaried. The majority of the respondents in this study came from these areas (see Chapter 5).

Kununa explained that he had moved from operating in Katutura to Khomasdal and Cimbabacia, which are town suburbs, i.e. low-density suburbs as mentioned in N70, because in Katutura he came across so many people who could not use English in their dealings. This was what Kununa said:

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N71: Actually, in Katutura the popular language was Oshiwambo. It was difficult to do business in Katutura. You know, if you meet those people in Katutura, those Oshiwambo people. Sometimes they do not understand even a word of English. If you go deep, deep in Hakahana and Havana there, completely they do not know anything, they do not understand. I find it difficult to deal with those people. (The popular language in Katutura is Oshiwambo. It is difficult to do business in Katutura because I met so many people who do not know English, especially in Hakahana and Havana. I find it difficult to do business with those people.)

Kununa further explained how he dealt with customers who do not know English, which included customers of Angolan origin. If they were accompanied by children, the children would interpret. Otherwise, he would use a notebook. He explained as follows:

N72: Sometimes you write down the price of things. Ok, I am selling this. You write down the price. Sometimes I meet those Angolans. They do not understand English. I have to write it down so that they can see this cost how much. Two hundred … negotiate, go down again. I just write 120 and then I just cancel it, then I write 100. (Sometimes you write down the prices of things that you are selling so that the customers can know the prices. You write down the price. Sometimes I meet Angolans who do not know English. I have to write down the price so that they can see how much a product costs. [For example, if the price is] 200 [Namibian dollars], [but they want to] negotiate, to bring the price down. [In negotiating,] I write 120, [if they don’t agree, e.g. by shaking their head] I will scratch it out and write 100.)

To manage the language barriers between Kununa and the customers, as he explained in N72, they barter by means of writing, rewriting, using gestures and head nodding (agreement) or head shaking (disagreement) until they settle on an amount.

Sam had a different approach to deal with the monolingual people and those who did not know English. He explained:

N73: … one, two, three words of Oshiwambo. There is no full conversation because we cannot understand each other clearly. They say ‘ngapi’, and I mention the price. Some people only know Oshiwambo or, let me say, their mother tongue.

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(We use one, two or three Oshiwambo words. We do not have an elaborate conversation because we do not understand each other’s languages well enough. They say “ngapi” (meaning “how much?”) and I mention the price. Some people know Oshiwambo only, or rather, their mother tongue.)

Just as was emphasised in N70 and N7, that Oshiwambo is used by most who do not know English, in N73 Sam explained that he used a few Oshiwambo words he had picked up to speak to customers. It is not clear whether those Sam referred to are specifically Oshiwambo L1 speakers, but even if they are not L1 speakers, one can conclude that Oshiwambo is the one local language outsiders acquire first when they arrive in Katutura. It is widely used in their daily communication.

(iii) Congolese migrants

The Congolese migrants’ answers to the question on how the migrants deal with the monolinguals and those who did not understand English provided different views. David, a security guard at a construction site in town (Windhoek West) mentioned that he had never met such people. In contrast, Mommy and Eugen, who worked in an informal restaurant in Katutura, said they had met such people, but since they did not understand what they wanted, they simply did nothing. Jean, a barber based in a singles housing quarter in Katutura, explained that he often met Oshiwambo people who did not understand English. In his own words:

N74: I have posters with styles in the barbershop. Not lot of talk. (I have posters showing different hair styles in the barbershop. There is no need to talk a lot.)

At the market John also met many people who did not know English, and below is his account:

N75: Like me, I understand small Oshiwambo, and I can hear they are saying this price in Oshiwambo, or we sell like this, ahh, “bring money” or “very ‘kashona’”. (Like me, I understand Oshiwambo a bit, and I understand when they mention prices in Oshiwambo. Or, we sell like this (gesturing), or saying “ahh, you have to pay” (literally “bring the money”), or “not very much” (literally “a very small amount of cash”).

Thus, John did not struggle to understand those who did not understand English, as if they would speak to him in Oshiwambo, and he could understand a few phrases of

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Oshiwambo, specifically when they named prices. Also, John explained that he met many who spoke no English at the market in Okuryangava selling the products that he wanted to buy, and they used to say to him:

N76: “Landa tatekulu, just fifty dollars” (Sir, you must buy. It is just fifty dollars).

The vendors would quote the price in this way while pointing at the products. John explained even though he did not know the language, he understood them from the first time he went there because the amount is said in English, and at the same time they pointed at different products, which made inferring the meaning relatively easy, even when he did not understand the larger part of the vernacular language.

6.2.5 Language and identity

Various elements of languages can be used as symbols of identity. During the interviews the respondents were not asked directly to talk about their identity since it is an abstract concept that we cannot “read off” or measure on the basis of answers to direct questions. Even so, the narratives clearly disclosed some aspects of language as a symbol of identity.

6.2.5.1 Namibian migrants

Listening to the recordings quite a few times brought the insight that Oshiwambo functioned as a measure of whether one was a foreigner or not. As Amalia mentioned, her colleagues sometimes referred to those who did not know Oshiwambo as “aambwela”. Clearly, referring to colleagues as “aambwela” (foreigners) on the basis of them not being able to speak Oshiwambo, was an indication that Oshiwambo functioned as a tool to identify foreigners and distinguish them from non-foreigners. Amalia felt bad when she was labelled because stigmatising a person on the basis of their language is normally viewed as a direct attack on the person’s identity (cf. Milroy & Milroy, 1991) (see § 6.5).

Furthermore, as quoted in N5, Amalia also mentioned that some police officers at the station spoke to clients in Oshiwambo, and when the clients asked why they were speaking Oshiwambo rather than English, the police held their ground, answering that Oshiwambo was the language they used. The argument even went further in

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that a political point was raised, as the officer mentioned that they had liberated Namibia. Thus, a question about language became one of identity; it indicated that the police were claiming their ethnic identify via their language, and “othering” the client, excluding her just because she is not an Oshiwambo person. Also, as explained by Ferrer and Sankoff (2004), Pillai (2006), Piller (2004) and Managan (2004,) the popularity of the language might be one of the factors that influence the police officer’s choice of Oshiwambo while on duty (see § 6.5). If an Oshiwambo person had been the client, s/he would have been helped well due to speaking the “right” language, namely Oshiwambo.

Also, Amalia and Penda explained how their employers, owners of a security company and a petrol station respectively, set English as a requirement for being appointed (see N3 and N5), and yet appointed Oshiwambo speakers who were not proficient in English. In spite of this being illegal, the scenario demonstrates how the two employers identified themselves with those who speak their L1 (Lanehart, 1996) even when they were not related. Such linguistic identity appears to have prompted employers to employ people who do not meet the official requirements.

Further evidence of this exclusionary use of language is found in Amalia’s narration of being called “aambwela” in a truck on the way to work, by which a foreigner identity was imposed on those that did not speak the majority community language (see N54).

Also, in relation to identity, it was painful for Amalia when she talked about her Oshiwambo-speaking neighbours in Ongwediva who refused to learn Sifwe. When she was asked why they refused to learn Sifwe, she explained:

N77: They use to tell me that is difficult, them their language is easy than our language. (They used to say our language is difficult and Oshiwambo is easier than our language.)

The above statements (N54 and N77) show how identity as a Sifwe L1 speaker is assumed by the speaker, and how such speakers of minority indigenous languages are identified as outsiders. These narratives on division based on language within the Namibian nation also show that the “internal migrant” did not identify herself as

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one with the Oshiwambo people at all. Her recollections were ones of having been at the receiving end of Oshiwambo hatred, and of her pride in her own L1 identity being derided.

Most of the migrants in the category of Namibians who do not have English in their repertoire, namely Anna, Emily and Nelago, explained that they only associate with those who speak their language, mainly because they believe they are the same and identity has to do with sameness (Bucholtz & Hall, 2004). This appears largely to be a defence mechanism shielding them from the exclusion that comes with linguistic isolation. These internal migrants identify themselves by their L1 and associate mostly with others who share this L1.

Migrant vendors who do not know English, such as Emily, sell mostly to those who speak the same language, in this case Nyemba. Emily said the following:

N78: I sell only to people who speak Nyemba. (I only sell to those who speak Nyemba.)

In persuading customers to buy her products, she preferred and attracted those with a linguistic identity that matched her own.

6.2.5.2 Foreign migrants

(i) Angolan migrants

Similar elements of identity were disclosed in the narratives of the Angolan respondents. Selma, in N31, explained that when she met customers who did not know English in the market and noticed them struggling to speak to other vendors, she called them in Kimbundu. Identifying herself as an Angolan signalled that she was one of them, so she insisted on speaking and doing business in Kimbundu. This earned Selma long-term customers who kept on coming back to support her business since they could identify with her due to their common L1.

Agustinho, the security guard, explained:

N79: … For someone I know from home, we do not speak English, but we speak our own language.

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(For people that I know from Angola, we do not speak English, but we speak our vernacular languages.)

Thus, Angolan migrants would not hesitate to exhibit their linguistic identity as speakers of either Kimbundu or Angolan Portuguese if they recognised the other as a fellow Angolan. Agustinho did this to identify with those he knew personally, and therefore he switched from English to the vernacular language when he met people that he knew were from Angola.

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

Elements of identity also came out clearly in the narratives of the Zimbabwean migrants. Kununa, Sam and Philip explained that they easily identified each other through their pronunciation of English words with their vernacular accents. Therefore, the pronunciation with either a Shona and Ndebele accent was used as marker of identity (Leibowitz et al., 2005). They all explained that the way they spoke to those that they knew were Zimbabwean is different to how they communicated with the Namibians, because they speak in their vernacular language to each other or sometimes mix English with their vernacular.

Philip had also mentioned that he noticed that the customers buy mostly from those who speak their vernacular languages, even if they did not know them personally (see N33). This was a signal of shared identity through the languages they speak.

Mlambo also explained that he gave the customers a better service when they spoke to him in their vernacular rather than in English (see N35). This shows that Mlambo’s African identity is activated by the use of an African language, regardless of which one. He felt part of those who come to him speaking in their vernacular, even those he cannot comprehend – he prefers any African language to English, even though he knows English better. In a country where African languages are dominated by English, the speakers of African languages, such as Mlambo, may feel marginalised and feel the strong need to identify themselves with all the other African languages instead of English (cf. Leibowitz et al., 2005) (see § 6.5).

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(iii) Congolese migrants

From the narratives of the Congolese respondents it became clear that they identified each other through speaking Swahili and French. Swahili and French are markers of their identity (Leibowitz et al., 2005; Wardhaugh, 2011). Mommy, John and Eugen explained that whenever they hear a person speaking Swahili or French in Namibia, they will identify such a person as Congolese. As already mentioned, language enables the police to easily distinguish the foreigners from non-foreigners. John (see N59) explained how the Namibian police easily identify certain individuals as foreigners, either through how they speak English or by the unfamiliar languages (foreign languages) they speak. In these cases, if it had not been for the language, the police would not have noticed that the person was a foreigner. Not knowing a certain language can also give away a person’s identity. For example, Eugen explained how some Namibian people in the hair salon noticed that she was a foreigner just because she did not understand Oshiwambo (see N58). As a result, some abandoned her, leaving her salon without using her services. Even though foreigners are away from their home countries, they still identify each other through their languages. Their vernacular unites them and makes them feel one, as is shown by the fact that they mentioned that they speak in their vernacular to each other.

6.2.6 Migratory journeys, and how language facilitates mobility

The study investigates various migratory trends that were noted by different groups of migrants. It also considers how languages facilitated the different journeys people had undertaken. The findings are presented below.

6.2.6.1 Namibian migrants

None of the respondents in this category believed that language had significantly facilitated their journey to the places they were before they came to Windhoek, or their journeys to Windhoek itself. Even those who knew only Oshiwambo, such as Nelago, prior to migrating to Windhoek, felt there was much more to worry about, for instance the poverty in their villages and inequality between rural and urban areas (Pendleton et al., 2014) (see § 2.3) than the languages they would find in Windhoek. When Nelago was asked whether she had thought about the problems she would encounter in Windhoek due to language, she answered:

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N80: Kutya elaka talikakala o problem ohandiyi ashike pwaau hatudulu kuudafana naye. (Even if the language is a problem, I normally go to those that I am able to communicate with.)

