Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics Plus
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The curse of poverty and marginalisation in language development: The case of Khoisan languages of Botswana
Full text linkKhoisan languages are spoken by tiny and remote-dwelling communities of Botswana, the members of which are characterised by socio-economic hardships and illiteracy in their own languages and in general. Historically and socially, these people emerged from a life of hunting and gathering, and, in that lifestyle mode, they were easily subdued and exploited by other language communities for cheap and serf labour. Colonialism found them in this social state, and post-colonialism has left them in the same state. As poor and marginalised subalterns, they have not had any means to advocate for their language and culture, and are currently assimilated into other peoples’ languages and cultures. Consequently, the remaining languages of these communities, spoken in remote areas by poor people, are threatened with extinction because they remain under-developed, under-documented, and are at best still at the stage of documentation by anthropologists and linguists. As illiterate people, the speakers of these Khoisan languages have no survival strategies for their languages in this ever-evolving, modern world. With their poverty and sociolinguistic marginalisation, they are devoid of any means of promoting their languages. This discussion focuses on the pitiful situation of the Khoisan languages of Botswana. Botswana’s language-use policy will be critically examined and characterised as one factor in the marginalisation and disempowerment of minority groups, both of which lead to the languages’ endangerment and death
China Town as a multilingual workplace
Full text linkSince the emergence of China within the BRIC[1]-group in 2001 (BRICS as from 2010), people of Chinese origin have gradually secured a market share in Africa that is successful at both formal and informal levels. A fitting example present at the informal level is the establishment of China Town stores and Chinese markets. These Chinese markets are characterised as a network of small, family-owned businesses which sell goods imported from China at competitive prices. This business model has become part of most towns and cities in Africa, with Chinese-owned stores featuring in lower- and middle-class areas. Overwhelmingly, the stores are managed by Chinese patrons who employ shop assistants of African migrant origin. Both groups have integrated themselves into specialised occupations, with the Chinese opening these (in)formal stores and the Africans working closely with them as shop assistants. The shopkeepers and their assistants speak different languages, but living and working in a multilingual South Africa, they communicate in English which is the common lingua franca. This research report presents an overview of an ongoing doctoral study which focuses on the Chinese markets in South Africa, with a specific interest in the nature of interaction between the Chinese shopkeepers and their African shop assistants. It seeks to describe and explain how language-in-interaction is performed or socially produced, where participants do not have a common first language, and English is the lingua franca. The data comprises audio recordings of the interaction between shopkeeper and assistants throughout the workday, as well as field note from observations of the research site. The ongoing study wishes to describe what happens linguistically when these different groups of migrants find themselves in new social and linguistic environments to which they acclimatise in profound ways.[1] BRIC: abbreviation for rapidly developing economies in Brazil, Russia, India and China, coined in 2001; in 2010 South Africa joined, so that then the group became “BRICSâ€
Writing centres as dialogic spaces: Negotiating conflicting discourses around citation and plagiarism
Full text linkCitation is fundamental in successfully constructing academic discourse. There has been much discussion concerning the considerable difficulties tertiary students experience when writing using sources, especially for those who speak English as an Additional Language. This paper interrogates the predominantly negative discourses that surround plagiarism, involving notions of honesty, integrity, punishment, trust, and deceit. These negative discourses tend to perpetuate hierarchical and impenetrable spaces in higher education. Drawing on our experiences in South African writing centres, and using key concepts from academic literacies, this paper explores ways of addressing plagiarism that can serve to empower students, including developing academic voice through citation, acknowledging “mimicry†as part of writing development, and developing critical thinking
From physical to online spaces in the age of the #FeesMustFall protests: A Critical Interpretative Synthesis of writing centres in emergency situations
Full text linkWriting centres play a vital role in guiding students in their academic writing. Central to this role is their physical location at tertiary institutions, where students usually walk in and schedule appointments with writing tutors. The recent #FeesMustFall protests saw the temporary closure of universities across South Africa. As a result, the functionality of the writing centres as physical locations was disrupted to the detriment of student development. This article evaluates the application of the principles that underscore the operation of physical writing centres as online spaces. First, it evaluates the writing centre as a physical space, and the resulting shift to an online space as a result of the #FeesMustFall protests. Secondly, with the methodological aids of Critical Interpretative Synthesis and my personal reflections as a tutor, I analyse the possible application of the principles that guide physical writing centres to the online environment
Developing agency in a writing centre context: A Social Realist interpretation
