Multilingual? Multicultural? English and the other nine South African languages

Section 6 of the South African Constitution is labelled “Languages”. In part, it reads as follows:

(1) The official languages of the Republic are Sepedi, Sesotho, Setswana, siSwati, Tshivenda, Xitsonga, Afrikaans, English, isiNdebele, isiXhosa and isiZulu.

(2) Recognising the historically diminished use and status of the indigenous languages of our people, the state must take practical and positive measures to elevate the status and advance the use of these languages.

(3) (a) The national government and provincial governments may use any particular official languages for the purposes of government, taking into account usage, practicality, expense, regional circumstances and the balance of the needs and preferences of the population as a whole or in the province concerned; but the national government and each provincial government must use at least two official languages….

(4) The national government and provincial governments, by legislative and other measures, must regulate and monitor their use of official languages. Without detracting from the provisions of subsection (2), all official languages must enjoy parity of esteem and must be treated equitably.

(5) A Pan South African Language Board established by national legislation must -
(a) promote and create conditions for the development and use
of -
(i) all official languages;
(ii) the Khoi, Nama and San languages; and
(iii) sign language ; and
(b) promote and ensure respect for -
(i) all languages commonly used by communities in South Africa, including German, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Portuguese, Tamil, Telegu and Urdu; and
(ii) Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit and other languages used for religious purposes in South Africa.

Ironically, despite the noble intentions of Constitutional protection and the proliferation of institutional and corporate language policies asserting the equality of all South Africa’s languages, local African languages are perceived to be declining both in terms of the extent to which they used by the population and in terms of the status which they enjoy. English is undoubtedly the lingua franca in metropolitan South Africa, perhaps with the exclusion of the Western Cape, and Afrikaans continues to be used extensively throughout much of rural South Africa.

Prior to 1991-1994 (the period of South Africa’s political transition) the government’s divide-and-rule strategy reinforced racial, ethnic and linguistic difference. By emphasising tribal and regional affiliations the government sought to exaggerate the separateness of closely-related ethnic and language groups, while at the same time attempting to deflect the hegemony of English by diverting considerable attention and resources to the artificial growth and promotion of Afrikaans. Indeed the spark which ignited the Soweto ‘riots’ of 1976 – an event that symbolically and tangibly provides concrete evidence of apartheid’s eventual demise – was the imposition of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction in ‘black’ schools.

The reasons for the migration to English in the post-1994 era are not hard to define. South African society is not exempt to the predominance of English as a world-medium of communication – a global lingua franca. Accordingly, English is seen as providing access to education, employment, economic advancement and all the trapping of middle-class society or, increasingly, the benefits enjoyed by the newly empowered black elite. English is also a politically-correct acceptable alternative to South Africa’s other ‘European’ language, namely Afrikaans. By conveniently ignoring the extent to which British colonialism, together with rampant Afrikaner nationalism, was responsible for centuries of dispossession and discrimination, Afrikaans unfairly bears the mark of the ‘language of the oppressor’. The fact that during the all-white 1978 election the Afrikaner nationalist government was returned to power with 78% of the vote and that throughout its period of influence dating from 1948 it enjoyed increasing majorities in every election, suggest that more than a few English-speaking, white South Africans actively supported racial segregation and the incremental implementation of enormously oppressive legislation to quell any threat from the black majority. It is an accepted truth that since the advent of multi-racial democracy it is almost as difficult to find a white South African who voted for the National Party or who supported apartheid as it is to find hen’s teeth. Finally, speaking English is modern and fashionable. It is the medium of international popular youth culture – video games, music, the latest movie on circuit, television, magazines and the paraphernalia of image. Using the language is to associate oneself with cosmopolitan society, to belong to the set, and to disown the ‘othering’ to which Africa and Africans are subjected.

In the face of such formidable opponents and against the tide of popular opinion, the language provisions of the Constitution may appear naïve and impossible to implement. Arguably they remain empty rhetoric as the funding required for the development and promotion of African languages is insufficient or unavailable. The government’s stance may seem hypocritical especially when Departments of African Languages have lost 75% of their student registrations and when the language of parliament and the economy is almost exclusively in English. And when African languages are used in speeches or in television programmes they are accompanied by voice-over translations or subtitles in English; neither of which provide much incentive to English-speaking South Africans to acquire an African language or two.

