Afrikaans

Afrikaans
Spoken in:	South Africa Namibia Botswana Lesotho Swaziland
Region:	Southern Africa
Total speakers:	est. 6.45 million (home language) 6.75 million (second or third language) 12 to 16 million (basic language knowledge) estimation October 2007.
Language family:	Indo-European  Germanic   West Germanic    Low Franconian     Dutch      Afrikaans
Official status
Official language in:	South Africa
Regulated by:	Die Taalkommissie (The Language Commission of the South African Academy for Science and Arts)
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	af
ISO 639-2:	afr
ISO 639-3:	afr
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Afrikaans is an Indo-European language, derived from 17th century Dutch and classified as Low Franconian Germanic, mainly spoken in South Africa and Namibia, with smaller numbers of speakers in Botswana, Angola, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Zambia and Argentina.^[1] Due to emigration and migrant labour, there are possibly over 100,000 Afrikaans speakers in the United Kingdom,^[2] with other substantial communities found in Brussels, Amsterdam, Perth, Mount Isa, Toronto and Auckland. It is the primary language used by two related ethnic groups in South Africa: the Afrikaners and the Coloureds or kleurlinge or bruinmense (including Basters, Cape Malays and Griqua).

Geographically, the Afrikaans language is the majority language of the western one-third of South Africa (Northern and Western Cape, spoken at home by 69% and 58%, respectively). It is also the largest first language in the adjacent southern third of Namibia (Hardap and Karas, where it is the first language of 44% and 40%, respectively).

Afrikaans and Dutch are largely mutually intelligible.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Dialects 1.1.1 Humorous dialects 1.2 Standardisation 1.3 The Afrikaans Bible 2 Grammar 3 Orthography 3.1 Comparison with Dutch 3.2 Diacritics 3.3 Initial apostrophes 3.4 Table of characters 4 Afrikaans phrases 5 Sample text in Afrikaans 6 Sociolinguistics 7 Future of Afrikaans 8 Afrikaans Music 9 See also 10 Notes 11 References 12 External links 12.1 General 12.2 Portals and links lists 12.3 Organisations 12.4 Spell checkers 12.5 Dictionaries

History

Afrikaans developed among the Dutch speaking Protestant settlers, and the indentured or slave workforce of the Cape area in southwestern South Africa that was established by the Dutch East India Company (Dutch: Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie — VOC, Afrikaans: Verenigde Oos-Indiese Kompanjie) between 1652 and 1705. A relative majority of these first settlers were from the United Provinces (now Netherlands), though there were also many from Germany, a considerable number from France, and some from Norway, Portugal, Scotland, and various other countries. The indentured workers and slaves were Asians, Malays, Malagasy in addition to the indigenous Khoi and Bushmen.

The Afrikaans School has long seen Afrikaans as a natural development from the South-Hollandic Dutch dialect, but has also only considered the Afrikaans as spoken by the Whites.

Though this 'theory' would imply the improbability of a language systematically developing out of a grammatology. Furthermore, this theory would fail to explain the systematic process of simplification from dialectical 17th century Dutch to Afrikaans, its geographically widespread and cohesive nature and also the persistent structural similarities between Afrikaans and other regional Franconic dialects including West Flemish and Zeelandic.

Afrikaans also remains akin to other West-Germanic languages (except English) in that it remains a V2 language which features verb final structures in subordinate clauses, just like Dutch and German.

Dialects

There is evidence to support the existence of a few strongly defined dialects as is also found in the Dutch language area. Following early dialectical studies of Afrikaans it was theorised that three main historical dialects probably existed before the Great Trek in the 1830s. These dialects are defined as the Northern Cape, Western Cape and Eastern Cape dialects. Remnants of these dialects still remain in present-day Afrikaans although the standardising effect of Standard Afrikaans has contributed to a great levelling of differences in modern times. Modern-day Standard Afrikaans itself is said to have developed from the Eastern Cape dialect, as this is where the Great Trek started.

Modern day Afrikaans has no dialects per se, although speakers from various regions may exhibit different pronunciation.

There is also a prison cant known as soebela, or sombela which is based on Afrikaans yet heavily influenced by Zulu. This language is used a secret language in prison and is taught to initiates.