Full text linkThe aim of this article is to explore how aspects of a Social Realist theoretical framework could be understood in relation to my professional development as a writing centre consultant and manager. I share the view that a Social Realist framework could enable consideration about processes of developing or extending knowledge about ourselves in relation to cultural and structural phenomena in society, and may explain how or why changes occur or remain unchanged in socio-cultural settings. The research question that this article sets out to address is: How can my internal reflexive conversations help explain my professional development? I begin the theoretical framing for this paper by means of a brief introduction to Critical Realism (Bhaskar 1998, 2008, 2009). This is followed by a discussion of Social Realism (Archer 1995, 1996, 2000, 2007, 2010). I present introductory explanations of the major concepts used in the Social Realist theoretical framework, namely ‘structure’, ‘culture and ‘agency’, and I explain related concepts necessary for analytical sense-making. The article focuses on the concept of ‘agency’ (Archer 2007, 2010), at which point the concepts of ‘reflexivity’ and ‘internal conversations’ are discussed. The research approach used is qualitative research, utilising an autoethnographic methodology developed from ethnographic records of my professional life over a period of 25 years. I use mini-narratives based on self-interviews as the research method. Part theoretical explanation, part reflexive account, this article attempts to convey a narrative about how I have used Social Realism to make sense of aspects of my development as a writing centre practitioner-researcher in South African higher education
On augment-less NPs in Xhosa and de NPs in French
Full text linkAugment-less NPs in Xhosa and de NPs like de chevaux ‘of horses’ have strikingly similar properties. It seems that the properties of de NPs reflect the absence of the definite article les which combines with de to form the so-called partitive article des chevaux ‘some horses’. Taking the Xhosa augment to be similar (though not identical) to the French definite article, we account for the observed similarities between augment-less NPs and French de NPs
Sensationalism in argumentation: A case of the Zimbabwean parliament debates
Full text linkParliamentary debates are an argumentative interaction in which Members of Parliament (MPs) employ varied language devices in order to win debates in their favour. However, in an effort to win the debate at all costs, some parliamentarians seem to sensationalise their arguments in order to win favour or support from both internal and external audiences - the rationale judge. Sensationalism in argumentation is a presentation of an argument in a specific way in order to appeal to the hearer or the other participant’s emotions or feelings. This article examines the role of sensationalism in argumentation, drawing its examples from the Zimbabwean parliamentary debates. The study is qualitative in nature, utilising a case study research design. It is couched in the Extended Pragma-Dialectic Theory of Argumentation. Debates from the Zimbabwean parliament are purposively sampled and the analysis is based on the argumentation theoretical framework. The article concludes that the main function of sensationalist language in parliamentary argumentation is rhetorical rather than dialectic. Arguers utilise sensationalist language to convince and win the debate in their favour. The use of sensationalism as an argumentative move is misused or abused, as it is a fallacious move
Meeting them halfway: Altering language conventions to facilitate human-robot interaction
Full text linkThis article considers the remaining hindrances for natural language processing technologies in achieving open and natural (human-like) interaction between humans and computers. Although artificially intelligent (AI) systems have been making great strides in this field, particularly with the development of deep learning architectures that carry surface-level statistical methods to greater levels of sophistication, these systems are yet incapable of deep semantic analysis, reliable translation, and generating rich answers to open-ended questions. I consider how the process may be facilitated from our side, first, by altering some of our existing language conventions (which may occur naturally) if we are to proceed with statistical approaches, and secondly, by considering possibilities in using a formalised artificial language as an auxiliary medium, as it may avoid many of the inherent ambiguities and irregularities that make natural language difficult to process using rule-based methods. As current systems have been predominantly English-based, I argue that a formal auxiliary language would not only be a simpler and more reliable medium for computer processing, but may also offer a more neutral, easy-to-learn lingua franca for uniting people from different linguistic backgrounds with none necessarily having the upper hand
“We are not a ‘fix-it shop’â€: The writing centre as a uniquely configured learning space
Full text linkFor decades, writing centre practitioners have contested and protested against the demeaning characterisations of their pedagogic space. The Cape Peninsula University of Technology’s (CPUT) Writing Centre has endured stigmatisation as a “clinicâ€, “laboratoryâ€, “fix-it shopâ€, and “remedial agency for removing students’ deficiencies in composition†(Archer and Parker 2016, Drennan 2017, Moore 1950, North 1984). Although writing centre practitioners and theorists have described these centres as hubs for nurturing and enhancing students’ intellectual and linguistic capacities in order to engage and master disciplinary literacies and genres while contributing to the transformation of educational projects, such a value tends to be misrecognised – by both lecturers and students at CPUT – as focusing on improving grammatical competence. This article contributes to the discourse of redefining the writing centre as a space with unique transformational pedagogies in the context of a university of technology, namely CPUT. Underpinned by the Academic Literacies approach (Lea and Street 1998), this study views the institutional spaces in which our writing centre operates as “constituted in, and as sites of discourse and powerâ€. The research purpose is to determine how the CPUT Writing Centre is viewed by the students who make use of it. Employing a mixed-methods approach, the researchers sought answers to the following two questions: (i) How is the CPUT Writing Centre configured to support learning at a university of technology? and (ii) How do students characterise the CPUT Writing Centre as a learning space with its own unique pedagogy? The article reports on students’ perceptions and assumptions about the Writing Centre as a learning space at a university of technology in the Western Cape (CPUT). It also examines the permutations of a uniquely configured learning space, the impact of its attributive conversations, and the extent to which it is (mis)recognised as a transformative agency