Oor die eerste 50 jaar se maak aan Standaardafrikaans
Abstract
Creating a standardised version of Afrikaans – the first 50 years
With Steyn’s 2014 publication We are going to make a language (Ons gaan ʼn taal maak) as stimulus,
the beginning of organised writing of Standard Afrikaans since 1875 is discussed, as well as its
consequences for the continued creation of Afrikaans. In particular, in this paper comments are
made on some of the points that Steyn made.
Plans for an Afrikaans Bible translation were initially unsuccessful because Afrikaans was
not yet serving a written function at the time. The written language subsequently established by
the Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners (“GRA”) (Association of Real Afrikaners) was able to fill
this gap, as illustrated by the many publications that appeared under the banner of the GRA.
Steyn points out that many people were enthusiastically involved in the creation of Afrikaans,
then indicates what many of them had done, and continues to mention the expectations some of them had of Afrikaans. The way in which this publication shows how people were involved in the
creation of Afrikaans makes it an exceptional document on the development of Afrikaans.
The fact that people create standard languages, of which Standard Afrikaans is an example,
is highlighted. People often start this process by developing written forms of spoken languages.
The title of Steyn’s work refers to this human endeavour. In the history of Afrikaans as a written
language, a start was made as early as the nineteenth century with the development of a written
form of some varieties of Afrikaans. A written tradition where Muslim Afrikaans was written in
religious scriptures, in Arabic script, has possibly been in existence since 1830. This movement
had a large readership and was based on the Cape variety of Afrikaans. At Genadendal Afrikaans
was possibly written from 1859, and in Paarl from 1875.
All these ways in which Afrikaans was written were close to the spoken variety. Patriot
Afrikaans, as the GRA’s written Afrikaans in the Paarl was also known, was based on the farmers’
dialect of the area. It did not enjoy a high status, and developed speakers did not want to associate
themselves with it. This Afrikaans was nevertheless made known by means of a large number of
publications, which were read across the country. Up to 1895 no fewer than 81 000 copies were
printed under the GRA banner.
Afrikaans was also written from time to time by newspapers, but not uniformly, with Afrikaans
being written the way it was spoken by the various speech communities whom these newspapers
wished to reach. The Afrikaans written in this newspaper tradition made the dialectal Afrikaans
of their target group a little more dignified by adding some Dutch to it.
The farmers’ variety on which GRA Afrikaans was based, was closely interwoven with the
Khoi Afrikaans of the Khoi-Khoi people, the learner’s Afrikaans that to a large extent had displaced
their Khoi-Khoi mother tongue by the end of the seventeenth century. Besides the Afrikaans of
the farmers, Khoi Afrikaans was one of the two main languages spoken for approximately a
hundred years in the Interior Region, located more or less between the Hottentots Holland
mountains and Graaff-Reinet. The two dialects had a mutual influence on one another, as is
illustrated by the general use of the word ons (in the subject position) in current Afrikaans, which
was earlier stigmatised as Khoi Afrikaans. This area of the interior is currently regarded as the
origin of many of today’s Afrikaans dialects.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, language creators made serious efforts to Dutchify
GRA Afrikaans, and the “write as we speak” principle of the GRA was changed in such a way as
to link Afrikaans more closely to Dutch; the writing somewhat resembled the way Afrikaans was
written in the newspaper tradition. In this way, a shortcut was taken to elevate the status of
Afrikaans and expand its corpus. This Dutchification process had a number of implications for
later Standard Afrikaans. Dutchified Afrikaans created some distance between this Afrikaans and
the Afrikaans of its dialects, with the result that this rich source of Afrikaans became marginalised.
The spelling of many words from GRA Afrikaans was adapted to the Dutch model, and earlier
well-known rural constructions and dialectal forms were lost (such as agint, speul and worre, for
agent, speel and word).
Currently there is an increase in literary works written in varietal Afrikaans. The Afrikaans
used in these works differs in various respects from Standard Afrikaans because it still contains
some remnants of the language spoken in the period before Dutchification took place.
But Dutchified Afrikaans remained a separate language. Quite a bit of material from the
farmers’ language, as written by the GRA, was preserved. The same applies as regards created
constructs. The argument put forward here is that the Afrikaans double negative, for which a
source cannot be found in the history of the Afrikaans language, was created by the GRA. By linking Afrikaans to Dutch during early legislation, an interesting move was made to support
Afrikaans: In this, the argument was that Dutch included Afrikaans, something that is not borne
out by the history of Afrikaans. After the Dutchification phase, “Dutch” continued to be linked to
the language name “Afrikaans”, for example in compounds such as “Afrikaans-Dutch”.
Steyn’s outstanding book does not just deal with the origins of Afrikaans. Ons gaan ʼn taal maak
shares with its readers, through many of the approximately 200 photographs that have been used,
the highlights of the Afrikaans language creation period, and takes them through the later period
of its history, sometimes with quite some nostalgia. Reading Steyn’s book brings one to a better
understanding of the creation of Afrikaans, and it is simultaneously also quite thought-provoking.
Collections
- Faculty of Humanities [2033]
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