Afrikaans on the Frontier: Two Early Afrikaans Dialects

ABSTRACT

The influence of Khoekhoe languages on Afrikaans on the Cape Frontier of the Nineteenth Century is considered as the cradle of Afrikaans. Two varieties of Afrikaans were used on the Frontier, the Afrikaans of cattle farmers and the Afrikaans of the Khoekhoen. Frederick Jackson Turner's theory, developed in relation to the American Frontier, is applied to the Cape Frontier. Turner argued that the American Frontier was not only a physical space, but a creator of new myths, and destroyer of existing ones. Frontiers can therefore be more than geographical spaces; they are a condition of constant transformation. Using the syntactic structure of Afrikaans verbal hendiadys we argue that the context of the Cape Frontier was the creator of Afrikaans. A closer examination of the community on the Cape Frontier suggests that it was a diverse but integrated community of Khoekhoen, Oorlams, Basters, Trekboers and European cattle farmers. They used Afrikaans as lingua franca. A syntactic analysis of the verbal connecting constructions of Standard Afrikaans suggests that Afrikaans constructions may originate from Khoekhoe languages and are not a spontaneous development from seventeenth century Dutch. Afrikaans, it is argued, is therefore less Germanic in origin and more Khoekhoe.

KEYWORDS:

• Afrikaans
• Cattle Farmer Afrikaans
• Cape Frontier
• Khoe Afrikaans
• learner variety
• place names
• verbal hendiadys

Acknowledgements

This article is dedicated to the late Prof. Christo van Rensburg and is in memory of his important rethinking of the history of Afrikaans. We would also like to thank those who improved this paper with the various translation suggestions. In particular we are indebted to Pedro Dâusab for his help and patience in this respect.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 “Khoekhoe languages” and “Khoekhoe” are here used interchangeably in regard to language (rather than people). Linguistically, Khoe refers to a major language family consisting of two branches, the Khoekhoe and the Kalahari. This paper only deals with the Khoekhoe languages within this language group. These include, but are not limited to, Nama, Damara, Korana (du Plessis this issue).

2 Khoi is the old Nama, and modern Afrikaans, orthography while Khoe is the new Nama orthography (Barnard 1992). We use the new orthography but retain the old orthography when quoting from other authors who use such.

3 We use Khoekhoen as a collective name given to the indigenous herding peoples of southern Africa. It includes the Cape Khoekhoen, Nama and Korana peoples. Historically each group inhabited a distinct region, with the Cape Khoekhoen being the first peoples the Europeans met upon arrival, with various groups living around the southwestern Cape. The Cape Khoekhoen succumbed to smallpox or genocide, or were absorbed into the “Cape Coloured” population. The Korana, who resided in the north-eastern Cape, were also absorbed into other populations, namely the Griqua, “Baster” and “Coloured,” as did many of the Nama of South Africa who became “Coloured” under colonization and apartheid. Cultural remnants of the Khoekhoen can be found still be seen today within many “Coloured” populations. The Cape Khoe, the Korana and the Nama, all spoke languages or dialects from the Khoe language family (Barnard 1992; Boonzaier et al. 1996; du Plessis, this issue).

4 The majority of Khoekhoen around the frontier at this time would have been Cape Khoe, hence, it is most likely that these were the people who influenced Afrikaans, as detailed in this article.

5 For more information on the origins of place names in South Africa see P. E. Raper who has spent most of his life researching the subject (see http://namessociety.za.org/history.html). He was appointed Professor Extraordinaire in Linguistics at the University of the Free State (UFS) in 2011 and his host department was involved in initiating the Place Names Symposium, now situated within the Department of South African Sign Language and Deaf Studies at UFS (see https://www.ufs.ac.za/conferences/conference/2019-international-symposium-on-place-names/about-ispn/about). He is also a member of the South African Academy of Science and Art the International Geographical Union’s Commission on Toponymy, and International Cartographic Association’s Working Group on Toponymy.

6 The Afrikaans speaking community included different groups that used learner’s varieties of Dutch: the Khoekhoen were using a form of Dutch with definite Khoekhoe markers; Oorlams, were of Khoekhoen origin, but accepted more European linguistic and cultural influence; a Baster was usually a person with a Khoekhoen or San mother and European father; Trekboers were mainly of European descent but were unorganized nomadic cattle farmers and the European cattle farmers who owned land (see Boonzaier et al. 1996; Legassick 2016; van Rensburg 2018).

7 The Afrikaans place name translations are by the author H du Plessis—a “mother tongue” Afrikaans speaker, while the remaining translations are from Raper (2004), and Raper, Möller, and du Plessis (2014). Raper and his associates rely on Nama spellings advocated by G. S. Nienaber for their interpretations. Some academics, however, question such translations, possibly due to their use of alternative Nama (Khoekhoegowab) spellings provided in the W. H. G. Haacke and E. Eiseb (2002). Despite inconsistencies over exact meanings, these place-names (and others) are indicative of the influence of the Khoekhoe languages on the Afrikaans speakers in the region.

8 Some linguists contest the attribution of the Afrikaans double negative to a Khoekhoe influence (see Biberauer 2015).

9 Following a decision by the Dutch East India Company, slaves were imported to the Cape from 1658, although informally small numbers had been imported prior to this. This slave population influenced the development of Afrikaans mainly through Malay which many spoke, and also their knowledge of Portuguese, which some had learned from the Colonial presence in their home territories (see van Rensburg 2018).

10 The translations are literal translations of the Afrikaans examples to reflect the Afrikaans structure and highlight the argument. Non-literal English translations have not been provided as they are unnecessary to the argument and may detract from the point being made.

11 For more on Creolization n of language see Mesthrie (2004).

12 The Griqua are descendants from Khoekhoen and European unions, originating from the Cape. The pressures of colonization, however, forced many such mixed race peoples to leave the area, some of whom became known as Griqua people, maintaining specific cultural attributes and language distinctions (see Barnard 1992 for further details).

13 When this article was reviewed, two anonymous reviewers offered suggestions for some of the Nama examples. Pedro Dâusab provided the final translations that are used in examples 17 and 18. During the process of writing the paper we found it difficult to gain universal consensus regarding translations.

14 The Nama translations for examples 25 and 26 are courtesy of an anonymous mother tongue speaker and confirmed by Pedro Dâusab. Pedro Dâusab provided the translation for 27.