Humorous dialects

Owing to mass emigration of mainly white South Africans post-1994, and Afrikaans media abroad, such as Die Stem in London and radio broadcasts in Sydney, it has been said that there is now a dialect of foreign Afrikaans, called Buitelands or more humorously Sout-mielie. The latter is a combination of "soutie" (a nickname for white English speaking South Africans) and "mielie" (a cash crop in South Africa sometimes associated with white Afrikaans farmers).

Standardisation

The linguist Paul Roberge suggests that the earliest 'truly Afrikaans' texts are doggerel verse from 1795 and a dialogue transcribed by a Dutch traveller in 1825. Printed material among the Afrikaners at first used only standard European Dutch. By the mid-19th century, more and more were appearing in Afrikaans, which was very much still regarded as a set of regional dialects.

In 1861, L.H. Meurant published his Zamenspraak tusschen Klaas Waarzegger en Jan Twyfelaar, which is considered by some to be the first authoritative Afrikaans text. Abu Bakr Effendi also compiled his Arabic Afrikaans Islamic instruction book between 1862 and 1869, although this was only published and printed in 1877. The first Afrikaans grammars and dictionaries were published in 1875 by the Genootskap vir Regte Afrikaners ('Society for Real Afrikaners') in Cape Town.

The First and Second Boer Wars further strengthened the position of Afrikaans. The official languages of the Union of South Africa were English and Dutch until Afrikaans was subsumed under Dutch on 5 May 1925.

The main Afrikaans dictionary is the Woordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal (WAT), which is as yet incomplete due to the scale of the project, but the one-volume dictionary in household use is the Verklarende Handwoordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal (HAT). The official orthography of Afrikaans is the Afrikaanse Woordelys en Spelreëls, compiled by the Taalkommissie.

The Afrikaans Bible

A major landmark in the development of Afrikaans was the full translation of the Bible into the language. Prior to this most Cape Dutch-Afrikaans speakers had to rely on the Dutch Statenbijbel. The aforementioned Statenvertaling had its origins with the Synod of Dordrecht 1637 and was thus in an archaic form of Dutch. This rendered understanding difficult at best to Dutch and Cape Dutch speakers moreover increasingly unintelligible to Afrikaans speakers.

C. P. Hoogehout, Arnoldus Pannevis, and Stephanus Jacobus du Toit were the first Afrikaans Bible translators. Important landmarks in the translation of the Scriptures were in 1878 with C. P. Hoogehout's translation of the Evangelie volgens Markus (Gospel of Mark), however this translation was never published. The manuscript is to be found in the South African National Library, Cape Town.

The first official Bible translation of the entire Bible into Afrikaans was in 1933 by J. D. du Toit, E. E. van Rooyen, J. D. Kestell, H. C. M. Fourie, and BB Keet.^[3][4] This monumental work established Afrikaans as a suiwer and oordentlike taal, i.e. a "pure" and "suitable language" for religious purposes, especially amongst the deeply Calvinist Afrikaans religious community that had hitherto been somewhat sceptical of a Bible translation out of the original Dutch language to which they were accustomed.

In 1983 there was a fresh translation in order to mark the 50th anniversary of the original 1933 translation and provide much needed revision. The final editing of this edition was done by E. P. Groenewald, A. H. van Zyl, P. A. Verhoef, J. L. Helberg, and W. Kempen.

Afrikaans Version of the Lord's Prayer. Onse Vader.^[5]

Onse Vader wat in die hemele is, laat U naam geheilig word. Laat U koninkryk kom, laat U wil geskied, soos in die hemel net so ook op die aarde. Gee ons vandag ons daaglikse brood, en vergeef ons ons skulde, soos ons ook ons skuldenaars vergewe. En lei ons nie in versoeking nie, maar verlos ons van die bose. Want aan U behoort die Koninkryk en die krag en die heerlikheid, tot in ewigheid. Amen.

Classic Dutch Protestant version of the Lord's Prayer. Onze Vader' ^[6]

Onze Vader die in de hemelen zijt, geheiligd zij uw Naam; uw rijk kome; uw wil geschiede, op aarde als in de hemel. Geef ons heden ons dagelijks brood; en vergeef ons onze schulden, gelijk ook wij vergeven onze schuldenaren; en leid ons niet in bekoring, maar verlos ons van het kwade. Want van U is het koninkrijk en de kracht en de heerlijkheid tot in eeuwigheid. Amen.

