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<h1>Language policy in South Africa and the unfounded fears of a Zulu hegemony</h1>
<p class="">Posted by <a class="" href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?author=1" title="View all posts by admin">admin</a> on 23/05/2013 in <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?cat=8" title="View all posts in Democratizing Democracy" rel="category">Democratizing Democracy</a>, <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?cat=25" title="View all posts in English" rel="category">English</a>, <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?cat=33" title="View all posts in Opinion" rel="category">Opinion</a>, <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?cat=15" title="View all posts in South Africa" rel="category">South Africa</a>, <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?cat=98" title="View all posts in Transformative Constitutionalism" rel="category">Transformative Constitutionalism</a> · <a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=1992#comments">0 Comments</a></p>
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<blockquote><p>Given South Africa’s stated commitment to
multilingualism, you might not think that a requirement from one of
the country’s universities that its students learn an indigenous
African language would raise much alarm. Yet alarm has nonetheless been
the reaction from a few unexpected quarters to the University of
KwaZulu-Natal’s announcement that all first-year students enrolled from
next near onwards will be required to develop “some level” of isiZulu
proficiency by the time they graduate.</p>
<p><a href="http://africasacountry.com/2013/05/23/language-policy-in-south-africa-and-the-unfounded-fears-of-a-zulu-hegemony/">Africa is a Country</a>, May 23, 2013.</p>
<p><br></p></blockquote>
<p>The university’s announcement doesn’t mean that it will become a
dual-medium English-isiZulu institution in 2014. Far from it. In keeping
with the gradualism of South Africa’s transition from apartheid, the
requirement is flexible and allows faculties to exempt students with
evidence of isiZulu proficiency at the required level. At the moment,
that’s well over half of the university’s annual intake of new students.
And even though there are plans to introduce isiZulu as a medium of
instruction, the university estimates that it won’t happen until at
least 2018, because centuries of colonialism and apartheid have meant
that very little work has gone into developing isiZulu and the country’s
other indigenous languages for use in higher education.</p>
<p>In some quarters, the <a href="http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/kwazulu-natal/kzn-varsity-praised-for-zulu-policy-1.1517429#.UZvwz79pu9Y" target="_blank">mostly lauded</a> decision has been called unconstitutional, which <a href="http://dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2013-05-18-kzn-university-a-storm-in-a-zulu-teacup/" target="_blank">it isn’t</a>,
while others said it was impractical and unfair, as it will mean that
many non-isiZulu speakers will encounter the language for the first
time in an educational setting over a decade later than the optimal
time to be learning a new language. Others have argued it will be
expensive. Indeed, it was estimated in 2006 that the cost of this first
phase of the university’s isiZulu development policy would cost almost
$1.5 million at today’s exchange rate.</p>
<p>Some have even said the decision is further evidence of the preeminence of the Zulu hegemony in current politics.</p>
<p>Stanley Mabuza, an aggrieved listener of public radio station SAfm,
emailed the station’s The Forum@8 morning talk show to register his
dissatisfaction. Mabuza’s email, read by the show’s host, said, “When we
speak of transformation in our tertiary institutions, we are not
inviting the introduction of unpopular policies by senseless individuals
who are intent at institutionalizing tribalism in our public
institutions. You cannot force an Indian child who wants to study at the
UKZN to now include isiZulu in their programme. I’m not being
tribalistic, but I’m afraid some people are trying to force their
language and culture upon all groups in the country.”</p>
<p>Mabuza’s comment underlines what has perhaps been the most surprising
aspect of the reaction, which is that some of the backlash has, for
various reasons, come from black South Africans against what is
perceived as an act of Zulu domination.</p>
<p>Much of the criticism is answered by the late educationist and anti-apartheid activist Neville Alexander <em>(portrait above)</em> in his posthumous collection of essays, <a href="http://www.jacana.co.za/book-categories/new-releases-65840/thoughts-on-the-new-south-africa-detail" target="_blank"><em>Thoughts on the New South Africa</em></a>.
