English in South Africa
Raymond Hickey, English Linguistics University of Duisburg and Essen
email: [email protected] 1 Southern African countries
2 Location of the Republic of South Africa
3 Physical geography of South Africa
4 5 Climatic regions of South Africa
6 Early Cartography of Africa
7 Africa (1550) by Dutch cartographer Sebastian Münster
8 Africa (early 17c) by English cartographer John Speed
10 History of South Africa
1)Indigenous peoples of southern Africa inhabit the region. Their descendents are to be found in the Kalahari Basin of Namibia, Botswana and parts of South Africa and speak a variety of languages, between which the genetic relationships are not always easy to determine. 2)In the early centuries CE Bantu peoples begin to move into the area of southern Africa. Their descendents constitute the black population of South Africa.
11 Bantu Migrations from Central to Southern Africa
12 History of South Africa
3)The first European to explore the coast of South Africa was Bartolomeu Dias in 1488. In 1497 the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope and opened the Indian Ocean for European colonial trade. 4)In 1654 the first Dutch settled in the Cape region, led by Jan van Riebeeck who established a colony there for the Dutch East Company interested in trading in spices.
13 Jan van Riebeeck(1619-1677) arrives in the Cape in 1652 to found a station for the Dutch East India Company between the Atlantic and Indian oceans.
14 The Dutch East Indies during the early colonial period
15 The southern Dutch dialects spoken by the first settlers developed over time into Cape Dutch Vernacular which was standadised in the early twentieth century and officially called Afrikaans.
16 Afrikaanse Taalmonument near Paarl in the Cape, a museum dedicated to the Afrikaans language.
The three pillars stand, in order of size, for Afrikaans, English and the other languages.
17 Afrikaans is now spoken by about 7m people (13-14%) in South Africa.
18 History of South Africa
5) In 1795 the British occupied the Cape region to prevent it being taken by their main rivals in Europe, the French. 6)In 1820 the British send about 5,000 middle-class settlers to the Port Elizabeth –Grahamstown region of the Eastern Cape.1654 the first Dutch settled in the Cape region. 7)In the 1840s more settlers follow, this time to the region of Natal (now KwaZulu Natal), starting around Durban and moving into the hinterland. 19 The 1820 Settlers Monument at Grahamstown, Eastern Cape
20 History of South Africa
8)In order to makeup for the shortfall in labour following the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1834, the British government transported people from northern and southern India to the province of Natal between 1860 and 1911 to work at labourers on the sugar plantations. Cane sugar was an important cash crop in the subtropical climate of Natal, located on the Indian Ocean.
21 English Settlement of South Africa
22 Indian migrations in the Indian Ocean and to East Africa
23 The Transportation of Indians to South Africa in the late 19th Century
24 Indian indentured labourers
25 The Indian population, largely speakers of Bhojpuri (a variety of Hindi) and Tamil (a Dravidian language) gradually shifted to English in the course of the twentieth century.
26 Migrations in South Africa in recent history
27 The Great Trek (1835-1846) when the Voortrekkers moved away from the Cape region north-westwards to the Transvaal region.
28 Monument to the Voortrekkers in Pretoria
29 30 History of South Africa
9)The Voortrekkers initially migrated to the area of Natal where they negotiated a land treaty with the Zulu king Dingane in 1838. However, the delegation under Piet Retief was killed as were several hundred Voortrekkers in the Blaukrans massacre. At a further battle they were successful against the Zulu and found the Natalian Republic in 1839. This area was annexed by the British in 1843 after which many Boers decided to move further north. They later found the Orange Free State and the South African Republic which remained separate entities until annexed by the British in 1900 after the Second Anglo-Boer War. 31 32 History of South Africa
10)Throughout the 19th century the Zulu in the east of southern Africa were involved in military conflicts, with both the Dutch and the English in the region. Often successful against the British they were finally defeated in the Anglo-Zulu War of the 1870s and not granted any formal recognition in the later Union of South Africa.
33 King Shaka (1787-1828), one of the most successful Zulu leaders.
34 Colonial Activity and the Partition of Africa
35 Division of Southern Africa in the late 19th / early 20th century.Notethe presence of two regions called Griqualand which were areas in which “coloureds”(the offspring of Europeans and non- Europeans) settled. These regions were later absorbed into other provinces.
36 British colonial activity in the north of Southern Africa in the late 19th century was dominated by the search for diamonds and gold, especially in the region of Johannesburg in the region then known as the South African Republic (1852- 1902).
Cecil Rhodes (1853-1902) is the greatest icon of colonialism in present-day South Africa. He is reputed to have said “Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life”.
37 A famous caricature of Rhodes based on his wish to link the Cape to Cairo by a telegraphic line.
38 39 The Cecil Rhodes monument overlooking Cape Town with a view to the north.
40 The (former) statue of Cecil Rhodes at the Upper Campus of the University of Cape Town which was removed on 9 April 2015 as a result of pressure from the Rhodes Must Fall movement.