Grammar

Main article: Afrikaans grammar

In Afrikaans grammar, there is no distinction between the infinitive and present forms of verbs, with the exception of the verbs 'to be' and 'to have':

infinitive form	Dutch	English	present indicative form
wees	zijn	be	is
hê	hebben	have	het

In addition, verbs do not conjugate differently depending on the subject. For example,

Afrikaans	Dutch	English
ek is	ik ben	I am
jy/u is	jij/U bent	you are (sing.)
hy/sy/dit is	hij/zij/het is	he/she/it is
ons is	wij zijn	we are
julle is	jullie zijn	you are (plur.)
hulle is	zij zijn	they are

The preterite has also almost disappeared in Afrikaans, with the perfect tense being used instead, the exception being 'to be'.

Afrikaans	Dutch	English
ek was	ik was	I was

For other verbs, the perfect tense is used in Afrikaans where the preterite would be used in Dutch or English, for example, in the case of the verb to drink:

Afrikaans	Dutch	English
ek het gedrink.	ik dronk.	I drank.

In other respects, the prefect tense in Afrikaans follows Dutch and English.

Afrikaans	Dutch	English
ek het gedrink	ik heb gedronken.	I have drunk.

Orthography

In Afrikaans many consonants are dropped from the earlier Dutch (see also the grammar section for a description of how consonant dropping affects the morphology of Afrikaans adjectives and nouns). This is a similar process to what happened with modern English. (compare: Afrikaans; regen=reën, and English; regn=rain.) The spelling is also considerably more phonetic than the Dutch counterpart. A notable feature is the indefinite article, which, as noted in the grammar section, is ′n , not 'een' as in Dutch. 'A book' is ' 'n boek', whereas in Dutch it would be 'een boek'. (Note that ' 'n ' is still allowed in Dutch; Afrikaans uses only ' 'n ' where Dutch uses it next to 'een'. When letters are dropped an apostrophe is mandatory. Note that this ′n is usually pronounced as a weak vowel ([ə]; like the Afrikaans 'i') and is not as a consonant. The Afrikaans word een is the number 'one'.

Other features include the use of 's' instead of 'z', and therefore, 'South Africa' in Afrikaans is written as Suid-Afrika, whereas in Dutch it is Zuid-Afrika. (This accounts for .za being used as South Africa's internet top level domain.) The Dutch letter 'IJ' is written as 'Y', except where it replaces the Dutch suffix —lijk, as in waarschijnlijk = waarskynlik.

The diminutive suffix in Afrikaans is -jie, whereas in Dutch it is -je, hence a 'little bit' in Afrikaans is bietjie - in Dutch it is beetje.

It is interesting to note that the use of the hard 'k' is analogous to the pronunciation in parts of West Flanders. Also noteworthy is that, although the first 90 VOC settlers came from Haarlem in the Northern Netherlands, the majority of the population of that city at that time consisted of Southern Dutch immigrants. (Recent academic research also points to Afrikaans probably being a modern perpetuation of an earlier Dutch dialect, Amsterdams (Paardekoper)).

The letters "c","q","x" and "z" are rarely seen in Afrikaans, and words containing them are almost exclusively borrowings from French, English, Greek, or Latin. This is usually because words that had c and ch in the original Dutch are spelt with k and g respectively in Afrikaans (in many dialects of Dutch (including the Hollandic ones), a g is pronounced like a ch (IPA /x/), which explains the use of the g in Afrikaans language). Similarly original qu and x are spelt kw and ks respectively. For example ekwatoriaal instead of 'equatoriaal' and ekskuus instead of 'excuus'.

Letter combinations in Dutch such as cht are simplified, for example, slechts (only) in Dutch becomes slegs in Afrikaans.