The language situation is possibly well illustrated by the reaction at Unisa to a recent request directed to tertiary educational institutions by the Norwegian government for funding proposals for the promotion of multilingualism, especially increased access to tertiary education and the provision of language development in African languages. While I was drafting or submission I was confronted by two views – neither of which is clearly representative of a particular racial or linguistic grouping. The one view was that our proposal should focus on improving the proficiency in English amongst historically-disadvantaged (a horrible euphemism) students. Resource-based learning materials should be provided in English and in nine South African languages to supplement or mediate the tuition process. Interestingly, whether language support materials should be developed in Afrikaans was an irresolvable issue. The notion of actually teaching a subject in one, any or all of the African languages was rejected entirely as futile, unachievable, monstrously expensive, and a disservice to students inasmuch as they would be excluded from (or at least inhibited) global economic and communicative opportunities.

The contrary view accepted the importance of English, but insisted on the tuition, at least at first level and in flagship courses, in a representative selection of African languages. The identity of the courses was not articulated expect that they should be high registration courses. Similarly, it was not clear how the university would select languages to be used for tuition. The implication was that tuition should be provided in accordance with demand, which would favour larger languages over those spoken by fewer people. A minority view was that tuition should be offered in all African languages (and in Portuguese) across a wide spread of subjects

The arguments underpinning these positions represent to two poles of language policy in South Africa – an opposition between pragmatism and idealism. The pragmatists have a significant advantage because to a large extent they represent majority opinion. Many speakers of African languages reject the notion of tuition in those languages as unnecessary. Here the notion of ‘mother-tongue’ or ‘home-language’ is taken literally. isiZulu and Tshvenda are languages imparted from parents to their children. They are seen as languages necessary for interpersonal communication, particularly within the family or the community, and not as integral components of education. Children go to school to acquire new knowledge, it is argued, not simply to extend a capacity that they already have.

This position is extremely problematic when applied to the school situation. It is generally accepted that literacy should be establish in the learner’s L1 prior to an attempt to develop and L2 and certainly before L3 acquisition is contemplated. To some extent the validity of this position is recognised by the Ministry and Department of Education. Children are entitled to L1 instruction during primary school grades. On the other hand, the efficacy of this policy is reduced because many parents who can afford to do so send their children to schools in previously white areas, where the medium of instruction is English or Afrikaans, rather than enrolling them in township schools where indigenous languages are used.. The policy also unravels in metropolitan areas. Labour migrancy, rural-urban population movements, and the cultural shift from traditional to market-based economies have blurred the linguistic identities. Thus while KwaZulu Natal remains predominantly isiZulu and Gauteng is often identified with Sesotho, the demographic mix includes large percentages of L1 speakers of other languages. Practically, schools in an area simply may not offer tuition in the learner’s home language.

The argument intensifies when we move into the senior secondary phase and into tertiary education. Here, the case for English draws on a wide range of reasons. Apart from the obvious, the suitability of African languages for high-level applications is depicted as dubious. In broad terms the debate unfolds as follows. African languages lack the vocabulary necessary for a knowledge-based, science and technology-driven society. If African languages are to be used it will be necessary to develop the corpus, prior to producing content. As this content is already available in English, the work and cost involved in Africanisation of the curricula wastes valuable resources, particularly in a ‘developing’ country where other needs are more urgent. It is pointed out that the Nationalist government diverted substantial resources to the development of Afrikaans as a language of higher education and failed, even though similarities between Dutch and Afrikaans theoretically made this task easier. If it was not possible to achieve completion in Afrikaans, how much less likely to succeed will any attempt to grow nine diverse African languages.

A second stab at African languages is the claim that it is incorrect to speak of individual languages as though they are monolithic wholes. Instead, the oral basis and the relatively recent emergence of written forms have led to a lack of standardisation. Instead of thinking of an African language as a single entity we need to conceive of these languages as comprising a number of distinct dialects. Moreover, because written standardisation was due to missionary and political influence, mediated by apartheid language boards, it often reflects a particular rural dialect that may be completely unfamiliar to many actual speakers of the language. As one commentator suggests, in such circumstances the development of all nine African languages would be ‘to undertake a mammoth task of linguistic and social engineering’ which ‘may well have the opposite effect to the multilingual ideal articulated in the constitution.’

