Hey Andre, aren't most Afrikaaners just Dutch-Africans anyway? How many of you guys are actually French or English or whatever else? Aren't moost of you just descendants of Dutch colonists, and essentially Dutch by ancestry?
No, we are not just Dutch-Africans, nor are any of us just French or English or whatever else! The rough estimate of who our ancestors are is 36% Dutch, 35% German, 15% French, 8% "non-white", 2-3% English, with the rest coming from other European countries. Remember that from 1652 to 1806 Dutch was the lingua franca at the Cape, and after 1806 remained the lingua franca for non-English speakers until eventually it was replaced by Afrikaans. (Dutch was still an official language in South Africa (in theory, at least) until 1994.)
These figures are merely an estimate, and disputed by some researches. Some believe the figures for German and French should be higher, and some also believe the figure for English should be higher as well (up to 8%, according to some researchers).
These figures only refers to white Afrikaans speakers, known as Afrikaners (note the one A in the middle). The make-up of the coloured Afrikaans speakers will be completely different. The collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers is Afrikaanses. There's a bit of a political controversy surrounding both terms.
Note that we never think of ourselves as "French", "German" or "Dutch" the way Americans do. Most Afrikaners are at most vaguely aware that their surname was originally French or whatever. In my own case it would seem that the majority of my ancestors were French, and a substantial number German.
Benjamin [inactive]
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
These figures only refers to white Afrikaans speakers, known as Afrikaners (note the one A in the middle). The make-up of the coloured Afrikaans speakers will be completely different. The collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers is Afrikaanses. There's a bit of a political controversy surrounding both terms.
I've always been a bit confused about this... can the term 'Afrikaner' refer to white people only? Would coloured Afrikaans-speakers ever be called Afrikaners?
André in Zuid-Afrika
Benjamin wrote:
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
These figures only refers to white Afrikaans speakers, known as Afrikaners (note the one A in the middle). The make-up of the coloured Afrikaans speakers will be completely different. The collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers is Afrikaanses. There's a bit of a political controversy surrounding both terms.
I've always been a bit confused about this... can the term 'Afrikaner' refer to white people only? Would coloured Afrikaans-speakers ever be called Afrikaners?
That's quite a controversial political issue. During the apartheid years, coloured people refused to call themselves Afrikaners, and initially most whites believed the coloureds couldn't be Afrikaners. From the seventies onwards this became a major debating issue in the white Afrikaans community, with more liberal Afrikaners believing coloureds should be included as Afrikaners, while conservatives believed they should be excluded.
Today, some whites refuse to be called Afrikaners (because of political connotations). The term "Afrikaanses" was coined a few years as collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers, regardless of colour. It hasn't really caught on, but is still used in some circles.
As far as I'm concerned, all people who consider themselves Afrikaners (white or coloured) are Afrikaners. And if someone doesn't want to consider himself an Afrikaner, but simply as an Afrikaans speaker, that's fine too.
It's complicated....
And I haven't even begun to explain about Boers, Boere-Afrikaners, those coloureds who consider themselves black...
Benjamin [inactive]
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
That's quite a controversial political issue. During the apartheid years, coloured people refused to call themselves Afrikaners, and initially most whites believed the coloureds couldn't be Afrikaners. From the seventies onwards this became a major debating issue in the white Afrikaans community, with more liberal Afrikaners believing coloureds should be included as Afrikaners, while conservatives believed they should be excluded.
Today, some whites refuse to be called Afrikaners (because of political connotations). The term "Afrikaanses" was coined a few years as collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers, regardless of colour. It hasn't really caught on, but is still used in some circles.
As far as I'm concerned, all people who consider themselves Afrikaners (white or coloured) are Afrikaners. And if someone doesn't want to consider himself an Afrikaner, but simply as an Afrikaans speaker, that's fine too.
Thanks for the information! So, would it be safer to just say Afrikaans-speaking South Africans? Would anyone object to that term?
I totally agree with you that people should be able to define themselves. I know someone who is evidently of Indian descent, but considers himself 'white' (and also supports the British National Party, even though they wouldn't accept him as a member). I find that I actually usually think of him as 'white'.
I suppose the other difficulty would be that the distinction between white Afrikaans speakers and coloured Afrikaans speakers probably isn't so clear (at least anymore).