Nelago’s indication of not being bothered about language as she could always rely on those with whom she could communicate, could be interpreted as Oshiwambo L1 speakers with a virtually monolingual repertoire not being affected by their inability to speak English in their businesses due to so many knowing Oshiwambo (Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012) (see § 2.3). As a result, these speakers had a choice with regard to who they wished to associate with. This contrasts with Anna and Emily whose language is not spoken by many people in Windhoek, so that learning another language was important to them.

In line with one of the findings of Pendleton et al. (2012), Martha, Justine, Trophy, Penda and Dax did not think about the languages they would find in Windhoek in advance because they all had friends and/or relatives who had called them to come and find jobs or to sell their products in Windhoek. These were the people who accommodated them at first. For instance, Penda came to Windhoek with his brother, who had called him to go to Swakopmund, and two years later they both relocated to Windhoek (see § 2.3).

Respondents such as Dax, Penda, Trophy, Emily, Martha and Sebastian where living in different towns before they migrated to Windhoek. They did not find that language facilitated their journeys to Windhoek; they had come because they just went to where their relatives and/or people they knew were. Six migrants in this category came to Windhoek because they had been called from the north or other urban centres by their relatives or the people they knew, for various reasons such as to care for children (Martha), to work in a bar (Anna), to look after the shack (Justine) and to find employment (Emily, Trophy and Sebastian).

Furthermore, except for Penda who relocated with his brother from Swakopmund, employment opportunities were the main reason they came to Windhoek. To the question whether they planned to leave Windhoek in the future, Nelago, Dax, Sebastian, Emily, Anna, Martha, Justine and Trophy surprisingly answered that the one place they thought of going to when they had difficulty finding accommodation,

154 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION was back to the villages where they came from. When they are suffering financially, or are getting old, their home town was the place they imagined as a refuge. Amalia, however, said she wanted to go to America. Although employment opportunities were the main reason all the migrants came to Windhoek, those who failed to secure employment, such as Justine, Anna, Nelago, Emily and Martha, resorted to selling their own products.

6.2.6.2 Foreign migrants

(i) Angolan migrants

Many Angolan respondents did not know English prior to coming to Namibia, and they knew that language would really be a dilemma in Namibia. However, the pushing factors, as explained by Crush et al. (2005), in Angola that prompted them to leave, weighed heavier than the language issue they expected to encounter, so they took the risk to come to Namibia (see § 2.3). The journeys of the Angolan migrants were mostly facilitated by their strong desire to fulfil their different needs.

Two of the Angolan respondents, Agustinho and Bravo, mentioned how education is the reason they left Angola. To be specific, Bravo’s narrative referred to the following:

N81: My mother, that time I was only alone. My mother decided for me to go school out. I left Omatala, I came with my dad ... (My mother [made the suggestion], as I was the only child at the time. My mother decided that I must go to school elsewhere. I then left Omatala and came here with my father.)

Also, Agustinho narrated his journey to Windhoek by highlighting education as the primary reason:

N82: Actually, I was coming with a plan to study. (Actually, I came here with the idea of studying.)

Selma explained that medical reasons had brought her family to Namibia. In her words:

N83 We really came here in Namibia because of my situation. You can see me, this is polio.

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… first, we came until Ondangwa. I can remember I heard my dad was talking to someone. Please I need help for my daughter. I heard in Namibia they can help. You see they ask a lot of money and that money you do not have. So, you have to use this way to go to first go to refugee camp by there they will help you so that you can take your daughter to the hospital. (My medical condition brought my family to Namibia. As you can see, I had polio. First, we came to Ondangwa. I can remember I heard my father speaking to someone, asking for help for his daughter as he had heard that in Namibia she could be helped. You see, medical treatment is expensive, and we did not have that kind of money. The best way is to go to the refugee camp [Osire] first as there they would help them and be told to take their daughter to the hospital.)

All the Angolan respondents, Selma, Valentino, Agustinho, Bravo and Francisco had been accommodated in Osire Refugee Camp before they migrated to Windhoek for financial survival.

(ii) Zimbabwean migrants

The Zimbabwean migrants had different stories when it came to their journeys and what facilitated them. Their stories will be presented individually. Kununa migrated to South Africa first, and later moved to Botswana in search of greener pastures in being trained in mechanics. He did, however, not find any opportunity, thus he returned to Zimbabwe, but the situation in Zimbabwe was worse. Having done some research on Namibia and knowing that English is widely spoken in Namibia and that language would not be a problem to him, he then decided to come to Namibia. Instead of becoming a mechanic he became a street vendor.

Melvin explained that he had migrated directly from Zimbabwe to Namibia as his friend who was based in Namibia helped him and even accommodated him. On languages, he said he knew that many Namibian people speak English, Afrikaans and many indigenous languages. Not knowing an indigenous language was not a problem to him as many of the African languages are almost the same, and him being a L1 Shona speaker meant he would not struggle that much.

Furthermore, Philip also narrated that the economic hardship in Zimbabwe forced him to flee the country to Namibia. He had chosen Namibia because many Namibian people speak English and he knew some Zimbabwean people who were based in Namibia, who helped to find him accommodation in Namibia.

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Sam first went to South Africa, but the xenophobic events there forced him to leave the country. Also, there were many people selling goods in the streets, which made this type of business very competitive. Also, factories that manufactured the mops and brooms that he used to sell were based in South Africa, and the people preferred buying from the factories rather than from vendors on the streets. As a result, he decided to go to Namibia as Namibia was an English-speaking nation, and the market for mops and brooms is not overcrowded. Also, he had a friend who was based in Namibia, who helped to accommodate him until he was financially settled.

According to Mlambo, the fact that many people in Namibia speak English encouraged him to bring his business to Namibia. Formerly, he had been in Botswana, Mozambique and South Africa, but the business was not going well for him. He returned to Zimbabwe and then heard that Namibia was a peace-loving nation, after which he decided to come to Walvis Bay in Namibia, through Windhoek. In Windhoek, his Zimbabwean friend who accommodated him encouraged him to stay in Windhoek as there was a good market for business, and he therefore decided to follow his friend’s advice and stay.

(iii) Congolese migrants

All the Congolese migrants in this study had come to Namibia through Zambia to Katima Mulilo. None of them had thought about the languages they would encounter in Namibia as they were simply running away from a gruesome war in their country (cf. Crush et al., 2005) (see § 2.3). When they arrived in Katima Mulilo, each at different times, the police escorted them to Osire Refugee Camp. Except for Jean, who came to Namibia alone, all the other respondents, namely Mommy, Eugen, John and David, had come with their families. In Osire Refugee Camp, David attended literacy classes where he learnt English. Those who had come at a young age, such as Mommy and Eugen, attended school where they learnt better English, which enabled them to communicate. After a few years in Osire, John and David looked for jobs on nearby farms such as Otjiwarongo, Okahandja, Gobabis, but after work they always travelled back to Osire Refugee Camp. They later migrated to Windhoek, as other Congolese people who came first, secured them jobs in Windhoek and at that time, most of them could communicate well in English due to their schooling in English at Osire. David, John and Mommy were accommodated by

157 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION the people who called them to Windhoek, while Eugen was accommodated by her employer. Jean came to Windhoek without knowing anyone in Windhoek. He related the following:

N84: When I came here in that bar. I asked for favour to stay in the bar because I didn’t have money to pay rent. (When I arrived here, I slept in the shebeen. I asked them a favour, to allow me to stay in the shebeen, because I did not have money to pay rent.) The bus that brought Jean to Windhoek stopped at a certain bar in Single Quarter Katutura. He told the bus owner his story and asked him if he could sleep in his shebeen, where he slept for the first month.

6.2.7 Narratives of hardship

As the selected migrants told their stories, some talked about the difficulties they went through as Namibian and foreign migrants on their way to, as well as in, Windhoek. Khomas Regional Development Profile (2015) mentions that migrants encounter some hardship in Windhoek (see § 2.3). Some of the hardship encountered by the respondents are documented below.

6.2.7.1 Namibian migrants

The Namibian migrants, both multilingual and monolingual, did not relate many stories of suffering due to being migrants. It was remarkable how they would refer to hardships without making the difficulties a special focus in their migration narrative. However, in talking about their experiences, they did (e.g.) mention working long hours and getting low pay in exchange. They had mostly come from limited opportunities in rural areas, seeking a better quality of life in the capital city, but their dreams were rarely realised. To be specific, Amalia said:

N85: I working last night and during the day, and the supervisor told me to stay at night again because there are not enough people on duty. I got paid 21 dollars every duty. (I worked last night and now (during the day), and again the supervisor told me to work tonight because there are not enough people on duty. I get paid N$20.00 per shift.)

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Being on duty for such long, uninterrupted hours, as conveyed by Amalia, demonstrates the suffering of a mother and breadwinner. Working such hours meant that her children went for a day without seeing their mother, who was on duty for 24 hours. This was not an exceptional occasion – apparently such long shifts are frequently expected.

Furthermore, respondents who spoke minority languages as L1 had to suffer emotional attacks by their fellow Namibians when derogatory language was used against them, for instance when they were called “aambwela” (see the definition in 6.2.3.1) simply because they belong to the minority language group. This scenario shows that xenophobic slurs are not only targeted against foreigners, but also against those coming to the city from remote regions within the country, such as Zambezi.

6.2.7.2 Foreign migrants

The narratives of the foreign migrants carried more direct reference to suffering than those of the Namibian migrants. Based on the interviews, one can conclude that the foreigners suffered more than the Namibian migrants. Jean slept in a bar (see N84 for Jean’s narration) on his first day in Windhoek because he did not know anyone in Windhoek who would accommodate him. The shebeen he slept in is made of corrugated iron. He had to wait for all the customers to leave before he could go to sleep, and he slept on the floor without proper blankets on a cold night. Jean’s story could possibly also be the experience of many homeless foreign migrants who sleep anywhere that is available just because they do not have relatives in Windhoek or elsewhere in Namibia.

David’s story of his first job in Otjiwarongo explains another element of suffering:

N86: I cannot call that job because we struggling. It’s like a contract. A boer just profited in your power and in your energy. He is like he is using you. When you cut those things you make a ton or maybe you agree with each other like, ooh, 27 or 5 tons (weight of wood) or whatever. So, we use to do like that because we do not have anything. We need money, maybe you can buy soap, you can buy lotion to use. So, no choice, just work like that. I used to have my friends there – the Angolan, Hereros and Wambos.

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(I cannot call that a job because we were suffering. It was like a contract. A farmer made profit out of our power and energy. He used us. We used to cut the shrubs, making tons of wood or maybe we agreed with each other to make 27 or 5 tons of wood. So, we used to accept such arrangements because we had nothing. We needed money, even just to buy basics like soap or body lotion. We had no choice but to do a job like that. I used to work with some friends who were Angolans, Hereros and Owambos.)

As David narrated this story (in N86), he got emotional, because the memory of what he had been through at the charcoal farm was clearly painful. The narrative sketched a vulnerable foreigner who did not have other means than his hard labour on which to survive; his education was not sufficient to assure a better job. David also suffered at his first job in Windhoek:

N87: I was working a private job for a person to clean his yard. After six months I left because the money was very small. (I worked for a private person as his yard cleaner. I left that job after six months because the money was not enough to survive on.)

Although according to popular wisdom Namibia is a peace-loving nation, as also expressed by the migrants from Zimbabwe, some Namibian people used derogatory names in referring to the foreign migrants. Such slurs indicate a certain degree of hostility, which certainly had an emotional impact on foreigners at the receiving end. For instance, John mentioned that some doctors and nurses in Otjiwarongo used to call them “people from Osile” even when they knew the patient’s name. John experienced that as demeaning and discriminatory. Also, Eugen mentioned that some people had said to her “you foreigners, go back to your country” (see N58), which she mentioned made her feel bad.

John also narrated how the police tormented them:

N88: When you are not from that place is not good when you do not have document, but if you have the documents no problems, but if you do not have – ah! My sister, your life is in danger because you are afraid. Like here in Windhoek, they only target foreigners asking if you have the documents. They put you in prison. Some, they meet them in street. Iyaa, some they meet them, maybe on the market. They can suspect. Come, can I have your ID?

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(When you are not from a particular place it is not good if you do not have the necessary documents. If you have them, you will have no problems, but if you do not have them – ah, my sister, your life is in danger and you will be afraid [all the time]. Like here in Windhoek, the police officers target foreigners, asking for their documents (residence permits). If you do not have them, they will imprison you. Some foreign migrants are confronted in the street. Yes. Some maybe they are confronted in the open market. If they suspect that someone is a foreigner, they ask “Come on, show me your ID”.)

From the foreign respondents’ narratives, it is evident that they faced many challenges in their daily lives.

