Language and Post-Apartheid Legacies

A friend from home just shared this NY Times article with me: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/22/world/africa/22bus.html?hp It is about the current "war" between taxi drivers and the bus industry. Taxi drivers in South Africa are predominantly black, and they became entrepreneurs in the industry post-apartheid. They're quite successful at it too. Now that the World Cup is coming to South Africa, the country is trying to improve the transportation system by introducing more buses as a means of transportation, thus competing with the taxi drivers. This competition is so fierce it has even broken out into violence and even death.

The current transportation competition is only one of the legacies of apartheid. Another is language. South Africa has 11 official languages, but English remains the main medium of communication in politics, business, education, and media. I don't have the statistics, but I think it is safe to say that most, if not all, South Africans are bilingual, speaking English and their mother tongue. (Nopi, our security guard, is fluent in nine of the 11 official languages.)

I assumed that having 11 official languages might pose problems when it comes to publishing newspapers, for example. But I never really considered how many levels of society it actually affected. Earlier this evening I attended my first Grade 9 Youth Group meeting at Equal Education. We played some fun games, discussed the goals of Equal Education, and talked about why the learners in the youth group decided to join Equal Educations causes. Since English is the language that will allow these learners to become successful, I was surprised that - when speaking in English without being prompted to - the youth group leaders asked them to speak in Xhosa (pronounced "cosa"), their mother tongue. Furthermore, everyone present could speak and understand English, but not everyone could converse in Xhosa.

Language is a powerful thing, and I understand some of the implications surrounding the debate over whether or not languages should be left to die out or not, though I admit the effects of such thing run much deeper than I am aware. For one thing, there are certain feelings, ideas, and concepts that cannot be adequately expressed in all languages. Secondly, language is a part of one's cultural identity. To allow a language to die out would be to cut one off from one's ancestors, and even one's immediate family. On the other hand, language is also a symbol of power and domination. The use of English, then, is a constant reminder of the colonizing of the African people. Although I don't think most South Africans are aware of this thing daily (particularly the youth), it is still a fact that resides in one's subconscious mind much the same as most white people in America do not wake up every day conscious of their skin color because they are part of the majority.

In short, the point is that apartheid's legacy is present at so many levels. You know, this shouldn't be surprising considering how recently apartheid was instituted. The thing that I still struggle to understand is how human beings can judge other human beings and decide that one is less human than he. Who are we to judge anyone? This is enough for tonight.