Comparison with Dutch

Afrikaans	Dutch	English meaning
agt	acht	eight
aksie/handeling	actie/handeling	action
asseblief	alstublieft/alsjeblieft (colloquially 'asjeblieft')	please (lit. 'if it pleases you' - compare archaic 'lief', or French s'il vous plaît)
dankie	dank je/dank je wel	thank you
eggenoot	echtgenoot	spouse (from Old French)
goeienaand	goedenavond (colloquially 'goeieavond')	good evening
hysbak	lift	elevator
kameelperd	giraffe	giraffe
lugdiens	luchtdienst	airline, air service
lughawe	luchthaven	airport
my	mijn	my
maak	maken	make
nege	negen	nine
oes	oogst	harvest
oop	open	open
oormôre	overmorgen	the day after tomorrow (lit. 'overmorrow')
reën	regen	rain
reg	recht	right
saam	samen	together (compare 'same')
sê	zeggen	say
ses	zes	six
sewe	zeven	seven
skool	school	school
sleg	slecht	bad (compare 'slight')
soos	zoals	as, like, such
sy	zijn	his(also 'she')
verkleurmannetjie	kameleon	chameleon
vir	voor	for
voël	vogel	bird, fowl
vry	vrij	free
vyf	vijf	five
waarskynlik	waarschijnlijk	likely
ys	ijs	ice

Diacritics

All letters in the Latin alphabet are acceptable in Afrikaans, although for non-loan words only the 26 letters of the English alphabet and certain vowels with diacritics are used.

The vowels with diacritics in non-loanword Afrikaans are: á, é, è, ê, ë, í, î, ï, ó, ô, ú, û, ý. These thirteen letters are pronounced the same way as their non-diacritic counterparts in isolation. For the purpose of alphabetic ordering, these diacritic letters are regarded as equivalent to their non-diacritic counterparts. It is not acceptable to replace them by their non-diacritic equivalents in situations where typing the diacritic forms may be difficult. In the early days of e-mail and on primitive computer systems, the diacritics were often left out or written next to the character, and computer illiterate users may still do so today.

Initial apostrophes

A few short words in Afrikaans take initial apostrophes. In modern Afrikaans, these words are always written in lower case (except if the entire line is uppercase), and if they occur at the beginning of a sentence, the next word is capitalised. Three examples of such apostrophed words are 't, 'k, 'n . The most common is 'n , which is the indefinite article, and the other two may soon be regarded as archaic.

'k Het hom lief (I love him)

similar to Dutch words: ik heb hem lief

'k 't Dit gesê (I said it)

similar to Dutch words: ik heb dit gezegd

'n Man loop daar (A man walks there)

similar to Dutch words: een man loopt daar

Daar is 'n man (There is a man)

similar to Dutch words: daar is een man

The apostrophe and the following letter are regarded as two separate characters, and is never written using a single glyph, although a single character variant of the indefinite article appears in Unicode, ʼn.

Some modern word processors have autocorrect features that incorrectly treat an apostrophe (also known as a 9-quote) at the beginning of a word as a single quote (also known as a 6-quote).

In non-stylised fonts, it is acceptable to use a straight quote for the apostrophe, and this is often done in electronic communication.

Table of characters

letter(s)	value(s) in IPA	notes
a	ʌ, a
aa	ɑː
aai	aə
au, ow	ou
b	b
ch	ʃ	found only in words borrowed from French, typically 'sj' is used instead
c	s, k	found only in borrowed words it is pronounced 's' before 'e', 'i', or 'y', otherwise 'k'
d	d, t	'd' is pronounced 't' in final position
dj	d͡ʒ	used to transcribe foreign words
e	ɛ, iˑe, ə
ê	ɛː
ee	iˑe
eeu	iːu
ei, ey, y	əi
eu	øː
f	f
g	x, g
gh	g	used for the g sound when it is not an allophone of x, found only in borrowed words
h	ɦ
i	i, ə
ie	i
ieu	iu
j	j
k	k
l	l
m	m
n	n, ŋ	'n' is 'ŋ' before 'c', 'k', 'q', and 'x', otherwise 'n'
ng	ŋ
o	ɒ, uˑo
oe	u
oei	uiː
oi, oy	oj
oo	uˑo
ooi	ɔiː
p	p
q	k	found only in foreign words with original spelling maintained, typically 'k' is used instead
r	ɾ
s	s
sj	ʃ
t	t
tj	tʃ, k	'tj' is 'tʃ' at the beginning of a word, but 'k' in '-tjie'
u	ɵ, y
uu	y
û	œː
ui, uy	œy
v	f
w	v, w	'w' is 'w' after a consonant, otherwise 'v'
x	ks	used only in foreign words with original spelling maintained, typically 'ks' is used
z	z	found only in borrowed words

Afrikaans phrases

Afrikaans is a very centralised language, meaning that most of the vowels are pronounced in a very centralised (i.e. very schwa-like) way. Although there are many different dialects and accents, the transcription should be fairly standard.