6.3 CASE STUDIES

Section 6.2 dealt with themes that were introduced by respondents during their interviews, and that were broadly mentioned, even when subtle differences between different categories of migrants became clear. To provide some finer detail, this section will discuss four case studies in which the narrative of one respondent from each of the identified categories will be described and analysed. These case studies provide the narratives of (i) Trophy, a Namibian multilingual migrant, (ii) Martha, a Namibian monolingual migrant into Windhoek, (iii) Philip, from Zimbabwe, and (iv) Selma from Angola. The names given here are not the real names of the respondents, but are pseudonyms used to protect the identity of the respondents.

(i) Trophy

Trophy’s narrative demonstrates the high level of mobility one comes across, even among indigenous multilinguals in Nambia. Particularly, it shows how economic insecurity and migration are connected. Trophy was born in Oilyateko in the Ohangwena region, where he stayed with his maternal grandmother until he was five years old. At that age he was taken to Okandume in the Oshikoto region to stay with his paternal relatives and that was where he was schooled until Grade 9. After Grade 9, he was convinced by his uncle, who worked in Outjo in the Otjozondjupa region, to leave school and go to Outjo for employment. In Outjo he was accommodated by his uncle, and he used to work as a general worker. At work they used to speak mostly Oshiwambo, English and Afrikaans, as a result of which he acquired Afrikaans as a L2.

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After some time, Trophy left his job as a general worker in Outjo for Eenhana because his employer was not paying him well. In Eenhana, he worked for a construction company, where he only stayed for two months before returning to his village, Okandume, because the contract ended. He stayed home for a year.

Trophy has two L2s, namely English, which he learnt at school, and Afrikaans, which he learnt at the construction site. In Okandume, Trophy kept on speaking Afrikaans to his friends, who said the sound of Afrikaans made them happy. As a result, they could ask him to interpret Afrikaans utterances into Oshiwambo and in the process his friends also learned a few Afrikaans words.

After a year in the village, his relatives in Windhoek called him to go to Windhoek to find a job instead of just being in the village doing nothing. After a month in Windhoek, he got a job at a construction site, and he noticed that people mostly speak Afrikaans at the site.

Trophy explained that the fact that he knew Afrikaans and English had helped him to secure the job in construction. He explained that most of the people who succeeded in securing construction tenders were Afrikaans speakers who were not partial to speaking English. He therefore thought that if one knows Oshiwambo without knowing Afrikaans one might not find a job, and considered it important to know mostly Afrikaans and English only as a second option.

Even though Trophy knew Afrikaans, he wanted to improve his proficiency because he believed Afrikaans would help him a lot. Particularly at the “males’ jobs” (referring to construction work), the bosses were mostly white Afrikaans L1 speakers, and if one knew Afrikaans well, the employers would trust you more than otherwise. He had noticed that even when they were not around, the bosses would call and instruct Afrikaans-speaking employees to lead the other workers as they knew that they would understand the instructions well and be able to communicate the instructions to their fellow workers.

In Trophy’s neighbourhood in Windhoek, most of the people were Oshiwambo L1 speakers. He found that they often mixed Oshiwambo with other languages such as Afrikaans. However, he preferred staying with the boys who were born in Windhoek

162 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION and knew Afrikaans. Trophy mentioned that he was not interested in learning other indigenous Namibian languages because he felt they were not important to him.

(ii) Martha

Martha is a Namibian citizen who was born in the Omusati region in the northern part of Namibia. Her family language and L1 is Oshiwambo. She grew up and was schooled in Omusati, although she dropped out of school after completing Grade 3. At the time of the interview, Martha was living in Okuryangava informal settlement in Katutura in a ghetto made of corrugated iron. She knows no other language than Oshiwambo. Martha sold fruit, chips and corn snacks at a stand next to her ghetto. She bought the goods she sold from a local supermarket in the Katutura area.

Martha stated that she got customers who were speakers of other languages, but communication was not a problem as most of the speakers of other languages knew Oshiwambo. However, she felt that if she had been an L1 speaker of another Namibian language she would probably struggle to communicate. In her neighbourhood everyone was Oshiwambo speaking, so there was no a need to speak other languages, not even the official language, English.

Martha first left Owamboland in the year 2000 with the idea to find a job to support her children who were in Lüderitz. In Lüderitz, she failed to secure a job, so she decided to start her business of selling cooked goats’ heads. She lived in Lüderitz for nine years, but even though Afrikaans was widely spoken in Lüderitz she still did not learn to speak it. She believed she was not gifted as a learner and that was why she ended up with only Grade 3 in formal education. From Lüderitz, Martha decided to go to Keetmanshoop, to stay with her brother because Lüderitz was far and the transport from Owamboland to Lüderitz was very costly. In Keetmanshoop, she continued to sell the cooked goats’ heads to the customers, and communication was never a problem because she put up posters, written in English by her brother, next to her meat pots stating the different prices, so there was no need for much verbal communication with the customers.

After six years of being in Keetmanshoop, Martha was called by her friend who lived in Walvis Bay to go there. As a result, she left Keetmanshoop for Walvis Bay, but she only stayed there for two months as her mother, who was living in Windhoek,

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called her to come to Windhoek to stay in a ghetto because she was getting older and she wanted to go back to Owamboland. Martha responded to her mom’s call and relocated to Windhoek in 2015. At the time of the interview, she stayed with her two children who were also vendors. Her children know English because they had gone to school, but in the house, they speak Oshiwambo only as their home language.

Martha had few encounters at the bank where the consultants pretended not to understand what she wanted to say. Once this happened just because the consultant did not feel like banking coins that Martha had brought from her small business and wanted to bank. Still she did not find going to the offices or the banks a problem because there were always security guards to interpret, and most of the guards, even those who were not Oshiwambo L1 speakers, had learnt Oshiwambo and were always available to interpret. Since Martha only knew Oshiwambo, she only associated with fellow Oshiwambo-speaking people, although she said she would like to learn English or Afrikaans because she heard people frequently speaking those languages in Windhoek. She was not thinking of leaving Windhoek at that moment, but when she gets old, she would also return to the North, just like her mother had.

(iii) Philip

Philip is Zimbabwean and his L1 is Shona. His linguistic repertoire includes only Shona and English. Philip was born and raised in Harare, but he schooled in a village in Zimbabwe. He could not speak the other widely distributed Zimbabwean language, Ndebele, because in the village he grew up there were no Ndebele- speaking people. After he completed his O-level, he stayed in Zimbabwe searching for employment, but due to political stress and a very weak economy in Zimbabwe, he decided to go to South Africa to look for opportunities. He stayed in South Africa for a couple of years, but he did not get the opportunities he desired until he migrated to Namibia.

The reason why Philip left South Africa for Namibia was not only the poor opportunities; events of xenophobia in 2007/8 in South Africa had made many African migrants in the country anxious. As there were too many migrants in South

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Africa, he felt he had a small chance to get employment, and even when he wanted to sell something on the street, no one could buy because there was too much overcrowding. When Philip moved to Namibia in 2015, he noticed an improvement because there was no overcrowding of people, no xenophobia, and people were willing to buy mops and brooms, because they were manufactured in South Africa.

In Namibia, he was first accommodated by a Zimbabwean friend who called him from South Africa to come to Namibia. He stayed with the friend in Khomasdal for a year, after which Philip got his own room to rent in Katutura. His landlady who was living at the same premises was an Oshiwambo L1 speaker, but she knew English well, so communication was not a problem.

Philip believes that language helped him to settle in Windhoek in terms of running his business. Specifically, that language was English, as he is confidently proficient in English, which is the only official language in Namibia. At times he said the he had faced linguistic challenges of people who cannot speak English, but he is confident that with time he will learn more of the indigenous languages. He also mentioned that there were some Afrikaans-speaking customers who refused to speak to him in English and even would tell him that if he cannot speak Afrikaans he should “Gaan! Gaan!” (Go away! Go away!). Some people he approached just stared at him without providing any answer.

Philip believed that a self-employed vendor operating in Windhoek mostly needs to know Oshiwambo as a local language, because in his experience most people who do not know English are Oshiwambo. He had also come across people who spoke Damara or Afrikaans as L1s and had the impression that they were good at English. He also emphasised that knowing many languages was an advantage, especially for those make a living as vendors, as they would be able to interact with everybody. He had noticed that people mostly buy from the vendors who spoke their own languages; thus speaking various languages would be an advantage since you would get customers of various languages. Philip again explained that he realised that in Namibia people mostly did not speak L2s beyond their ethnic languages. He explained how he went to the Herero location and found that many people knew Otjiherero only, in the Damara location many people knew only Damara, and someone from the Zambezi region could not communicate with them in a vernacular

165 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION other than those indigenous to Zambezi. In the latter case, English became a critical medium of communication. Philip believed if he was to learn a language, he would prefer Oshiwambo because most of his friends speak Oshiwambo.

(iv) Selma

Selma was born in Lubango in Angola and spent her early years there, learning Kimbundu as the family language, as well as Portuguese, which is the medium of education in Angola. In 1999 at the age of 10, she migrated to Namibia with her family to seek medical care as she suffered the effects of polio. On their way to Windhoek, they passed through Ondangwa, where her father had a discussion with another man about where to get medical treatment for his daughter’s disability. The man advised Selma’s father that the medical treatment would be expensive for him as a foreigner, but that if he went to the Osire Refugee Camp and gained refugee status, his daughter would be helped from there with privileges similar to those of Namibian citizens.

After that conversation, Selma and her family moved from Ondangwa to Osire as refugees. She was very ill, to the extent that she could not walk properly. From Osire, Selma was admitted to Katutura Hospital for two consecutive years and sometimes she got transferred to the Central Hospital in Windhoek for treatment of her polio-related paralysis. While she was in the hospital, her parents and siblings where at Osire Refugee Camp about 200 km to the north of Windhoek.

After Selma was released from the hospital, she went back to join her family in Osire, where she started school. She completed primary school and started with secondary school, but she did not complete her secondary education because she fell pregnant. Selma stayed in Osire even after she had dropped out of school and gave birth to her two children. In the Osire school she was taught English and Portuguese as language subjects, but all the content subjects were taught in English.

In Osire, most of Selma’s neighbours were Congolese, except for one who was Angolan and thus shared her knowledge of Kimbundu and Portuguese. The situation of being surrounded by Congolese migrants meant that she acquired Swahili, as well as a bit of Lingala; both of these are indigenous DRC languages that are quite commonly used in Windhoek. In 2012, the Namibian government repatriated the

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Angolan refugees who had been living in Osire. Most Angolans went back to Angola at that stage, and Osire was declared to no longer be a refugee camp, but to continue as a resettlement camp. Selma, however, decided not to go back to Angola because she had been in Namibia for 13 years, and as her children had been born here. Also, none of her family members left for Angola; her parents stayed on in Osire. At the time of the interview, her father had passed away, but her mother was still living there. Some of her brothers and her older sisters came to Windhoek, and another brother went to Swakopmund.

Tragically, Selma’s elder sister who used to stay with her brothers in Windhoek passed away relatively recently. The sister’s three children and her brothers were then left alone without proper care in Windhoek. Selma had to relocate from Osire resettlement camp to Windhoek in 2015 to take care of her deceased sister’s children. Although Selma’s L1 is Kimbundu, Portuguese became her L1 in Osire, as well as later in Windhoek. She explained that she only spoke Kimbundu when her mother was around. Her children do not speak Kimbundu, but they can understand her whenever she speaks to them in Kimbundu.

Selma is a vendor who sells fruit and vegetables at the Okuryangava open market in Katutura. In the workplace in Windhoek she uses Kimbundu most of the time. She explained that at the market she encounters many Angolan Kimbundu speakers who struggle to speak English because they do not know it. With pride Selma calls out to them in Kimbundu, telling them to come to her as she was “one of them” and with happiness they support her business well since she spoke to them in Kimbundu. At the time she narrated the story of her migration and the related language biography, she was staying with her youngest brother, her late sister’s three children and her own children in Oshandumbala location in Katutura, where they were renting a house. Her mother was still in Osile; she sometimes just came to visit them and then returned to Osire.