André in Zuid-Afrika
Benjamin wrote:
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
That's quite a controversial political issue. During the apartheid years, coloured people refused to call themselves Afrikaners, and initially most whites believed the coloureds couldn't be Afrikaners. From the seventies onwards this became a major debating issue in the white Afrikaans community, with more liberal Afrikaners believing coloureds should be included as Afrikaners, while conservatives believed they should be excluded.
Today, some whites refuse to be called Afrikaners (because of political connotations). The term "Afrikaanses" was coined a few years as collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers, regardless of colour. It hasn't really caught on, but is still used in some circles.
As far as I'm concerned, all people who consider themselves Afrikaners (white or coloured) are Afrikaners. And if someone doesn't want to consider himself an Afrikaner, but simply as an Afrikaans speaker, that's fine too.
Thanks for the information! So, would it be safer to just say Afrikaans-speaking South Africans? Would anyone object to that term?
I totally agree with you that people should be able to define themselves. I know someone who is evidently of Indian descent, but considers himself 'white' (and also supports the British National Party, even though they wouldn't accept him as a member). I find that I actually usually think of him as 'white'.
I suppose the other difficulty would be that the distinction between white Afrikaans speakers and coloured Afrikaans speakers probably isn't so clear (at least anymore).
Yep, Afrikaans speaking South Africans would be a safe term. Nobody would object, and if anyone wants to be called something is, they'll be quick to point it out to you.
As for the differences between white Afrikaans speakers and coloured Afrikaans speakers... cultural differences are disappearing, fast. There also tend to be a difference in accent, but this is also slowly disappearing, especially in the cities. And of course many coloureds actually have very light skins, so they look white.
Porthos
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
Porthos wrote:
Hey Andre, aren't most Afrikaaners just Dutch-Africans anyway? How many of you guys are actually French or English or whatever else? Aren't moost of you just descendants of Dutch colonists, and essentially Dutch by ancestry?
No, we are not just Dutch-Africans, nor are any of us just French or English or whatever else! The rough estimate of who our ancestors are is 36% Dutch, 35% German, 15% French, 8% "non-white", 2-3% English, with the rest coming from other European countries. Remember that from 1652 to 1806 Dutch was the lingua franca at the Cape, and after 1806 remained the lingua franca for non-English speakers until eventually it was replaced by Afrikaans. (Dutch was still an official language in South Africa (in theory, at least) until 1994.)
These figures are merely an estimate, and disputed by some researches. Some believe the figures for German and French should be higher, and some also believe the figure for English should be higher as well (up to 8%, according to some researchers).
These figures only refers to white Afrikaans speakers, known as Afrikaners (note the one A in the middle). The make-up of the coloured Afrikaans speakers will be completely different. The collective noun for all Afrikaans speakers is Afrikaanses. There's a bit of a political controversy surrounding both terms.
Note that we never think of ourselves as "French", "German" or "Dutch" the way Americans do. Most Afrikaners are at most vaguely aware that their surname was originally French or whatever. In my own case it would seem that the majority of my ancestors were French, and a substantial number German.
Hum, that's interesting. I always assumed most Afrikaners were of Dutch ancestry, being that it was a Dutch colony and they speak a language derived from Dutch. Just as I think of most Australians as being descended from settlers arriving from the British Isles, as its Anglo heritage would suggest. But apparently, Afrikaners are a mix of all sorts of things.
Benjamin [inactive]
Porthos wrote:
Hum, that's interesting. I always assumed most Afrikaners were of Dutch ancestry, being that it was a Dutch colony and they speak a language derived from Dutch. Just as I think of most Australians as being descended from settlers arriving from the British Isles, as its Anglo heritage would suggest. But apparently, Afrikaners are a mix of all sorts of things.
In the same way that the majority of English-speaking Americans are actually not descended from settlers who migrated from the British Isles.
André in Zuid-Afrika
Benjamin wrote:
Porthos wrote:
Hum, that's interesting. I always assumed most Afrikaners were of Dutch ancestry, being that it was a Dutch colony and they speak a language derived from Dutch. Just as I think of most Australians as being descended from settlers arriving from the British Isles, as its Anglo heritage would suggest. But apparently, Afrikaners are a mix of all sorts of things.
In the same way that the majority of English-speaking Americans are actually not descended from settlers who migrated from the British Isles.
