{"title":"The language predicament of South African universities in a global perspective","authors":"Abram de Swaan","doi":"10.1016/j.langcom.2022.12.003","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>In many formerly colonized countries the colonial language still prevails as the medium of education and nationwide communication: at Independence, the various language groups would not accept another group's language as the new national medium. Much like India or the European Union, post-Apartheid South Africa officially adopted 11 languages on an equal footing. English remained in the lead and even expanded considerably. Afrikaans stayed in second position. The other African languages remained mainly as vernaculars. South African universities continued to teach in either English or Afrikaans, but black and colored students increasingly felt excluded from an Afrikaans curriculum. In a more varied and flexible academic policy, language choices should be made to depend on the relevant level of education, the academic discipline concerned, and the intended audience.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":47575,"journal":{"name":"Language & Communication","volume":"89 ","pages":"Pages 1-7"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2023-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Language & Communication","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0271530922001021","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
In many formerly colonized countries the colonial language still prevails as the medium of education and nationwide communication: at Independence, the various language groups would not accept another group's language as the new national medium. Much like India or the European Union, post-Apartheid South Africa officially adopted 11 languages on an equal footing. English remained in the lead and even expanded considerably. Afrikaans stayed in second position. The other African languages remained mainly as vernaculars. South African universities continued to teach in either English or Afrikaans, but black and colored students increasingly felt excluded from an Afrikaans curriculum. In a more varied and flexible academic policy, language choices should be made to depend on the relevant level of education, the academic discipline concerned, and the intended audience.
期刊介绍：
This journal is unique in that it provides a forum devoted to the interdisciplinary study of language and communication. The investigation of language and its communicational functions is treated as a concern shared in common by those working in applied linguistics, child development, cultural studies, discourse analysis, intellectual history, legal studies, language evolution, linguistic anthropology, linguistics, philosophy, the politics of language, pragmatics, psychology, rhetoric, semiotics, and sociolinguistics. The journal invites contributions which explore the implications of current research for establishing common theoretical frameworks within which findings from different areas of study may be accommodated and interrelated. By focusing attention on the many ways in which language is integrated with other forms of communicational activity and interactional behaviour, it is intended to encourage approaches to the study of language and communication which are not restricted by existing disciplinary boundaries.
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