Afrikaans	IPA	Dutch	English
Hallo! Hoe gaan dit?	[ɦaləu ɦu xaˑn dət]	Hallo! Hoe gaat het?	Hello! How are you?
Baie goed, dankie.	[bajə xuˑt danki]	Heel goed, dank je.	Very well, thank you.
Praat jy Afrikaans?	[prɑˑt jəi afrikɑˑns]	Praat/Spreek jij Afrikaans?	Do you speak Afrikaans?
Praat jy Engels?	[prɑˑt jəi ɛŋəls]	Praat/Spreek jij Engels?	Do you speak English?
Ja.	[jɑˑ]	Ja.	Yes.
Nee.	[neˑə]	Nee.	No.
'n Bietjie.	[ə biki]	Een beetje.	A little.
Wat is jou naam?	[vat əs jəu nɑˑm]	Wat is jouw naam? More common: Hoe heet jij?	What is your name?
Die kinders praat Afrikaans.	[di kənərs prɑˑt afrikɑˑns]	De kinderen praten Afrikaans.	The children are speaking Afrikaans.
Ek het jou lief.	[ək hət yo lif]	Ik heb je lief. Also: Ik hou van jou.	I love you.

Note:- The word Afrikaans means African (in the general sense) in the Dutch language. Although considered wrong, to avoid confusion the word Zuid-Afrikaans, lit. "South African", is sometimes used when referring to the Afrikaans language specifically. This problem also occurs in Afrikaans itself, resolved by using the words Afrika and Afrikaan to distinguish from Afrikaans(e) and Afrikaner respectively.

An interesting sentence having the same meaning and written (but not pronounced as it sounds more closely to Dutch) identically in Afrikaans and English is:

• My pen was in my hand. ([məi pɛn vas ən məi hɑnt])

Closely in Dutch: Mijn pen was in mijn hand.

Similarly the sentence:

• My hand is in warm water. ([məi hɑnt əs ən varəm vɑˑtər])

Closely in Dutch: Mijn hand is in warm water has almost identical meaning in Afrikaans and English although the Afrikaans warm corresponds more closely in meaning to English hot and Dutch heet (Dutch warm corresponds to English warm, but is closer to Afrikaans in pronunciation).

Sample text in Afrikaans

Psalm 23. 1983 Translation

1. Die Here is my Herder, ek kom niks kort nie. 2. Hy laat my in groen weivelde rus. Hy bring my by waters waar daar vrede is. 3. Hy gee my nuwe krag. Hy lei my op die regte paaie tot eer van Sy naam. 4. Selfs al gaan ek deur donker dieptes, sal ek nie bang wees nie, want U is by my. In U hande is ek veilig.

The Lord is my shepherd I shall not be in want: He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters: He restores my soul. he guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are with me ; your rod and staff they comfort me''

Lord's prayer (Dutch Living translation)	Lord's prayer (Afrikaans New Living translation)
Onze Vader in de hemel, wij eren Uw heilige naam. Laat Uw Koninkrijk spoedig komen. Laat Uw wil op de aarde worden gedaan, net zoals in die hemel. Geef ons vandaag het eten dat wij nodig hebben. Vergeef ons onze zonden, zoals wij anderen hun zonden vergeven. Laat ons niet in verleiding komen, maar verlos ons van de kwade machten.	Ons Vader in die hemel, laat u Naam geheilig word. Laat u koningsheerskappy spoedig kom. Laat u wil hier op aarde uitgevoer word soos in die hemel. Gee ons die porsie brood wat ons vir vandag nodig het. En vergeef ons ons sondeskuld soos ons ook óns skuldenaars vergewe het. Bewaar ons sodat ons nie aan verleiding sal toegee nie; en bevry ons van die greep van die Bose.

Sociolinguistics

Afrikaans is the first language of approximately 60% of South Africa's Whites, and over 80% of the Coloured (mixed-race) population. The race with the highest number of Afrikaans speakers are the Coloureds (three million), followed closely by whites (2.6 million). Some 200,000 black South Africans speak it as their home language.^[7] Large numbers of Bantu-speaking and English-speaking South Africans also speak it as their second language.