6.4 CONCLUSION

This chapter has presented the data collected by means of interviews with selected respondents. As stated in Chapter 4, the data were presented under various emerging themes. In qualitative, semi-structured interviews, 25 respondents

167 | Page CHAPTER 6: INTERVIEW DATA INTERPRETATION AND PRESENTATION provided a great deal of interesting information on their linguistic repertoires and the trajectories that has helped to determine which languages they know or do not know. From the information obtained, it is clear that the use of English is helpful to the migrants in the whole of Windhoek, especially in the CBDs (Central Business Districts) and the suburbs. Knowledge of Oshiwambo is vital in Katutura, especially in the informal townships. Afrikaans is important in Khomasdal, while Otjiherero and Khoekhoegowab are vital in the areas in Katutura that were previously segregated for the people who are L1 speakers of such local languages. This indicates that the effect of segregating people based on their mother tongue is still evident even if this is a pre-independence phenomenon imposed by the South African government. The post-independence linguistic landscape of Windhoek has not eroded ethnic divisions in the city. Some Namibian people use language as a tool to identify local people and distinguish them from the foreign nationals, and even from minority groups recently migrated from other parts of the country. Windhoek is multilingual city, but when it comes to interethnic communication, certain languages become prioritised. The high-status languages of Windhoek, according to this study’s respondents, are English and Afrikaans, and on rare occasions, also Oshiwambo.

The next chapter will present and discuss the main findings of the study and link them to the four main research questions that were outlined in Chapter 1.

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CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

7.1 INTRODUCTION

In this chapter, the data from the questionnaires and the interviews that were presented in the two data analysis chapters (i.e. Chapter 5 and 6) are collated in order to critically consider the findings, using the lens of postcolonial theory as one of various critical theories applied in explaining African narratives. Therefore, the focus now turns to the data from both the questionnaires and the interviews, to interpret the data on the migrants’ linguistic repertoires and language biographies, as well as their narratives. First, the main findings of respondents’ knowledge and use of languages will be discussed and linked to the literature that was reviewed in Chapter 3. After that, the connections between linguistic repertoires and migration as they emerged from the narratives of the migrants will be critically analysed through the lenses of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and postcolonial theory. The approach taken is one that, in accordance with CDA, recognises the uneven distribution of power in multilingual Windhoek. The perspective taken here is upfront about the inevitable subjectivity of all social analysis. The data presentation uses the voices of migrants themselves to show up the difficulties they have in challenging inequality, also linguistic inequality (see Wodak, 1997 § 3.8). Postcolonial theory aligns with this CDA position in explaining the difficulties of vulnerable communities to overcome the oppression of social structures in response to new forms of government and to various forms of violence that persist or emerge, even long after colonial powers have been removed. Particularly, from a sociolinguistic perspective, this chapter pays attention to how language embodies and discloses current social and economic dilemmas, specifically for various categories of migrants. Eventually, this study, by the insight it develops and articulates, would like to contribute not only to the body of literature on the linguistic identities and experiences of this particular vulnerable population sector, but also to address the structures that continue to secure the position of those in power at the expense of those who are considerably less powerful.

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7.2 MULTILINGUAL REPERTOIRES, TRAJECTORIES AND IDENTITIES OF THE MIGRANTS

To begin with, the concept of multilingualism in the context of the migrants in the informal sector of Windhoek could be considered at two levels, namely the level of individual migrants and the societal level (see Mc Laughlin, 2009 discussed in § 6.2.1). At the societal level, this study can confirm what is already evident, that Windhoek is a multilingual city, characterised by L1 speakers of at least 24 languages, both Namibian and foreign languages. The Namibian languages found amongst the respondents in Windhoek were Oshiwambo, Otjiherero, Khoekhoeowab, Silozi, Subia, Nyemba, Thimbukushu, Afrikaans, Dhimba, Sifwe, Rukwangari, Rukavango, Ngangera, Rumanyo and Otjithamba; the foreign languages reported by and represented among respondents are Kimbundu, Portuguese, Tjokwe, Shona, Ndebele, Kasayi, Kimbembe, Swahili and Amharic. Interestingly, among the sample of 440 respondents who completed the questionnaires, none were L1 speakers of the current official language, English. Similarly, none were L1 speakers of an earlier colonial language, German. The sample of respondents all make a living in the informal sector and are mostly, in socio-economic terms, part of a vulnerable community, thus they do not belong to current or past power-holding groups.

The four respondents who listed Afrikaans, a former language of power, as their L1 form an interesting group. They provide evidence of how the language of the powerful is appropriated by subjected communities, to enable more leverage in interaction with those who offer employment and other kinds of social and/or economic advantage (see, e.g. Heldring & Robertson, 2013). The fact that most of the languages reported in the data were not native languages of the Windhoek area, testifies that the movement of people reflects the movement of repertoires, so that an interesting form of multilingualism emerges as a feature of Windhoek’s population (see also Bayiga (2016) on urban multilingualism in Kampala, Uganda). The fact that languages are no more constitutionally confined to political boundaries and spaces shows the need to redefine what Namibian languages are. Are Namibian languages those spoken by citizens or those spoken in the country? There is a need to move away from classifying languages according to the places of origin of those who

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speak them. Which languages can be declared ‘local’ or ‘foreign’ in a certain space needs another spectrum, a new framework that fits the contemporary movements of people. Languages are not confined to spaces, but move with their speakers (Pennycook, 2010; Spolsky, 2006). That is why even foreign languages are present in significant numbers in the informal sector of Windhoek. Windhoek is a meeting point of various Namibian and foreign languages (Simpson, 2017).

Further, as explained by Wardhaugh and Fuller (2005) (see §3.2 on multilingualism in general) multilingual speakers do not have the same capabilities in all the languages. The study also shows that even if Windhoek is characterised as a multilingual city, migrants, both Namibian and those of foreign origin, do not have the same capability in all the languages they know. On the previous point, Scridhar (1996) in Wardhaugh and Fuller (2015) notes that the language capabilities of multilingual speakers in a language are determined by the need for the speaker to use such a language. The latter explained that the reason why many respondents know English rather than other Namibian indigenous languages is that English is the official language and is a language that is used in most employment sectors. Therefore, those functions of English trigger most migrants to prefer to know English over other Namibian indigenous languages. This study emphasizes that since most respondents learned their L2s in school, education is also the main vehicle through which people learn new community languages. The need to pass the examination in an L2s forced people to learn L2s. When it comes to new migrants, their repertoires reflect where their life journeys started, i.e. their places of origin, as well as the journeys that brought them to their current location (cf. Vigouroux, 2008). For many in this study, the languages they know are limited to their L1 (the language(s) of the community of their birth and early years) plus English. Many grew up in Anglophone countries such as Zimbabwe, Botswana or Malawi, where English is the primary medium of education. To be specific, the Zimbabwean migrants’ repertoires mostly comprise their L1s, which would be either Shona or Ndebele (depending on the Zimbabwean region where their families lived) and English, which is the medium of instruction in Zimbabwean schools. In contrast, the Angolan migrants’ repertoire comprises mostly their L1s, which are either Kimbundu, Tjokwe or Oshiwambo (also depending on where they come from in Angola) and Portuguese, which is the medium of instruction in Angolan schools. Further, the repertoires of the Congolese

171 | Page CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION migrants mostly comprise three languages, namely their L1s, which among the respondents are Kasayi, Kimbembe or Swahili, as well as French, which is the medium of instruction in Congolese schools, and mostly also English, which they learnt informally (or in basic education at school as an L2). Local Congolese lingua francas such as Lingala or Lari are also widely distributed among these respondents.

Regarding repertoires, as Harlech-Jones (2001) and Tötemeyer (2010) (see §2.4 for their reviews) pointed out, this study confirms that the Namibian migrant population in general, know no other indigenous African languages than their vernacular languages. For both the internal and external migrant groups, English is the only language they have in common, which ensures its role as the lingua franca of the mobile community (cf. Achebe, 2006 in section 3.9.2). Thus, in their daily activities in the informal sector, new migrants communicate with one another and with others living in Windhoek, through the medium of their L2, namely English. The study disclosed that the Namibian and Zimbabwean migrants mostly gained access to English during their formal schooling, while most of the Angolan and Congolese migrants learned English informally during their trajectory to Windhoek (see Peirce & Ridge, 1997, § 3.9.2 on language and trajectories). For example, places of refuge or indentured employment in Namibia, such as Osile refugee camp became sites of schooling for such international migrants. Also, a section of the migrants testified that they had learnt local Namibian languages in the course of finding their way to Windhoek. For example, in different towns where they settled before they headed to Windhoek, and in the various work places where they found more or less temporary employment, if they worked alongside local speakers of, for example Oshiwambo or Afrikaans, they would soon pick up basic communicative skills in such local languages. Therefore, it can be concluded that based on the need at a particular time, the migrants learn new languages during their trajectories. The knowledge that the Angolan and Congolese migrants gained of English can to a large extent be explained by the route along which they came to the city. This is in accordance with insight articulated by Blommaert (2008), who reported on Joseph, a Rwandan refugee in the UK whose repertoire reflected his life trajectories. This is relevant to the study because most Angolan and Congolese migrants who were proficient in English, could be identified as having been settled in the Osile refugee camp for some time before they migrated to Windhoek. Thus, the inclusion of English in their

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repertoires was a reflection of their trajectory. It appears that informal learning of the indigenous languages often provided insufficient support in developing their vocabulary of the indigenous languages.

On the one hand, it is possible to trace the migrants’ trajectories to and within Windhoek or other towns by the linguistic repertoires that they had developed, as with respondents who had been accommodated by Otjiherero or Oshiwambo speakers. On the other hand, the brief and sporadic contact of migrants with such dominant speakers of Otjiherero or Oshiwambo did not assist in developing versatile vocabularies or a wide range of grammatical features of these languages with which they came into contact.

As mentioned by various authors being multilingual gives the speaker multiple identities, which can be related to the different languages they know (cf. Le Page & Keller, 1985; Anchimbe, 2005 § 3.2.3). Thus, a speaker of L1 Umbundu who hails from the south of Angola, who has been schooled through the medium of Portuguese and who en route to Windhoek spent time in a refugee camp where he was taught English (among other subjects), will most probably present a personal identity with features typically associated with three different speech communities. Interestingly, however, most Angolan migrants who were asked to discuss their language biographies and their resultant repertoires, preferred to identify themselves as Portuguese speakers. Despite having L1s such as Kimbundu or Chokwe, they indicated a preference for Portuguese. They explained a degree of dissociation from their L1s by referring to their L1s as somewhat unfashionable, as a language for the older generation, or as one that marked them as limitedly educated. This is to be understood against the background of how, at the moment, African languages do not play any role in the global economy (cf. Achebe, 2006; §3.9.2). In the context of Windhoek, Afrikaans and Oshiwambo do play a marked role in the economy in the informal sector, even if not equal to the extent that English is used. Other Namibian vernacular languages are largely reduced to languages migrants use at home (Banda, 2009; §3.4), while European languages such as English, Portuguese, French, and even German are perceived to be prestigious languages that enable migrants to participate socially and economically in the current global market. Nduati (2016), on the situation of Kenyan teachers in the United States, explains that

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teachers felt their African languages and identity were marginalised. Analogously, this could explain why the Angolan respondents consciously or unconsciously resisted mentioning or using their L1 in favour of Portuguese. Also, Martín Rojo (2018), in reference to the educational context, mentions that parents prefer their children to learn prestigious and international languages such as English, Portuguese or French over local languages to facilitate their children’s chances of attaining employment opportunities, which could also be the reason why the Angolan migrants preferred Portuguese over their L1s.

The study revealed that developing knowledge of languages mainly spoken in the host community helps newcomers to integrate better in the host community (cf. Esser, 2006; Craig, 2014, § 3.4). In the context of Windhoek, the external migrants who know English reasonably well, integrated with more ease than the Namibians (internal migrants) who only know their vernacular languages. As it is widely spoken in Windhoek, it seems that knowledge of Oshiwambo also enhances integration in the capital city, thus in some contexts, particularly in the township areas such as Katutura, Oshiwambo may have the same functionality to migrants as English or Afrikaans, which as mentioned by Stell and Dragojevic (2016) and the Namibia Statistics Agency (2012) and National Planning Commission (2003) are also widely spoken in Windhoek. This finding added to what Stell and Dragojevic (2016) and the Namibia Statistics Agency (2013, 2003) found on the major languages in Windhoek: apart from English and Afrikaans – which they claim are widely spoken in Windhoek – Oshiwambo is also widely spoken in Katutura, where the majority of those without university qualifications are accommodated. The data of this study disclosed that some migrants felt the need to expand their repertoire by learning Oshiwambo, especially those who operated in Katutura.