41 Africa at the time of the Scramble for Africa
42 43 44 European colonies in Africa just before WWI
45 Countries in present- day Africa
46 The Provinces of present-day South Africa
47 The Apartheid Era
48 Background
The Union of South Africa was formed in 1910 with the unification of four British colonies –the Cape, Natal, Transvaal and Orange River. The Union lasted until 1961 when the Republic of South Africa was formed. In the beginning the Union was a self-governing dominion within the British Empire (like Canada). The ties with Britain were, however, weaker not least because of the dominance of Afrikaner in the government, a group which harboured historical grievances against the British. In 1925 Afrikaans became an official language of the Union just after the National Party came to power in 1924
49 Background
The National Party, staunchly Afrikaaner, was out of office during WWII but was returned in 1948 to 1994. During this time it implemented its policy of Apartheid (“separateness”) which segregated the races in South Africa, securing all social privileges for whites and none for black. In order to control the black population, the government instituted a system of homelands (bantustans), poorer areas of the coutnrywhere blacks were forced to live. With the release of the iconic black leader Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) in 1990 the road was clear for democratic elections which led to the first black government in 1994 and a new, justerconstitution in 1996.
50 Black homelands of the apartheid era
51 52 The Sharpeville massacre (21 March 1960, now Human Rights Day in South Africa) in which 69 blacks were killed by police during a demonstration against the Apartheid pass laws. Another iconic protest was that by students in Soweto (near Johannesburg) in 1976 against the introduction of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction in schools which led to the killing of at least 176 people by police.
53 54 The Rainbow Nation (1994 -)
55 Post-apartheid, modern South Africa
Nelson Mandela (1918- 2013) is released from prison on Robben Island and negotiates with F. W. De Klerk, the then president of South Africa, about a peaceful transition to majority Black rule in South Africa
56 The constitutionally recognised languages of present-day South Africa are the following 11: Afrikaans, English, Xhosa, Zulu, Northern Sotho, Southern Sotho, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Swazi, Southern Ndebele
57 Languages in Africa
58 59 60 The Bantu languages in South Africa resulted from a southward migration. The languages of the Kalahari Basin, formerly labelled Khoisan, are original languages of the south-west of Africa and consist of many unrelated languages now spoken by very small numbers. 61 Map from the Kalahari Basin Project, Humboldt University Berlin 62 63 64 65 English in Africa
66 67 Divisions by region
West Africa 1: English in Cameroon 2: English in Nigeria 3: English in Ghana 4: English in Liberia 5: English in Sierra Leone
East Africa English in Tanzania
Southern Africa (distinguish South Africa –a country –and Southern Africa –a region) 1: Language in South Africa, 1: South African English 2: Language in South Africa, 2: Afrikaans English 3: Language in South Africa, 3: South African Indian English 4: Language in South Africa, 4: Black South African English
68 Divisions by type
Supraregional / lingua franca New Englishesin Africa: Pan-African features (East Africa, the north of Southern Africa: Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia) Black South African English Swahili on east African coast
Pidgins and creoles West Africa: Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon
69 Divisions by type
Transportation, re-settled English African American English: the African connection Liberia, partially Sierra Leone
Native forms of English (settler English) South African English, Zimbabwe (white population)
Contact forms of English Afrikaans English Cameroon English (contact with French) South African Indian English
70 English in South Africa
71 White South African English
1) A cover term for varieties of English spoken by people of European descent in South Africa. These people are generally English in background but there are small numbers of Scottish and Irish descent South Africans. White South African English in its least local form is close to the norm of British English while showing features of its own, such as the traditional raising of short front vowels.
72 Afrikaans English
2) Most, but by no means all, Afrikaaners(people of Dutch descent) in South Africa are fluent in English. The degree of fluency varies, from fully bilingual to a basic command of English for practical purposes.
Depending on the influence of English on the speech of any given Afrikaanerit can show a greater or lesser amount of interference (negative transfer) from Afrikaans.
73 Indian South African English
3)Today all South African Indians can speak English. However, there is still much influence of the background Indian languages to be discerned in highly local forms of Indian South African English spoken primarily in rural KwaZulu-Natal, the traditional settlement area for Indians. This influence is found in pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.
74 Black South African English
4) The black population of South Africa varies greatly in background. The two main indigenous language groups are (i) the Zulu, chielfyin KwaZulu-Natal and (ii) the Xhosa, chielfyin the Eastern Cape. The influence of Bantu phonology on the speech of blacks in South Africa is very obvious, e.g. in the reduction of vowel distinctions and the lack of phonemic vowel length. Black South African English is also non- rhotic. With the gradual rise of a black middle class young speakers are increasingly adoping the white middle class speech norms of South Africa.
75 What comes next? There will be more detailed discussion of the history and present-day linguistic situation in South Africa in the various weeks of this seminar.
Raymond Hickey English Linguistics University of Duisburg and Essen
Email: [email protected] 76