Some state that the term Afrikaanses should be used as a term for all people who speak Afrikaans, irrespective of ethnic origin, instead of 'Afrikaners', which refers to an ethnic group, or 'Afrikaanssprekendes' (lit. people that speak Afrikaans). Linguistic identity has not yet established that one term be favoured above another and all three are used in common parlance.^[8]

It is also widely spoken in Namibia, where it has had constitutional recognition as a national, but not official, language since independence in 1990. Prior to independence, Afrikaans, along with German, had equal status as an official language. There is a much smaller number of Afrikaans speakers among Zimbabwe's white minority, as most have left the country since 1980. Afrikaans was also a medium of instruction for schools in Bophuthatswana Bantustan ^[9].

Many South Africans living and working in Belgium, The Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom are also Afrikaans speakers; and there is now an Afrikaans newspaper in London, called Die Stem. New Zealand has an Afrikaans club which is based in Auckland and which organises Afrikaans dances and meetings (http://www.afrikaans.org.nz/).

Afrikaans has been influential in the development of South African English. Many Afrikaans loanwords have found their way into South African English, such as 'bakkie' ('pickup truck'), 'braai' ('barbecue'), 'tekkies' ('sneakers'). A few words in standard English are derived from Afrikaans, such as 'aardvark' (lit. 'earth pig'), 'trek' ('pioneering journey', in Afrikaans lit. 'pull' but used also for 'migrate'), 'spoor' ('animal track'), 'veld' ('Southern African grassland' in Afrikaans lit. 'field'), 'boomslang' ('tree snake') and apartheid ('segregation'; more accurately 'apartness' or 'the state or condition of being apart').

In 1976, high school students in Soweto began a rebellion in response to the government's decision that Afrikaans be used as the language of instruction for half the subjects taught in non-White schools (with English continuing for the other half). Although English is the mother tongue of only 8.2 per cent of the population, it is the language most widely understood, and the second language of the majority of South Africans. ^[10] Afrikaans is more widely spoken than English in the Northern and Western Cape provinces, several hundred kilometers from Soweto. The Black community's opposition to Afrikaans and preference for continuing English instruction was underscored when the government rescinded the policy one month after the uprising: 96% of Black schools chose English (over Afrikaans or native languages) as the language of instruction.^[11] Many historians argue that the language issue was a catalyst for the uprising rather than a major underlying cause (which was racial oppression). Others argue that the primary cause of the uprising was one specific aspect of the government's language instruction decision: that non-White (i.e., Black, Coloured and Indian) South African children be denied instruction in all but the most basic topics of mathematics, sciences, fine arts, etc. The government justified this policy by claiming that non-White South Africans would never have an occasion to use such knowledge; see History of South Africa.

Under South Africa's democratic Constitution of 1996, Afrikaans remains an official language, and has equal status to English and nine other languages. The new policy means that the use of Afrikaans is now often reduced in favour of English, or to accommodate the other official languages. In 1996, for example, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reduced the amount of television airtime in Afrikaans, while South African Airways dropped its Afrikaans name Suid-Afrikaanse Lugdiens from its livery. Similarly, South Africa's diplomatic missions overseas now only display the name of the country in English and their host country's language, and not in Afrikaans.

In spite of these moves (which have upset many Afrikaans speakers), the language has remained strong, with Afrikaans newspapers and magazines continuing to have large circulation figures. Indeed the Afrikaans language general interest family magazine Huisgenoot, has the largest readership of any magazine in the country. In addition, a pay-TV channel in Afrikaans called KykNet was launched in 1999, and an Afrikaans music channel, MK, in 2005. A large number of Afrikaans books are still published every year, mainly by the publishers Human & Rousseau, Tafelberg Uitgewers, Struik, and Protea Boekhuis.

Afrikaans music is also flourishing, from retro pop artist like Nicholis Louw, Eden, and Shine 4 to more forceful/avant garde outfits (Kobus!, Fokofpolisiekar, Buckfever, Battery9 etc.) singing in the language.

Modern Dutch and Afrikaans share 85 plus per cent of their vocabulary. Afrikaans speakers are able to learn Dutch within a comparatively short period of time. Native Dutch speakers pick up written Afrikaans even more quickly, due to its simplified grammar, whereas understanding spoken Afrikaans might need more effort. Afrikaans speakers can learn a Dutch accent with little training. This has enabled Dutch and Belgian companies to outsource their call centre operations to South Africa ^[12].

