South Africa - Problems of identification and the role of the English language

Universität Rostock
Institut für Anglistik/ Amerikanistik
PS: Geographical Varieties of English
Wintersemester 2005/ 2006

South Africa –
Problems of identification and the role of the English language

LA Gy Englisch, Spanisch
3. Semester

Datum der Abgabe: 27.03.2006

Contents

1. Introduction: Aims of this work

2. English in South Africa
2.1 Overview: the English language in South Africa
2.2 History of the English language in South Africa

3. Sociallinguistic background: Problems of identification
3.1 What is identity?
3.2 Language Identity, Identity due to language
3.3 Language identity in a multilingual context

4. The problem of identification in South Africa

5. The status of English in South Africa today
5.1 English as a mother tongue and as a second language
5.2 The spread of English

6. Conclusion

7. Bibliography

1. Introduction: Aims of this work

The aim of my work is to give an overview of the Egnlish language in South Africa. I would like to describe, how the English language reached South Africa, which other languages were and are there and what problems exist between those languages and probably between their ethnical groups too.

Later on I will talk about the status of English in South Africa. Who uses English? Is it used by specific social classes? In which fields of society can English be found? Is it more a mother tongue than a second language or the other way around?
All those things I will try to find out.

At the end of this work I will try to draw a conclusion and answer the question if there are real identity problems and in which way the citizens try to handle the situation.

2. English in South Africa

In this chapter I will talk about how the English language came to South Africa and how English developed there.

First of all I would like to give a small overview of English in South Africa and afterwards I will talk about the history of English in South Africa more in detail.

2.1 Overview: the English language in South Africa

The English language reached South Africa for the first time in 1795. Britain occupied the Cape of Good Hope for a strategical reason: they saw the possibility of getting to India by sea.

In Cape Town there was still a Dutch colony since 1652 and also some Frenchmen and Germans still lived there.

The white settlers mainly came from farmer- families. Therefore they called themselves "the Boers". The language they used for communication was Dutch, which later on developed into an own, specific language. This language was a mixture of Dutch and African languages and was called "Afrikaans".

The English language became more and more important in Cape Land since 1806, in the new republics of Natal and Transvaal as well as in the Orange Free State, because in those areas there were arguments between the Boers and Britain, which were won by Britain. In 1820 the first British settlers came and the importance of an African English developed.

In 1910, the four british colonies were joined together to the "Union of South Africa", which had the status of a British dominion¹.

In the second half of the 19th century more British colonies arised. Out of these colonies later on developed states like Sambia in 1964, Malawi in 1966, Simbabwe in 1980, Botsuana or Lesotho. English was mostly spoken as a second language there. Nevertheless it was acknowledged as an official language in most of these countries. Only in South Africa English had to share the position of an official language with the Dutch or Afrikaans language. Not until the end of the British colonial supremacy more native languages forced the English language back to an “co-official” or “second official language” status.

However in countries like Sambia, Simbabwe and Namibia, English is the only means of communication in the official area.

[....]

1 Dominion means, that Britain still had the power and the control over these republics.