LL-L "Terminology" 2006.05.02 (02) [E]
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Tue May 2 14:36:34 UTC 2006
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L O W L A N D S - L * 02 May 2006 * Volume 02
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From: Marcel Bas <marcelbas at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Terminology" 2006.05.01 (08) [E]
Dear Ingmar, Mark, Elsie and others,
Obviously, Ingmar couldn't have known that a word like _Boer_ could not be
used interchangeably with _ Afrikaner_. I'm not sure if his trivial
terminological mistake is a matter of prejudice, as Elsie states. Maybe it
is even the contrary of prejudice: his use of _Boer_ as a synonym for
_Afrikaner_ displays an egalitarian idea. He thinks they're the same. I
like to believe that Afrikaners and Boers are the same, too, but I know that
many Afrikaans speakers don't agree.
I guess that's one of the sad things about the Afrikaner people: as Elsie
said, Boers might be offended when being called _Afrikaners_, and vice
versa.
I have met several people who call themselves Boers, and the way I have
always understood it, _Boer_ has a strongly idenititarian meaning. It is
used by people whose ancestors joined the Great Trek in 1836, 1837, etc.,
and who are proud of their heritage and their culture, identity and
religion. But anthropologically and linguistically there is not much of a
difference, I guess. They are all considered Afrikaners since they are
Caucasian Afrikaans speakers. They have the same ancestors. Ingmar, maybe
you could compare it with the discussion we had the other day. It was about
Radio Pretoria and about Radio Sonder Grense. Boers may prefer the former
radio station (target group: the conservative, proud, religious, etc.) and
Afrikaner the latter (target group: the default Afrikaans speaker).
As Mark points out, there are also Bruinmense (Coloureds) who are called
'brown Afrikaners'. That would be a linguistically reductionist identity
marker of the word _Afrikaner_ (they also listen to Radio Sonder Grense).
Some po-mo Afrikaners even doubt the legitimacy of the word altogether. They
say that they are 'Afrikaans speaking Africans'. However, if you ask any
black South African, English speaker or average Afrikaans speaking
individual to give a definition of _Afrikaner_ they will refer to a white
Afrikaans speaking individual. As you can se, identity is not so difficult
to define. Things start changing if you doubt yourself and your own
identity. I guess one shouldn't try to rationalise identity too much.
To me this Boer/Afrikaner division is very sad and symptomatical for this
small nation's dividedness. No matter how small the Afrikaans speaking
nation is in a predominantly Bantu country with an increasingly
anti-Afrikaans government & atmosphere, the Boers still feel that there is a
great gap between them and Afrikaners, that they are different, etc. And the
default Afrikaners feel they don't want to unite with Boers either.
There ar many more divisions within the Afrikaans community, which seriously
hadicap the 'ex unitate vires' that the Afrikaans language needs so badly
nowadays.
>From a European viewpoint this all seems rather trivial, petty and
counterproductive. These days, Afrikaners cannot afford being divided and
doubting their identity to this extent.
Best regards,
Marcel.
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