Similarly, Afrikaans was needed by those who operated in other locations, such as Khomasdal, or those employed in construction because those are the languages that would provide them with extensive access to the city and construction industry. Mbembe (1997) and Mc Laughlin (2009) note that the newcomers in urban areas need to learn the dominant language they find in the new areas as it eases their integration processes. Therefore, knowledge of the Oshiwambo language would ease the integration of new migrants in Katutura, while knowledge of Afrikaans would

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facilitate the integration of migrants in Khomasdal and in the construction industry where Afrikaans is widely used. The latter phenomenon is explained by Sridhar (1996) in Wardhaugh and Fuller (2015) (see § 3.2), namely that the need for a language as instrument in social spaces virtually forces speakers to learn a new language in the multilingual setting. In this context, the need to communicate in places such as Katutura and Khomasdal or in industries such as construction would force the new migrants to learn the two languages Oshiwambo and Afrikaans respectively.

A further finding in this regard is that knowledge of some languages of the host community has a higher value than knowledge of others in terms of integration of the new migrants. This does not agree throughout with sentiments expressed by Esser (2006), whose study was based on a scientific and official survey of integration of immigrants in host countries such as the USA, Australia, Canada, Great Britain, Israel and Germany, and Pfeffer and Para (2009), who looked at the role of social ties and human capital in the integration of Latino immigrants in the local economy. These authors found that knowledge of the national language in the host community helps newcomers to integrate. In Windhoek, the only linguistic knowledge that matters for newcomers is knowledge of the languages that hold the key to economic power in that particular society. This was shown to be English, and not the most widely distributed L1s of the local population. In some cases, however, Oshiwambo and Afrikaans, which are much more widely used as L1s, also had instrumental value for migrants.

For this reason, most foreign migrants still manage to penetrate the informal sector even though they do not have any knowledge of local languages; in fact, those who know English seem to fare better than Namibian migrants who do know indigenous languages but do not understand English. The fact that English is gaining momentum in postcolonial Namibia at the cost of indigenous Namibian languages has not gone unnoticed. A question widely considered in many circles concerns the maintenance, and even raising the standard, of Namibian languages to achieve at least equal status to English in the country. Achebe (2006) suggests that English should be valued for its role as a lingua franca, but at the same time African languages must be respected. It is, however, not known how to reposition African

175 | Page CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION languages in the Windhoek society where English is more valued. However, Phephani (2018) on the inconspicuousness of indigenous languages, to be specific IsiZulu, suggests that to promote African languages they should be integrated into primary education, which is already happening in rural Namibian schools.

7.3 MULTILINGUAL VALUES IN THE INTEGRATION OF NEW MIGRANTS

The study discloses and confirms a widely held belief that being multilingual is a valuable asset when it comes to the integration of new migrants (e.g. Fürstenau 2005; Ribes-Gil, 2011). Similar to the studies that were conducted in the education sector by Dolgunsöz (2013), Okal (2014) and Housen et al. (2014) (see their review in chapter 2), this study also established that in the Windhoek area, being multilingual enables improved communication possibilities at a personal level, for instance when seeking accommodation, as well as a professional level, for example when seeking employment.

Many scholars, such as Baker (2001) and Webb and Kembo-Sure (2000), have commented on how multilingual migrants easily adapt to different social settings as the set of different languages they know helps them to adjust and act like everyone else where they find themselves at that moment. The data of the current study reveal that, for instance, when a person who is from another region and language group finds herself in the Damara location, if she has acquired some Khoekhoegowab, she could use this linguistic resource and behave as if she is a Damara. Similarly, with some proficiency in Otjiherero, a person who moves to the Herero location could easily switch to Otjiherero and in that way integrate with the local community.

Although there is a great deal of consensus in both socio- and psycholinguistic research on the benefits of being bilingual or multilingual (cf. Fishman, 1965; Wei, 2009; Marian & Shook, 2012; Martin-Jones & Martin, 2017 on the advantage of being multilingual), research does not support the view that monolingual speakers have less potential (see Bonfiglio, 2018). Two matters are of interest here. First, a few migrants that were encountered presented themselves as knowing only one language, and then not the official language, nor necessarily one of the languages of power. Second, it was not evident that being multilingual in the informal trading sector gave a significant advantage over those who presented as monolingual. For

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example, Ndeenda, one of the monolinguals and an L1 speaker of Oshiwambo, has repertoires that include more than one language – she could recognise English, Afrikaans and few words/phrases of Afrikaans – but she could not hold or fully understand conversations. The monolinguals who are L1 speakers of Oshiwambo faced fewer difficulties in running their business than monolingual speakers of minority languages such as Sifwe. The only places the monolingual of Oshiwambo L1 face problems – like monolingual speakers of minority languages – is in employment sectors like in construction and/or in the security industry, as English and/or Afrikaans is/are always part of the requirements and the employers would not appoint a person that could not at least demonstrate some command of English, and in some cases Afrikaans.

This study did not find the multilingual migrants to be more creative in communicating and in doing business than those that said they knew only one language, as was discovered by Bialystok (2009) in a study in the education sector. Those in the trading industry, whether monolingual or multilingual, sell similar products such as fruits, vegetables, clothes, accessories, and so on, and appear to have similar challenges and/or successes. Yet, the data confirmed that the multilingual respondents were enabled to search for employment throughout Windhoek and, particularly in working for employers who do not know many languages, they could move to different suburbs as opposed to monolingual migrants whose mobility is limited to Katutura. Also, in finding their way in public places, such as banks, the post office or police stations, multilinguals were at an advantage.

A study that was done in Canada on multilingual employees revealed that multilingual employees earn better salaries than their monolingual colleagues as they are regarded as competitive in the global economy (Chiswick & Miller, 2007). (Also see Basara, 2005; Relano-Pastor, 2015 on the economic benefits of multilingual employees.) In the current study, such a distinction could not be confirmed from the data. It is uncertain from the narratives whether the multilingual traders or employees earned better incomes than their monolingual counterparts. However, what was discovered was the fact that multilingual migrants could apply for jobs competitively – when it comes to securing employment those who had the high-

177 | Page CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION status languages in their repertoires, which in Windhoek were mostly English and/or Afrikaans, and in a few cases also Oshiwambo, were in a better position than those without access to the language(s) of power.

Annury (2017), in a study on multilingual classrooms, claims that multilingualism is an important value when it comes to the unification of people in a particular environment. He suggests that people in multilingual settings tend to identify themselves with their nation rather than with the languages they speak since they know various languages, but are intent on finding common ground. This study on the integration of multilingual migrants in Windhoek finds differently, as people tend to live and work together with people who share their regional, tribal and linguistic backgrounds, thus not overtly enabling the integration of outsiders and foreigners. For instance, Isabel mentioned that her best clientele is those with a similar migration background to hers. Zimbabwean migrants indicated that their support in coming to Windhoek and finding accommodation and employment came from other Zimbabweans. Even among the indigenous people, it was clear that Oshiwambo, Otjiherero and Kwekwegoab speakers mainly kept to themselves. There are anecdotes in the narratives of both Namibians and foreigners, but mostly Namibians, that relate some discrimination against others who do not share the same linguistic resources (see §6.2.3 on discrimination based on languages). They appear to identify with their L1s more than with the Namibian nation. As a result, some discriminate against or abuse others by labelling them and by refusing to support their businesses simply because they do not speak the language of the indigenous people. Unification through language, with a language policy affording official status to English only, is clearly a pipedream. Current research (Frydman, 2011) shows that a single Namibian national language will not achieve national unity or social integration. This indicates a need for more research into how people use their diverse linguistic repertoires successfully in various public spaces.

Stell (2016), who conducted his study in the education sector, refers to English as a lingua franca in education. This study found that English is also widely used as the lingua franca among the migrants in the informal sector. English is the language that enables migrants to communicate with each other and/or the employers when securing economic opportunities in Windhoek as part of their integration. Therefore,

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knowledge of English is a ticket to economic benefits, wider communication with prospective employers, customers and landlords, and wider social belonging in the new environment, which is also one of the prerequisites for new migrants’ integration (Ferrer & Sankoff, 2004; Pillai, 2006; Piller, 2004; Managan, 2004).

As claimed by Mastin (2011), whose work is situated in general linguistics, that English is the language of mass media, entertainment, business, employment and social networking in most countries, the context of Windhoek shows that knowledge of English alone is more important than being multilingual, because English is used everywhere in Windhoek. As mentioned by Bhowmik (2015) in his research on World Englishes and teaching of English as a second or foreign language, there are many varieties of English in the world. It was also discovered that the English spoken by the migrants is not standard English. Among the Namibians, English is influenced by the vocabulary and styles of the local languages. Foreign migrants in Windhoek mentioned that they found the local varieties of English challenging at first, but in time they managed to master it.

Furthermore, apart from English, this study has also found that the migrants felt that knowledge of Afrikaans and Oshiwambo is vital in the integration of new migrants in the city. Afrikaans was Namibia's official language before independence, but still, in postcolonial Windhoek, it remains relevant. Migrants from the central and southern regions of Namibia (see Chapter 5, § 5.2.1, Figure 5.4) testified that the previous government concentrated resources on Afrikaans. Hence it was, and has to a large extent remained, a lingua franca in Windhoek (Stell, 2016). Oshiwambo is not recognised as a lingua franca, but it certainly is the language of the majority of residents in Katutura (Niikondo, 2011), as well as being the L1 of the majority of new internal migrants. Across the city, and as testified by many newcomers (see Mlambo, 2017), Oshiwambo is a very useful language if one wants to find your way and establish working relations in Windhoek. Therefore, as explained by Decker and Grummitt (2012), the three languages required to become part of migrants’ repertoires for them to have choices in various environments are English, Afrikaans and Oshiwambo. For instance, as narrated by the migrants, Afrikaans is a language to use in the construction industry, English is used in various companies and town suburbs, while Oshiwambo is mostly used in Katutura, but also proved to be

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important in using a taxi or going to the police station, for example. Therefore, a migrant who knows these three languages will be able to hold their own in virtually any setting. It is a pity that multilingual Windhoek is in many public places reduced to mastery of English, as this denies the linguistic resources of the majority of the city’s inhabitants. Also, one finds linguistic discrimination favouring Afrikaans (in Khomasdal and in the construction industry) or Oshiwambo (in the public spaces of Katutura). These languages seem to guarantee individuals’ success in the different parts of the informal sector, while speakers of the wide range of other languages tend to be excluded or marginalised.

Code mixing and code switching are also of important value in the linguistically diverse Windhoek. The migrants mix and switch between languages, especially when they struggle to find the right words for concepts in English in their communication with customers whose L1 they do not share. Especially the monolinguals and the Angolan migrants, who do not know English well, even if it is the L2 of all the migrants (Muthusamy, 2010), find themselves isolated. Mixing or switching languages signifies living in a diverse city (McLaugh, 2009). Therefore, mixing languages or switching between languages is vital as it enables the migrants to communicate with customers and potential employers. It also enables migrants of different backgrounds and repertoires to interact verbally, so that through translanguaging they not only communicate, but at the same time also enact their linguistic identities (Greene & Walker, 2004; Wei, 2011, 2018). Gesture, body language, interpreting and written placards are acknowledged and accepted ways of conveying messages when linguistic resources fail (Gumperz, 1964). This is widely encountered in the informal sector of Windhoek. These paralinguistic communicative resources (gesture and body language) and language facilitation practices (interpreting and written, as opposed to verbal, communication) typically emerge as a result of language barriers when people who do not share a language meet. Recent developments in human mobility and globalisation contribute largely to speakers inventing new ways to communicate when they do not have a language in common.

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7.4 THE MIGRANTS’ DISCOURSES AND POSTCOLONIAL THEORY

In agreement with post-colonial effects elsewhere, this study found that many respondents with poor education and limited linguistic knowledge think of their limited opportunities as their fault. They do not recognize the effects of an oppressive system, but rather appear to be ashamed, as if they are personally responsible for putting historic inequalities right. For example, Martha, a monolingual respondent who left school after grade 2 during the war of independence in the north of country, feels she doesn’t know English because she is not gifted in languages. That larger political processes denied her education, and that language development through adult literacy courses is not an equal opportunity, are not transparent to such citizens.

The respondents who formed part of this study did not complain about poor state support; in fact, they are satisfied that they are living in slightly better conditions than they had in their rural villages. That an established social system keeps them in poverty is beyond their grasp. Many of the respondents, especially the male respondents, left their family in villages or in a foreign country to find employment in Windhoek - this practice is rooted in a colonial system which constructed citizens in terms of their value in labour. Many men from rural areas worked on commercial farms south of the ‘red line’, leaving their families behind in less developed villages (see § 2.4 about contract labour system and red line demarcation).The effects of these kinds of labour migration are still felt in many areas.