Afrikaans has two monuments erected in its honour. The first was erected in Burgersdorp, South Africa, in 1893, and the second, better-known Afrikaans Language Monument (Afrikaanse Taalmonument) was built in Paarl, South Africa, in 1975.

Future of Afrikaans

Post-apartheid South Africa has seen a loss of government support for Afrikaans, in terms of education, social events, media (TV and Radio), and general status throughout the country, given that it now shares its place as official language with ten other languages. Nevertheless, Afrikaans remains more prevalent in the media - radio, newspapers and television^[13] - than all the other official languages, except for English. More than 300 titles in Afrikaans are published per year ^[14]. Further, some legal advertising is still provided in the Government Gazette bilingually^[15], in English and Afrikaans.

Afrikaans is still viewed negatively by some. Through all the problems of depreciation and migration that Afrikaans faces today, the language still competes well, with Afrikaans DSTV channels (pay channels) and high newspaper and CD sales as well as popular internet sites.

Afrikaans Music

Afrikaans language music has a long history in South Africa, probably originating with the first songs that Dutch East India Company or V.O.C. sailors sang by the slopes of Table Mountain. The 19th century is probably when most of the tunes known to this day finally assumed their more or less modern forms. This was the period of the Great Trek, the Zulu Wars, Boer Wars and the gold rush on the Witwatersrand, all factors that contributed to the formation of a South African, and chiefly, Afrikaans identity. This was of course reflected in the songs of the white and coloured South African peoples. There is also a growing Afrikaans Hip-Hop scene with a number of groups, mostly Cape Coloured in origin. Interestingly, these groups have had some success in the Netherlands where, owing to intelligibility between Afrikaans and Dutch, Kaapse Hip-Hop has become quite popular.

See also

• Aardklop Arts Festival
• Arabic Afrikaans
• Languages of South Africa
• List of Afrikaans language poets
• List of English words of Afrikaans origin
• Afrikaans speaking population in South Africa
• South African Translators' Institute

Notes

References

• Roberge, P. T., 2002. Afrikaans - considering origins, in Language in South Africa, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom. ISBN 0-521-53383-X
• South African Afrikaans: History Slang

External links

General

• The Ethnologue: Afrikaans
• Wordgumbo: Afrikaans
• Afrikaans sample at Language Museum
• An introduction to Afrikaans
• Learn Afrikaans Online at www.afrikaans.us
• Largest supplier of Afrikaans language learning material on the web
• Afrikaans thematic vocabulary

Portals and links lists

• Grou - Afrikaans search engine and Afrikaans portal
• Litnet - Literature, culture and debate
• Die Knoop - A very large list of links to Afrikaans websites
• Woes.co.za - A popular multi-user blog
• The New South African - Afrikaans - More about South Africa's official languages.
• Kuier.co.za - A popular multi-user blog
• afrikaners.org.za - An Afrikaans portal containing links to other Afrikaans related site
• Uitsaaines.co.za - An International Afrikaans Music Radio Station on the Internet..click Luister

Organisations

• Federasie van Afrikaanse Kultuurvereniginge (FAK) - Federation of Afrikaans Cultural Associations
• Afrikaanse Taal- en Kultuurvereniging (ATKV) - Afrikaans Language and Cultural Association
• Vriende van Afrikaans - Friends of Afrikaans
• http://www.afrikaans.com/ - Stigting vir Bemagtiging deur Afrikaans

Spell checkers

• Spel.co.za - Commercial spell checker for Microsoft Office
• WSpel - Free spell checker for Microsoft Office
• Translate.org.za - Open source spell checker for OpenOffice.org, Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Thunderbird

Dictionaries

• Afrikaans Dictionary - with definitions (approx 8763 words)
• Afrikaans to English - from Wordgumbo.com (5129 words)
• English to Afrikaans - from Wordgumbo.com (6397 words)
• Afrikaans-English-Afrikaans Online Dictionary - sometimes using Esperanto as intermezzo (7975 Afrikaans words)
• Afrikaans at Dict.info - Afrikaans into 57 languages (roughly 2300 words each) and Afrikaans-English (10 127 words)
• Elektroblok - Crossword Puzzle Solver and Thesaurus Dictionary (4 Million Afrikaans and English words, synonyms and hints)

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