Exactly. The very fact that our ancestors were a mix of various European groups, instead of being mainly Dutch. played a major part in Dutch developing into Afrikaans, instead of simply remaining Dutch.
Porthos
I always find it rather fascinating that Afrikaans developed as a seperate language, while all other European "white" colonies retained the same language spoken in the mother land.
Benjamin [inactive]
Porthos wrote:
I always find it rather fascinating that Afrikaans developed as a seperate language, while all other European "white" colonies retained the same language spoken in the mother land.
It would be more accurate to say that Modern Dutch and Modern Afrikaans developed from 17th century Dutch. But even then, there is considerable dialect diversity within the Dutch-speaking world.
It's also a bit of an oversimplification to suggest that all other 'white' European colonies simply retained the same language spoken in the 'mother land'. You don't speak the same as me, for example.
André in Zuid-Afrika
Benjamin wrote:
Porthos wrote:
The difference between what I speak and what you speak amounts to a different accent and a few slang words, along with slight variations on common words such as "while" vs. "whilst". But we both speak the same language, and communicate naturally and with ease, at 100% fluency between each other. We don't speak entire different *languages*.
From a linguistic perspective, it's actually rather difficult (some would say inappropriate) to distinguish clearly between one language and another. I have difficulty understanding people from Northeast England; you might not find them much more intelligible than speakers of Frisian. Yet they would call their language 'English' — so is that a separate language, or not?
You could say that the divergence between Standard Dutch and Standard Afrikaans since the 17th century has simply been greater than the divergence between Standard British English and Standard American English. However, there was not a certain point where Afrikaans became a 'separate language' from Dutch.
Sorry, Ben, disagree with you on this one. We even have a date for when Afrikaans officially broke away from Dutch - 1875, the year in which work started to formalise the differences between Afrikaans and Dutch. But even before that people were stating categorically that they didn't - or did, as the case may be - speak Dutch. In the 1800's there existed a clear division between what was considered Afrikaans (Cape Dutch, as it was previously known), and Dutch. It wasn't just a linguistic thing, but also cultural and to some extent political.
Benjamin [inactive]
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
Sorry, Ben, disagree with you on this one. We even have a date for when Afrikaans officially broke away from Dutch - 1875, the year in which work started to formalise the differences between Afrikaans and Dutch. But even before that people were stating categorically that they didn't - or did, as the case may be - speak Dutch. In the 1800's there existed a clear division between what was considered Afrikaans (Cape Dutch, as it was previously known), and Dutch. It wasn't just a linguistic thing, but also cultural and to some extent political.
I see what you mean, but as you say, the desire to maintain a difference had cultural and political connotations. My point was that the actual everyday language spoken by Afrikaners (or whatever would be the appropriate term for these people) did not suddenly change one day — that was a gradual process.
André in Zuid-Afrika
Benjamin wrote:
André in Zuid-Afrika wrote:
Sorry, Ben, disagree with you on this one. We even have a date for when Afrikaans officially broke away from Dutch - 1875, the year in which work started to formalise the differences between Afrikaans and Dutch. But even before that people were stating categorically that they didn't - or did, as the case may be - speak Dutch. In the 1800's there existed a clear division between what was considered Afrikaans (Cape Dutch, as it was previously known), and Dutch. It wasn't just a linguistic thing, but also cultural and to some extent political.
I see what you mean, but as you say, the desire to maintain a difference had cultural and political connotations. My point was that the actual everyday language spoken by Afrikaners (or whatever would be the appropriate term for these people) did not suddenly change one day — that was a gradual process.
Agree. But the people who spoke Afrikaans arrived at a point where they started to realise that they were speaking a different language, not simply Dutch which differed a bit from Standard Dutch, as is the case between Standard British English and Standard American English, which is essentially still the same language, despite some differences (as is also the case with South African English, Australian English etc.). The point here is that, during the second part of the 1800's, Afrikaans evolved into a seperate language, and was recognised as such by its speakers (and indeed by those who still preferred Dutch, and regarded Afrikaans as inferior), while this never happened in the case of American (or South African, or Australian) English. You're right in the sense that American English went through a similar process as Afrikaans did, with the difference that Afrikaans went down that road a lot faster and further. Porthos is right in the sense that Afrikaans was the only case where a colonial language developed into what is officially considered a new language, whereas English in other parts of the world (and also other colonial languages elsewhere) at most developed into a local version of that language.