Although one could argue that there was tribalism prior to colonialism, it seems that colonialism hardened ethnicity and tribalism, which translates into linguistically related discrimination. Colonialism encouraged competition based on one tribe or race being better than the next. As a result, in the postcolonial Windhoek some people still regard certain tribes and their languages are inferior. The latter correlates with many language-related discrimination practices that emerged from the interview data as documented in Chapter 6, § 6.2.3. Further, post-colonialism is manifest in people internalising the status of languages differently. The study’s findings revealed that some speakers, especially of the minority Khoekhoegowab, are so aware of the low status of their language, that they prefer to be identified as Afrikaans speakers (See § 5.2.1 on the Khoekhoegowab and Afrikaans L1 speakers). Similarly, Angolan

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Kimbundu speakers would not identify themselves as such, preferring to be identified as Portuguese L1 speakers (see section 5.3.1). Responding to how colonial divisions attached low status to both Khoekhoegowab and Kimbundu, respondents would refer to languages they believed give them higher status, thus they identified languages which they knew well and used often – Afrikaans or Portuguese, respectively – as their L1.

The language policy in the form Namibia has accepted it, is also a typical post- colonial endeavour. Rather than accepting a long existing division of land among peoples with different languages without working with nation state constructs, and without regulating language uses, the post-colonial government perpetuates colonial ideas of discrete languages and nations that do not fit the lived reality of communities. So, the post 1993 government introduced a language policy did not recognize the use of indigenous languages in the economic sphere of the country. As a result, many indigenous languages are now reduced to home use only. In this way language policy has contributed to the poverty experienced by many, especially those who are not proficient in an international language such as English. A very interesting observation has been that and important social characteristic such as multilingualism, is still not visible to the migrants. Firstly, they often did not recognize the differences in language status as central in their integration in the city. Secondly, many do not notice the contradiction of a government policy that in working towards unity celebrates inclusive multilingualism, but then promotes a monolingual language policy.

That most communities in Windhoek remain affiliated via certain languages, is yet another post-colonial effect. The study has revealed that Afrikaans is most strongly represented in Khomasdal, Oshiwambo in Katutura, and English in the elite suburbs. Community linguistic affiliation is rooted in the colonial system since the South African government rule (see § 2.5.2 on tribal segregation in Windhoek after 1948) segregated people according to tribes, which translate to language divisions that remain marked in the linguistic landscape. Attached to this effect is that Oshiwambo, a majority language in Windhoek, is dominant only in Katutura – this community of speakers has remained concentrated in Katutura, without it spreading to other suburbs of Windhoek. The popularity of Oshiwambo in Windhoek is an indication that

182 | Page CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION the majority L1 speakers of Namibian languages still live in poverty and cannot afford to live in wealthier suburbs. As a result, their languages do not make any impact in the linguistic landscapes of the economically affluent parts of the city.

From the narratives of the migrants, it becomes evident that their social problems are complex (Wodak, 1996; Snel, Engbersen & Leerkes, 2006; OECD, 2013). Not only linguistic barriers, but also a range of other social determiners have to be considered when reflecting on the development and value of various kinds of linguistic repertoires among migrants. Hence, it is difficult to fully understand multilingualism in Windhoek without referring to colonialism, which did not only affect the people’s everyday lives and their societal structures in the past, but continues to do so even in the present. To fully appreciate multilingualism and the rich linguistic repertoires of individuals requires a thorough understanding of migration in Africa and the high tendency toward mobility in African communities. The languages people know, use and value are very intimately linked to circumstances of linguistic inequality that are continually perpetuated and that the migrants experience daily. In postcolonial circumstances, processes of integrating into the city has a linguistic impact that demands scholarly attention (wa Thiong’o, 1986; Thomas & Kaufman, 1988). The current and past power ideologies need to be taken into consideration, also as they emerged in the narratives of the migrants interviewed in this study. Scholars whose work is foundational in post-colonial studies, include Fanon (1952, 1961), Said (1978), Wodak (1996), and Ashcroft et al. (1989). Relevant aspects of postcolonial theory related to linguistics have also been introduced and critically discussed by scholars such as Bolton and Hutton (2000), Schmidt-Brücken, Schuster and Wienberg (2015), and Heller and McIlhenny (2017). These studies have been used as a backdrop to understand the narratives of displacement, hardship and vulnerability that emerge, often indirectly, in the migrants’ reflection on their language biographies and how these relate to their status as newcomers in Windhoek.

The linguistic setup of Windhoek is part of the aftermath of colonial rule. Colonial perspectives are responsible for creating an impression that Namibian indigenous languages, ideas and cultures are inferior to all that is Western, as has been mentioned earlier by Fanon (1967), later by Rubagumya (1991) and quite recently by

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Martín Rojo (2018). The ideologies that developed as part of colonial thought resulted in prestige being attached to English as a European language and a language of education and advancement. This becomes material when we observe that migrants who know English enjoy the benefits of integrating much more easily into the host community of Windhoek than those who do not know it. Although Namibia has been independent since 1990, psychologically, ideologies of minimising African-ness are perpetuated in different ways, also in self-perception and in the evaluation of “the other”. The migrants’ vernacular languages are still suppressed by English (wa Thiong’o, 1986), and even by the colonial languages of former powerful institutions, that is German (currently to a lesser extent) and Afrikaans, which are still mentioned as being valuable, having “cultural capital”, and affording various kinds of opportunity (Frydman, 2011). The many Namibian or African languages that make up the repertoires of the migrants do not have important currency in postcolonial Windhoek, as a result of which they stay confined to Katutura. Traders with limited linguistic repertoires, many representatives of numerically small groups, have less opportunity to market themselves and promote their business; they have to wait for customers to approach them and support their business, while those who are good at English, mostly foreigners of Zimbabwean heritage, move around to places in the whole of Windhoek, from Katutura to town suburbs where wealthy people stay, to find customers, sell their products and/or find employment. Although the latter may merely seem to be a matter of preference, it can be read as evidence of how English is functioning as more than just a language. It is an instrument that buys access, or in wa Thiong’o’s (1986) words, it is a weapon of suppressing people; those who are competent in English feel better equipped than those who do not have it, regardless of whether they know many other vernacular languages. People with low or no English proficiency are scared and uncertain of how to react when potential buyers address them in high-level English, which they do not know. Therefore, as postcolonial theory postulates, the common belief among the Namibian people is that vernacular languages are not necessary; hence many look down on the languages as well as on the speakers (cf. Young, 2009; Fanon, 1967; Rubagumya, 1991). In fact, such elitism actually transfers to the point where speakers position and perceive themselves as worthless and unworthy of more than the meagre means that their repertoires afford them.

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As established by Young (2009) in his article on what can be characterised as “postcolonial”, the languages people know, as well as the social groups to which they belong (such as that of “migrant”), dictate the types of lives they will live in Windhoek. During the colonial era, the vulnerable, who were mostly the black Namibian population, lived in poverty in demarcated areas such as Katutura. After independence, the tables turned, but new forms of perpetuating the disruption of colonial policies have emerged. Now Katutura has become home to economic asylum seekers who live in poverty, and more so if they do not know English (and in some cases also Afrikaans or Oshiwambo). The latter is made clear by the fact that all the migrants in this study’s sample of respondents who do not know English, also those who presented as monolingual migrants, are people who live in Katutura, and they indicated that they operate only in Katutura, close to their shacks or houses.

Furthermore, other respondents, both Namibians and foreigners, explained that their encounters with people who do not know English was in deep Katutura in informal settlements. This means their trajectories within Windhoek are confined to Katutura, as they lack the right language to facilitate their journeys into other suburbs, where access is mostly enabled by English, or to a lesser extent Afrikaans. Therefore, similarly to the pre-independence situation which was characterised by Katutura being an area accommodating mostly labourers, more recently, post-independence, when it comes to informal industry, Katutura is remains a place that accommodates those who are vulnerable. The connection between their vulnerability and their language repertoires is not incidental. A postcolonial lens identifies these migrant communities as victims of the current political system that remains determined by structures and values that afford privilege in ways that do not acknowledge or prioritise the resources that many migrants possess. The linguistic dominance and the unequal opportunities that are currently disadvantaging the vulnerable residents, especially the migrants, are a result of governmental and managerial failure and power abuse (Wadak, 1997; Said, 1978; Fanon 1952, 1961).

More recent reflection on political failure aligns with this perspective in that many African leaders cannot imagine development and wealth in other terms than being imported (cf. Alemazung, 2010; Platteau & Gaspart, 2003). The language policy of the country is in part also a continuation of the many ways in which imprints of

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European colonialism remain. The decision to institute an English-only official language policy carries a denial of equal value of all languages and renders English an instrument that excludes a very large proportion of the Namibian population, as well as other migrant groups, from participation in public action and discourses. Those who are already vulnerable, due also to the linguistic dispensation, are denied access to good education, and their opportunities to gain improved qualifications to expand their life chances, are minimised – to such an extent that they do not perceive themselves able or deserving of upward mobility.

When it comes to employment opportunities, English has liberated those who are proficient in the language and suppressed those who do not know it. This can be linked to the same ideology that promotes all that is Western, including the languages (Kayira, 2015). This study has revealed that the migrants who do not know English and/or Afrikaans lack confidence in seeking employment opportunities, as they do not have the required languages as part of their repertoire. Namibian languages are hardly ever a requirement for a job. Employers already have the economic power since they have the means to employ people; additionally, they exercise linguistic power over people when they expect the migrants to know English and thereby strengthen the perception that without English they will never be employed. In a way this makes the migrants believe that English is superior to their vernacular languages (Martín Rojo, 2018; Meyer, 2001). English, or sometimes Afrikaans in addition to English, is compulsory in virtually all the employment sectors in Windhoek. Thus, English has become a limiting factor (cf. wa Thiongo, 1986; Kumar, 2009) that disempowers the asylum seekers and other migrants. Hence many believe this policy should be contested (Janks, 1993). Politically speaking, Namibia with Windhoek as its capital city is independent; however, many find English to be a new coloniser that is betraying the ideals of the people and confining them to poverty. With limited chances to secure employment and better accommodation or to conduct their businesses in any of the urban spaces, life chances become dependent on a language provision (Kumar, 2009; Sawant, 2011).

The current Namibian language policy is contributing to the continued suppression of local languages. With English as the sole official language in the country, indigenous languages are given lesser status, which besides signalling to citizens that their

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languages are inferior, in a way also regulates the behaviours of the migrants and the employers, as one language is given more privileges (Martín Rojo, 2018). Thus, English is more than just a pragmatic arrangement; it is overly powerful in giving social advantage in the country to one language at the expense of the indigenous languages. As explained by Ngefac (2010), colonialism introduced English in Africa, but Namibia was never a British colony, so its connection to colonialism is relatively complex. Through the colonial rule of Germany (1884-1915) and then through South African administration, the country was divided, regulating places where people live in Windhoek according to their tribes and related indigenous languages. Therefore, at present, the division tactic is perpetuated indirectly by the current administration to divide people according to their economic status, thus situating most of the migrants in Katutura. Although the status of English is increasingly growing at the expense of local languages, a practice criticised by scholars such as Wa Thiongo (1986), some local languages such as Oshiwambo and Africans are gaining momentum especially in townships which were previously reserved for speakers for those languages. New migrants have the opportunity to move into areas other than Katatura, thus are able to claim space for other languages, also in the informal sector of Windhoek beyond Katatura. This gives some insight as to the value of different languages in an urban multilingual space: it can be determined by the number of speakers it has, as is the case with Oshiwambo; or it can be determined by the economic status of its speakers, as it the case with Afrikaans. Many L1 speakers of Afrikaans have maintained economic stability and even strength since it was largely the language of pre-independence administration.

The post-independence Namibia gave people severely restricted rights to migrate into and out of the country. However, this freedom of movement is controlled by other forces, of which language is one such a tool that used to continue the effects of colonialism. It is one of the new limiting factors that restrict the migrants in their attempts to secure opportunities in Windhoek (Kumar, 2009). Of course, Africa, to be specific Namibia and Windhoek, was already multilingual before colonialism (wa Thiongo, 1986); however, colonialism instilled the belief in people that some languages are more important than others. This belief is hurting many migrants in their daily journeys to integrate into Windhoek. At the moment, being multilingual without having English, Afrikaans or Oshiwambo as part of one’s linguistic repertoire

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does not benefit the migrants. Even those who know other indigenous Namibian languages, especially minority languages such as Nyenba or Khoekhoegowab, do not derive any economic benefit (Foucault, 1980). De Waele and Nakano (2013) in their study that investigated the feelings of multilingual people when using second or third languages, found that for a number of reasons many do not feel comfortable in using those languages. In the context of Windhoek, this is more complex: if the speaker’s L2 or L3 is a Namibian/African language, even if they are fluent and therefore more confident in such a language, they do not feel empowered.