These arguments at best may bear elements of truth and at worst may simply be used to justify the continued dominance of English. It is deeply ironic the divergences between standard British and Standard South African English are ignored, as are the considerable differences in dialects of English within the United Kingdom itself. The imposition of a standard for official communication that may differ widely from actual usage is not seen as inherently disadvantageous in English, but surely is when it comes to nine African languages. The glib dismissal of African languages and the easy promotion of English as the obvious choice for academic and official communication also fail to take cognisance of the connections between language and identity. If we accept constructivist and post-structuralist ideas that identity is not real, inherent or unitary, but rather, that it is fragmentary, constructed through meaning making and representation, then the role of language in identity formation and in discourse cannot be ignored. The Ministers of Education of the African Union, meeting last year in Algiers, put the case rather eloquently. Their final communiqué contains the following words:

Languages have complex implications in terms of identity and social integration, both globally and locally, and thus are of strategic importance. They are not only tools of communication, but also, and mainly, systems of perception and thought, mirrors of cultural identity and vectors of its fundamental values. They are an essential constituent of the self-consciousness and identity of individuals and societies, and are the basis for the creation, processing and transmission of knowledge. The capacity of peoples to live in and modify their environment, interact and socialize is heavily dependent on and marked by their language faculty. Thus, marginalization or integration, exclusion or empowerment, poverty or development, are to a certain extent determined by linguistic choices and strategies.

I would like to believe that the Ministers of Education were not merely engaging in politically-correct, populist statements pandering to the an-African myth or to the much vaunted African Renaissance. But even if their words are devoid of practical consequences they do hold value to all people who value Africa’s diversity and the richness of its ancient and modern cultures. Can there really be any question of the worthiness of developing African languages and promoting not only their survival, but their daily use?

But are South Africa’s nine African languages in danger? The evidence is inconclusive. Based on sample proficiency tests amongst first level students it could be argued that English and the other ten South African languages face severe challenges. Across the board, students appear to be functionally illiterate for the purpose of tertiary study irrespective of their home language. While black students are often more efficient readers and writers of their second or third language – English – than of their mother tongue, class and economic circumstances seem to play a greater role in academic preparedness than ethnic or linguistic origin. Thus, white and black students from disadvantaged backgrounds are equally likely to show low proficiency levels.

I have not seen any statistic that shows that fewer people are speaking African languages than in the past. Indeed, it would seem that speakers of African languages exemplify extreme multilingualism. It is not uncommon for black South Africans to speak several languages and understand several more. By contrast, many white South African are functionally unilingual, even though they are exposed to bilingual education. Accordingly, it is the unilingual individual who is most at risk in a multilingual, multicultural society. The ability to speak multiple languages and to code-switch with ease that is the preserve of the majority of the population is a powerful instrument. In this sense, I would argue that the position of South African languages is not nearly as fragile as might appear on the surface. Moreover, the non-English majority have shown remarkable skill in harnessing the power of their colonial inheritance to advance their struggle for social, economic and cultural recognition. Language is an instrument and English can certainly be used instrumentally in ways that undermine, or at least redefine, its hegemonic presence.

In bald terms, the crisis of language in South Africa is based on the extent to which English is used for official purposes, the perception that general standards of proficiency (in English and in other languages) are slipping, and in the tendency to reject African languages particularly in academic contexts. If we examine the assumptions and attitudes which underpin expressions of a crisis, we often encounter the notion of falling standards, of increasing deviation from the norm, and of a lack of understanding – on the part of students – of the conventions of academic discourse. If I was inclined to be controversial, I would suggest that promoters of the crisis exemplify a particularly reactionary and conservative position. Unwilling to allow for a new South African identity or to accept that contemporary Africanness may differ considerably from the traditional forms that are so conveniently packaged at various resorts for tourist consumption, they cling to outdated notions of social, cultural and linguistic stasis. In this respect, changing entrenched notions of acceptable expression and behaviour may be more important than acts of preservation, which are bound to fail. It is only when we are able to shake off the shackles of convention and to have the courage to explore new forms of academic and social discourse that we, as South Africans and Africans, will have achieved our emancipation. In the meantime, I take some consolation of the inefficacy of the Pan South African Language Board and the impotence of innumerable empty language policies. Policing, fencing, legislating, conserving, promoting and developing African languages (and English) as part of the state’s bureaucratic mechanisms would, I think, be entirely inimical to an authentic multilingual, multicultural society.