Alexander, who played a central role in developing the country’s
higher education language policy, argues that developing African
languages is necessary because English and Afrikaans—the West Germanic
language whose imposition on black high school students was the final
straw that triggered the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/june-16-soweto-youth-uprising" target="_blank">1976 Soweto Uprising</a>—are
not functioning adequately in South Africa as languages of higher
education. He says many students aren’t making it to graduation owing in
large part to a lack of proficiency and grasp of idiom in languages
not their own. He also rebuts as a non-question the notion that
developing African languages in the way UKZN and other South African
universities are will create “ethnic universities”.</p>
<p>Alexander has also, in other essays and papers, charted the
development of an appetite for multilingualism in post-apartheid South
Africa, despite what he described as the persistent fallacy that
assigning indigenous languages an official status in post-colonial
African states would lead to ethnic rivalry and separatist movements. He
put it down to South Africa’s liberation movement—in its true, broad
multiparty sense, not just the African National Congress—understanding
multilingualism’s role in intercultural communication and social
cohesion.</p>
<p>That some black South Africans have reacted angrily to this
announcement could be due to a misunderstanding of the rationale behind
the UKZN’s choice of isiZulu as its African language to punt—a choice
informed by the university being located in a mostly isiZulu-speaking
province (in a country where isiZulu is the most common first language).
The choice was also informed by the purpose of this initial phase of
the policy, which is to provide the university’s non-isiZulu-speaking
graduates with the facility to interact with the communities where
they’ll be living and working.</p>
<p>The reaction may also be due to not knowing that the country’s other
universities have also adopted a similar policy to develop other
indigenous languages. The University of the Witwatersrand in
Johannesburg, for example, is focusing its language development work on
Sesotho and Rhodes University in Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape is
developing isiXhosa. All of them are doing so following the path
advocated by the national policy: first focus on building proficiency in
the language among all staff, enrolled students and graduates while at
the same time developing the language for introduction at a later
stage as a full-fledged language of instruction at the institution.</p>
<p>This nonetheless has not stopped some influential pundits from
arguing that UKZN’s decision is further evidence of the so-called “<a href="http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/82016" target="_blank">Zulufication</a>”
of the country, as intimated by Mcebisi Ndletyana, head of the faculty
of political economy at the Mapungubwe Institute think tank. Ndletyana
said, during an interview on The Forum@8 this week, that language
policy in the country should be directed towards encouraging people to
speak languages other than their own because regional monolingual
communities, which he said South Africa has many, propagate ethnic
stereotypes that can be co-opted for political campaigning.</p>
<p>Absent from Ndletyana’s analysis is the recognition that no such
monolinguistic communities exists in South Africa, save for a few
enclaves of English and, to a lesser extent, Afrikaans speakers. The
majority of South Africans have a basic knowledge of English and are
fluent in at least one other language. Ndletyana’s definition of
monolingualism, it appears, scopes out English and Afrikaans, and refers
only to speakers of one indigenous South African language.</p>
<p>But Alexander warned of this specific type of casual acceptance of
the English and Afrikaans linguistic dominance. He said English and
Afrikaans gained their position as “legitimate languages” first through
colonial conquest, then through the consent of the victims of colonial
subjugation who accepted and internalised the superiority of the
languages. South Africans would do well to keep his warning in mind.</p>
<p>Related posts:</p><ol><li><a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=1420" rel="bookmark" title="South Africa: The inhumanity of dividing identities">South Africa: The inhumanity of dividing identities</a></li><li><a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=906" rel="bookmark" title="Here’s what some South African artists make of the country’s politics">Here’s what some South African artists make of the country’s politics</a></li>
<li><a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=1628" rel="bookmark" title="Freedom Day">Freedom Day</a></li><li><a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=1625" rel="bookmark" title="Call for Papers – ALICE International Colloquium">Call for Papers – ALICE International Colloquium</a></li>
<li><a href="http://alice.ces.uc.pt/news/?p=1392" rel="bookmark" title="Another Side of the Story: A Discussion with the Managing Editor of “Daily News Egypt”">Another Side of the Story: A Discussion with the Managing Editor of “Daily News Egypt”</a></li>
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