On the other hand, with an L2 that is a language of power and of gaining access, people feel civilised and empowered when using such an L2 or L3. The data demonstrate that this is especially the case when those languages are European languages such as French, Portuguese or English. In fact, locals regard those who are most proficient in African languages without competence in one of the European languages, as primitive. This again is explained by postcolonial theory, which suggests that colonialism caused people to look down on everything that is African (Rubagumya, 1991). This is noticeable, for example, in how most Angolan migrants preferred to be identified as being Portuguese L1 speakers, although it is their L2.

In postcolonial Windhoek, most of the people have a hybrid national, personal and linguistic identity (Achebe, 2006) due also to the presence of various indigenous languages. Nevertheless, the indigenous identity instilled in the migrants by their indigenous languages does not contribute to the migrants’ integration in the global economy (Jones & Barkhuizen, 2011). The indigenous languages are suppressed by Western languages, and when people’s languages are suppressed, their identities are also suppressed (Delpit & Dowby, 2002). There is no doubt that English has suppressed the identity of many migrants in Windhoek, not only those of foreign heritage, but also the internal migrants who are L1 speakers of the Namibian minority languages. Their linguistic repertoires contribute to subjecting them to poverty and social injustice.

Also, this study will reveal that there is a power difference between those who know English and those who have limited command of the language. Those who know English are empowered, gain secure employment more easily, and thus can make a better living. The results will show a correlation between living in poverty and not

188 | Page CHAPTER 7: PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION knowing English; most who have no English proficiency are vulnerable and self- employed. The latter affects the possibility of realizing hopes of a better future that drives so many migrants to Windhoek.

Further, added to the power difference between English speakers and others, there is a distinction between those who know Oshiwambo and those who do not. A few Oshiwambo speakers feel oppressed and intimidated in some instances (see the analysis in § 6.2.1). This is an indication that many years after independence in the postcolonial state people are still divided based in the status of their languages in the society. There is no general understanding that all languages are important in multilingual settings, and that languages with small numbers of speakers need special protection. Although, some argue that where there are speakers of many languages there will always be power differences, this study suggests that practices of inclusive multilingualism would be a better way to minimise the power differences that emerge between those who speakers of more and less powerful languages.

This study has disclosed that there were some elements of mistreatment due to language difference. The speakers of majority languages feel they are more powerful and better than the speakers of the minority language which, according to some participants resulted in them being taunted, such as in labelling, or in people refusing to support thier businesses, as explained in section 6.2.3.

7.6 SUMMARY OF FINDINGS AS PER THE RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

To summarise the study’s findings, I now return to the research objectives that were outlined in chapter 1. For ease of reference, they are repeated here and linked to the insights that emerged from the analyses in chapters 5 and 6.

7.6.1: The study aimed first to establish what the linguistic repertoires of a selected number of recent migrants to Windhoek are. This objective is met by relying on data from the questionnaire. The interview data enabled the researcher to refine some of the insights.

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• As the concept ‘linguistic repertoire’ has been clearly defined in various contexts by e.g. Gumperz (1964) and Busch (2015) (see §3.4), this study aligns with these definitions in referring to the languages that respondents know and actively use in conversations. Although the data does not elaborate on repertoire by using (e.g.) language portraits, we agree that evidence of purist grammaticality is not used as a measure, and we recognize that often speakers know more languages than they list when asked to consciously reflect. The linguistic repertoires of the new migrants are influenced by the geography as explained by other scholars, but to a great extent, they are also determined by the education opportunities of the respondents, and the kids of intercultural contact they are exposed to.

• In a survey of 440 internal and external migrants it was established that the repertoires of the Namibian migrants consist mostly of their L1s and English. A small number of people (46) had no knowledge of English. The repertoires of the majority of the respondents is therefore limited to active knowledge of two languages. Still, due to the variety of indigenous languages in the urban context, many have passive or fragmented knowledge of more than only two. • Fifteen different Namibian languages were reported as L1s of the Namibian migrants. • Most of the internal migrants' L1s are Bantu languages. Most cannot speak or understand other ethnic languages beyond their own L1s. However, speakers of different language forms identified as dialects of the same language family, such as Rukwangari, Thimbukushu and Nyemba that are known as varieties of the Rukavango language (see § 5.2.1 for explanation on relations of the latter languages), do in fact have access to the different L1s of the particular family. • A majority of the Namibian migrants know English as their L2 as it is taught at all the schools. As an L2, English is followed by Afrikaans, which is understood by those who are initially from other urban centres such as Swakopmund, Rundu or Oshakati, or who had been living in other urban centres before they came to Windhoek. • The Namibian migrants who claimed to know only their L1 were speakers of Oshiwambo and Nyemba. The Oshiwambo L1 speakers who identified

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themselves as monolingual feel that knowing only Oshiwambo is sufficient for their survival and integration in Windhoek; L1 speakers of other languages with no functional proficiency in an L2 reported considerable more difficulties. • The repertoires of foreign migrants differ depending on their place of origin. The Zimbabwean migrants mostly claimed knowledge of their L1 and English only, while the Angolan migrants claimed to know their L1, Portuguese and English; the Congolese claimed knowledge of their L1, French and additionally some other Congolese indigenous languages such as Swahili and Lingara, while the Ethiopian migrant’s repertoire consisted of his L1, Amharic and English. • The foreign migrants have many different languages in their repertoires – on average this group reported three languages in their full repertoires. Even so, the finding is that only their knowledge of English is useful to facilitate their settlement in Windhoek. • Both the Namibian and foreign migrants’ repertoires were clearly shaped by and therefore also resembled those of the region, the community or country they came from. • Namibian, as well as foreign, migrants have developed a number of resourceful ways to communicate whenever they are faced by language barriers in Windhoek. These communicative resources include translation/interpreting, code mixing, written posters and writing down numbers.

7.6.2: Second, the study aimed to establish how the linguistic repertoires of the selected migrants may or may not help them to settle and secure employment in Windhoek. This objective is met by using data from the questionnaire, which led to the selection of respondents for interviews, as the interview data enabled detailed insight into personal experiences of different categories of respondents.

• English, unsurprisingly, was reported as the most helpful resource when it comes to the migrants settling or securing a job. All the interviewed respondents mentioned it, even those who do not know English. Additionally, besides English, Oshiwambo and Afrikaans were mentioned, depending on

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where in Windhoek the person operates, e.g. Katatura versus Khomasdal or Eros. • Different language repertoires are vital in different suburbs and areas of employment. For instance, Oshiwambo is mostly helpful for those operating in Katutura. For the vendors operating in Khomasdal, knowledge of Afrikaans together with English is helpful. Otjiherero is a minority language, and thus the knowledge of Otjiherero was found to be beneficial only in the small segment of Katutura, Herero location, an area that was designated for Otjiherero- speaking people during the apartheid era, but after independence the location has been occupied by speakers of many other Namibian languages; however, the Otjiherero L1 speakers seem to be the majority in that location. Other Namibian languages such as Khoekhoegowab, Sifwe, Lukavango and so forth did not have specific areas where knowledge of such languages was found to be helpful as their speakers are spread out in different areas of Windhoek. • In employment in the construction industry, Afrikaans is reportedly more helpful than knowledge of English and Oshiwambo. • For other employment opportunities such as in the hospitality industry, in domestic work or casual day jobs, English and/or Afrikaans is/are important. • Except knowledge of Oshiwambo, for those respondents trading in Katutura, the Namibian indigenous languages do not bring any advantage in the process of their settling and securing employment in Windhoek. • Foreign migrant respondents solely depend on English for settling and securing jobs since they do not know Afrikaans or Oshiwambo and their knowledge of their vernacular languages is not helpful in Windhoek. Some of the respondents making a living as vendors reported how they were extending their repertoires by learning Afrikaans and/or Oshiwambo. Such language acquisition was completely informal and dependent on the need as well as the entrepreneurial attitude of the learner.

7.6.3: Third, the study aimed to establish, according to their own perceptions, how migrants’ repertoires need or need not be extended in order to improve their opportunities regarding settlement and employment. This objective is met by drawing on the data from the interviews.

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• The Namibian multilingual migrants feel they need to know Afrikaans in addition to English, which they already know. • Namibian non-Oshiwambo monolingual migrants feel they need to extend their repertoires with Oshiwambo and English in order to broaden their chances. • Some Oshiwambo monolinguals who operate in Katutura feel there is no need to extend their repertoires as the knowledge of their L1 Oshiwambo alone is sufficient. • The foreign migrants who operate in Katutura feel that they need to learn Oshiwambo as the majority of the people they meet who do not know English in Katutura are Oshiwambo speakers. Those who operate in other suburbs except Katutura believe that they should extend their repertoire with Afrikaans because Afrikaans is known by many tribes’ people, except Oshiwambo people.

7.6.4: Fourth, the study aimed to establish, describe and interpret migrants’ discourses of mobility with relation to their language biographies and linguistic repertoires after their arrival in Windhoek. This objective is met by drawing on data from the interviews. Although only 25 respondents were interviewed and the recorded data gave valuable insight into the experiences, impressions and attitudes of migrants regarding the connection between language and their integration into Windhoek communities, as well as their life chances and future prospects.

• The Angolan migrants’ knowledge of English is an indication that they had spent time in other places in Namibia before they came to Windhoek. The respondents in this case especially reported on living in Osire Refugee Camp, where most of them where accommodated and schooled in English. The Angolans who do not know English came straight from Angola to Windhoek and thus they did not get the opportunity to learn English formally in school. • Although some Congolese knew English before coming to Namibia, they reported not having learnt English at school in their home country. The majority of those who know English well lived in the Osire Refugee Camp before they came to Windhoek.

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• Namibian migrants who are from the southern or central regions, thus those from south of the red line (see Chapter 2 about the red line), had in the course of growing up learnt Afrikaans in addition to English and their L1, while those migrants who are from the northern regions (Oshana, Oshikoto, Omusati, Kavango West, Kavango East and Zambezi region) do not know Afrikaans because Afrikaans is an urban language that is not spoken much in rural areas previously known as the “communal area” (see Chapter 2). This means that biographically, Namibians from villages in the northern areas would not have encountered Afrikaans, and therefore were unlikely, formally or informally, to have learnt this language of former power, and still one of upward mobility. • The mobility of the migrants who know only their L1 is limited to Katutura; they work and are accommodated there. • The migrants who know English well, especially the Zimbabwean migrants whose biographies show that they were schooled through the medium of English, move around the whole of Windhoek, mostly as vendors selling their products. • In differentiating between formal and informal employment, only the migrants (both Namibian and foreigners) who know English and/or Afrikaans find formal or contracted employment. Those whose linguistic resources are limited in these official and formerly official languages are mostly self-employed as street vendors, and they do not even seek other employment because they do not have the required languages. Oshiwambo appears to be an exceptional case in that it is a majority language and a language of power among the indigenous Namibian languages in Windhoek. Therefore, some evidence emerged for privileged appointment of Oshiwambo L1 speakers in positions where English was a requirement, which the applicant hardly could meet. • From the narratives of the migrants, various themes emerged, as discussed in Chapter 6. Respondents gave insight into the vitality of being multilingual, as well as on how the multilingual society benefits mostly those of majority language groups like Oshiwambo and disadvantages those of minority language groups. Foreigners, who can easily be identified on the basis of the languages they speak, reported experiences of being discriminated against.

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Furthermore, issues of language and identity also emerged. Most interestingly, from a research perspective, most of the migrants at first said they did not believe that language had facilitated or impeded their journey to Windhoek, as they mostly go where they know people, without thinking about the languages. Only on being asked to elaborate did they recognise and acknowledge the role of language. Foreign migrants raised the problem of having to leave behind difficult circumstances and their desire to seek economic survival as the force that brought them to Windhoek. Thus, similarly, they did not reflect much on the languages they would encounter. This confirms that the role language plays, even if it is strongly determinant of the educational and employment opportunities migrants have, is largely opaque – language is consciously and unconsciously used to include or exclude, and for a large part it is not immediately visible.

7.7 Presentation of the key findings

The study revealed that language is perhaps much less of a push-pull factor in the mobility of migrant communities. Most respondents at first denied the importance of language in their attempts to settle in Windhoek. Only after more specific questions, would they remember and acknowledge experiences of language discrimination. Even so, language is a strong marker of where a person is situated in the cultural and social dispensation of the city.

The study also confirmed a long established insight that there is a connection between economic insecurity and migration; most of the respondents’ narratives explained their mobility in terms of searching for economic opportunity.

The study revealed a need for indigenous Namibian languages to be considered more seriously in future language policy debates, to emphasize the historic language diversity of the country; indeed, of the whole region. Current trends indicate the demise of minoritized languages in Windhoek as a result of their speakers moving to Windhoek and being overwhelmed by ones with more social status and greater numbers of speakers.

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Children born to migrants in Windhoek. e.g. a new generation of Shona or Ndebele children of Zimbabwean migrants, could eventually claim language rights as new multilingual Namibians. There is a need to redefine what counts as Namibian languages. Appropriate definitions are likely to move away from the confines of certain geographic areas.

The study disclosed that a new metro-language is used in the Namibian informal sector, which has reduced pidgin-like features. Speakers who are not fluent in Egnlish or Oshiwambo, e.g. develop means of interacting which need to be further studied.

Further, the study revealed that the formal language policy used in Windhoek impacts on the economic livelihood of the migrants in the informal sector. Although English was introduced as a strategy to promote linguistic inclusiveness for all the people in the country, when it comes to the informal sector English disadvantages many people whose repertoires does not include it. Therefore, there is a need for a better language policy which recognises de facto language practices which use of all vernacular languages in the country.

7.8 CONCLUSION

The study concludes by affirming that Windhoek is a linguistically diverse city with both Namibian and foreign languages present. That the country has accepted a monolingual language policy, instituting English as the only official language, denies and obscures this linguistic diversity. As a result, English is limiting the chances of many, and of the migrants in particular. Especially those who are not good in English and therefore are already academically vulnerable, are severely disadvantaged. Although all the migrants are vulnerable, the most vulnerable ones are those who do not know English (in this study the Namibian, Angolan, and Congolese migrants). They mostly ceased searching for employment as they do not have the right language. Furthermore, even their trajectories within Windhoek are mostly limited to informal settlements in Katutura.

Although the migrants have many other languages as part of their linguistic resources, most of them cannot confidently speak beyond their ethnic language,

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hence they depend on English as a lingua franca for inter-ethnic communication and to a lesser extent, for some Namibians, on Afrikaans. Code mixing, translation/interpreting, written posters and writing down of numbers are some of the linguistic mechanisms that the migrants employ to communicate whenever they are faced with language barriers. Although both Namibian and foreign migrants of different L1s live in Katutura, the knowledge of Oshiwambo is mostly useful for trading in Katutura, not because Oshiwambo is known even by those who are not Oshiwambo L1s in Katutura, but because Oshiwambo is a language of the majority of migrants in Katutura (Niikondo, 2011), and the majority of the people in Katutura as well as the majority of the Namibian population are Oshiwambo (cf. Frayne & Pendleton, 2002; Namibia Statistics Agency, 2012).

English is the most useful language that the migrants believed helped them to settle or secure employment in Windhoek, followed by Afrikaans for those in construction and/or those who trade in town suburbs such as Klein Kuppe and Khomasdal. Furthermore, Oshiwambo is only useful in Katutura. Language is not perceived as facilitating the journeys of the migrants from their place of origin to Windhoek as some only came because they know people in Windhoek prior to their travel, while others, especially foreigners, were simply trying to escape from their political and economic problems, coming to seek medical care or better education, without thinking of the languages they would encounter. Afrikaans emerges largely as an urban language that is only known by migrants who are from other urban centres in the country or those who settled in other urban centres before heading to Windhoek.

Also, from the narrative of the migrants, the study concludes that being multilingual is vital in general, but it does not help many migrants as even though Windhoek is multilingual, knowledge of all the languages is not important. Some languages, mostly the vernacular languages, appear not to serve any purpose in Windhoek, apart from a very important function of maintaining family and community ties, and communicating and identifying with people of that language group. Thus, knowledge of English alone might at a pragmatic level be more useful than knowledge of many Namibian and African vernacular languages. However, from a personal and social identity perspective, people’s L1s have not lost their function or significance, even without official status.

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This study also concludes that apart from Oshiwambo in Katutura, the migrants do not regard their L1s as important as they do not serve any purpose in national discourses. The Namibian migrants of minority languages and foreigners suffer discrimination on the basis of language or they are labelled mostly by the speakers of Oshiwambo because they are majority migrants. The fact that Windhoek is a capital city with many opportunities attracts many people to Windhoek to find employment, but upon arriving in Windhoek, the majority struggle to find such opportunities and thus they establish their own business in Windhoek; that is why the majority of the respondents are street vendors.

From the questionnaire data collected from 440 respondents, the conclusion can be drawn that most home communities, especially in remote areas both in Namibia and other African countries, cannot sustain their citizens in terms of employment. As a result, people seek a living elsewhere in towns such as Windhoek. This contributes to multilingualism in Windhoek, but still, colonial attitudes and practices inhibit full integration.

7.9 RECOMMENDATIONS

Given the above major findings of this research, this study has a number of practical recommendations. Starting with the policy makers, the study joins other calls to revisit and change the Namibian language policy from a monolingual policy to a multilingual policy. The capital city, and the country as a whole, is multilingual and most of the occupants are multilingual. Therefore, if more languages are given official status, those who only know vernacular languages may have better chances of finding opportunities than they do now.

Furthermore, if English is given prominence while the indigenous languages are neglected, it is very likely to affect the future and life span of indigenous languages. To sustain linguistic diversity, it is important to counter a trend in which people emphasize knowledge of English while not properly attending to their L1s. The study recommends that future researchers investigate ways of raising the status of Namibian indigenous languages to that of English in order to recognise their value even to the point of encouraging migrants to maintain their languages for the generations after them. The question that needs to be asked is how we can raise the

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relevance of Namibian local languages in the economic and social context in postcolonial Windhoek. We must recognise some of the Namibian vernaculars together with English (Achebe, 2006), and confer the same power on them as that of English. This will result in people having their voices heard through their indigenous languages, the languages in which people are comfortable to express themselves (cf. Young, 2009).

Authoritative institutions should be encouraged to inspire speakers of indigenous languages to develop their home languages. That can be done by attaching economic and social benefits to the indigenous language. For instance, instead of positions requiring English and/or Afrikaans only, other indigenous languages such as Sifwe, Oshiwambo and Nyemba could be added to the job requirements in relevant contexts. In this way, people, including migrants, will have pride in using their languages as they benefit from them socially and/or economically.

The study further recommends research that will investigate how the repertoires of the new migrants change over time in Windhoek. Also, future research could investigate the repertoires of the migrants’ children, with regard to those who have children in Windhoek, to find out how the children’s repertoires are similar to and/or different from those of their parents. At the moment it seems that neither migrant adults, nor their children receive assistance in the form of short courses (e.g.) from the government or other public institutions in the process of linguistically integrating them in the city.

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Wright, W.E. (2013). Bilingual education. In T.K. Bhatia & W.C. Ritchie (eds.). The Handbook of Bilingualism and Multilingualism (2nd edition) (pp. 598-623). Oxford: John Wiley & Sons.

Young, R.T. (2009). What is the postcolonial? ARIEL: A Review of international English Literature, 40(1):13-ß25. Available from: https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/ariel/article/view/33560

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APPENDIX A QUESTIONNAIRE

Language Biographies:

Q. no......

DATE: ......

Location of data collection: ......

Meta-data:

Name: ......

Contact details (tel no.): ......

Address in Windhoek: ......

Age: ......

Gender: female male

Languages: Which languages do you understand, speak, read, write, in which domain

My mother tongue is …………………………………….

Other languages which I know (specify where necessary): rate your proficiency on a scale of 1 to 5 (where 1 is excellent and 5 is poor):

WHEN / WHERE understand speak read write you use this language

English

Afrikaans

Oshiwambo

Otjiherero

Silozi

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WHEN / WHERE understand speak read write you use this language

Rukavango

Khoekhoegowab

Nama

Others (Specify)

……………

Others (Specify)

………….

Others (Specify)

…………….

Formal education/schooling (give the name of your school, and the place) SCHOOL (PRIMARY)

......

SCHOOL (SECONDARY

......

Training after school

......

Place(s) of origin:

Currently living in ......

Living here since ......

Places of residence before Windhoek (Give approximate date in each case):

Birthplace ......

Early years ......

Left home town ......

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This table asks for information on where and when you learnt the languages you listed in question 3. Please complete the table below for each language you listed. Fill in the name of the languages in column (A), the age at which you learnt it in column (B), the place and setting in which you learnt it in column (C), and people among which you learnt it in column (D).

A B C D

Age of Place/context of Person you interacted Languages acquisition acquisition with during acquisition

English

Afrikaans

Oshiwambo

Otjiherero

Silozi

Rukavango

Khoekhoegowab

Nama

Others (specify) ......

Others (specify) ......

Others (specify) ......

Family: (Give brief information: married, children – in Windhoek or not – to explain home language used currently.)

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APPENDIX B INTERVIEW GUIDE

The following topics will be included in the interview to guide the conversation.  Do you think language helped you to get the job/ run your business?  Is knowing many languages essential in Windhoek?  What are some of the benefits and/or disadvantages of knowing many languages for the people in the informal industry.  Have you ever felt discriminated because of knowing or not knowing a certain language?  How do you find the use of language in your job/ informal sector?  If you are to advise someone who is thinking of migrating to Windhoek to find the job, which language will say they must know?

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APPENDIX C INFORMED CONSENT FORM

Informed consent form Name of the researcher: Julia N. Indongo Contact details: +264812185691 (Cell); Work number: +264612072019 Supervisor: Prof. E. Cornelius, University of Johannesburg Co-supervisor: Prof. C. Anthonissen, Stellenbosch University

1. Title of the study: Language and mobility: A study of migrants’ discourses in Windhoek, Namibia

2. Purpose of the study: This study investigates the multilingual profiles of recently arrived migrants to Windhoek in Namibia and how they report on their mobility. It is interested in the ways in which newcomers to the capital city reflect on what brought them here and how the languages they know have helped (or perhaps not helped) them to settle in terms of finding accommodation, finding employment and taking care of their families. A study of the kind of linguistic variety we find in Windhoek will teach us about the role of language in experiences of migration in an African city.

3. Procedures to be followed and their purposes: Data will be collected by means of a questionnaire administered by a trained student of the Windhoek University of Technology. Following this, a smaller number of respondents will be invited to take part in an interview where more detailed additional information will be asked. The interviews will be recorded and transcribed by the researcher.

4. Risks and discomforts: There are no foreseeable risks to respondents in the study. If a situation does arise in which respondents feel uncomfortable or in some way alarmed, they may withdraw from further participation. The researcher will, in the event of any unforeseen distress, consult a psychologist at the Namibian Ministry of Gender and Child Welfare.

5. Confidentiality: Confidentiality and anonymity are guaranteed. Information collected from respondents during the research will be kept in a locked filing cabinet and a password-protected computer, and only the researcher and her supervisors will be

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able to access it. Information sheets and recordings will be coded so that names and personal details remain strictly private and anonymous. Only the researchers will have access to the raw data. Information will not be shared with or given to anyone except the supervisors, Prof. E. Cornelius and Prof. C. Anthonissen.

6. Benefits: There will be no payments for participating in this study. Respondents will assist in the development of new knowledge about language and migrant experiences. In time the findings may assist policy makers in a post-independence Namibia to make informed decisions when attempting to redress past, existing and new language inequalities.

7. Respondents' rights: Participation in this study is voluntary. Respondents are free at any stage to withdraw from the study or request that the material they offered be removed from the data-set.

8. Right of access: If respondents have any questions before the study has started, during or after the contact sessions, they are free to ask the interviewer. Should respondents want to contact the researcher for further clarity, they have the right to contact her or the supervisors on the contact details provided above. The information about the project and interview was explained to me in the language I understand (Oshiwambo/ English/Nyemba). I am satisfied that I understand and have had the opportunity to ask questions before signing consent for use of the recordings.

Respondent’s name: ...... Signed at ...... on this ...... day of ...... 2016.

Respondent’s signature: ...... Researcher’s signature: ......

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