L. J. Louwrens

On the Development of Scientific Terminology in African Languages: The Terminographer's Dilemma in a New Dispensation·

There currently exists a noticeable tension in South Africa between the political aim of one homogeneous South African nation on the one hand and the autonomy each language deserves in practice according to the constitution on the other. The real development of individual languages and the purposeful cultivation of language pride necessarily accentuate races and ethnical differences, which are contrary to the ideal of nation-building. Consequently, languages are subtly denied acknowledged constitutional rights in practice, which will impact negatively on the development of especially the African languages into technical and academic languages in their own right. The question thus arises whether it is sensible for the terminographer to develop scientific and technical terms for the African languages, while everything at this stage indicates that these terms will hardly, if ever, be used by subject specialists. Keywords: terminology, african languages, language attitudes, medium of instruction, language-teaching, linguistic awareness, language planning, language policy, multilingualism, nation-building, constitutional rights, harmonization, standard language, standard sotho, standard nguni, language boards, language academies, ethnicity, monolingual schools, radio services

Semantic change in loan words

In this article the phenomenon of semantic change as it manifests itself in a variety of loan-words or adoptives from different Bantu languages is investigated. After a discussion of the notion ‘semantic change’ several factors which play a role in such changes are considered, e.g. ellipsis, analogy, metonymy, metaphor, folk etymology, etc. It is shown that meaning change may result in the generalization, specialization or radical change in a words meaning, as well as in changes in the emotive content of words. As far as the latter is concerned, the important role played by taboo and euphemism is focussed upon.

Some pragmatic functions of interrogative particles in Northern Sotho

In Northern Sotho, two sets of particles are employed in interrogative structures, namely na (which varies with naa), and afa (which varies with a). In this article I indicate that, contrary to existing views, the two sets are incorporated into interrogative structures to mark quite different pragmatic functions. The central theme of the article is that unmarked general questions are characterized by a specific intonation pattern. When interrogative particles are introduced into these structures, they point towards the involvement of pragmatic factors which stretch beyond mere interrogativity.

Contrastiveness and the so-called absolute pronoun in Northern Sotho

In this article the verb:object relationship is investigated with regard to indicative main clauses in Northern Sotho. The major objective is to prove that the verb:object relationship differs from the verb:subject relationship, in as much as objects are semantically more closely associated with verbs than subjects are. The Northern Sotho data which are presented in support of this hypothesis relate to the distributional properties of (a) the so-called ‘absolute pronouns’ and (b) the ‘imperfect tense morpheme a’ in the verb of indicative main clauses. It is concluded, inter alia, that traditional views on both the absolute pronoun and the ‘long form’ of the imperfect indicative verb need revision.

Northern Sotho colour terms and semantic universals

In 1969, Berlin & Kay published a book entitled Basic colour terms in which they explicate their findings after having investigated basic colour terms in 98 genetically unrelated languages. This enabled them to formulate the following two-fold hypothesis: (a) that there exists a universal set of eleven basic colour terms, and whereas some languages select sub-sets from this universal inventory to name colours, other languages utilize the set as a whole; and (b) the colour vocabulary in any given language develops along an evolutionary line commencing with terms for white and black, and culminating in terms for pink, purple, orange and grey. In this contribution, the basic colour terms of Northern Sotho are subjected to Berlin & Kays findings against two opposing hypotheses with regard to language, namely the relativist approach (also known as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis), on the one hand, and the universalist approach, on the other. It is shown that Berlin & Kays hypothesis, which gave further impetus to...

The conceptualization of spatial relationships as expressed by locative structures in Northern Sotho

Three types of locatives are investigated with regard to the structural and semantic features which distinguish them from one another, i.e. locative nouns, locativized nouns, and locative particle groups. An explanation is put forward, for the co-occurrence of these three structures in Northern Sotho and the ways in which mother-tongue speakers possibly conceptualize the spatial relationships expressed by these structures are investigated.

Towards an interpretation of the concept ‘meaning’

In the first section of this article two terms which are very often encountered in semantics are discussed, i.e. reference and sense. Thereafter, some difficulties which arise when the concept ‘meaning’ has to be defined are outlined. Finally, a suggestion by Leech as to how some of these difficulties can be overcome is reflected upon: Leech suggests that ‘meaning’ in its broadest sense should be broken down into seven subtypes, since such a subdivision facilitates the interpretation of the concept ‘meaning’ in general. These seven types of meaning are discussed and illustrated with examples from Northern Sotho whenever possible.

Cattle and cattle colour terminology in South Africa

A comparison between cattle colour terminology found in the Khoikhoi languages and that found in South African Bantu languages brings noticeable similarities to light, leading to the assumption that both the cattle and the terms used to describe their characteristic features were acquired by the South Eastern Bantu-speakers through contact with Khoikhoi pastoralists. In this article we investigate the possibility that these terminological similarities are the result of mutual relatedness to a single progenitor set of terms, rather than of borrowing that took place in a restricted geographical area. To this end, three hypotheses are proposed, respectively termed the East African link-hypothesis, the Northern Botswana link-hypothesis and the Sudan link-hypothesis. We argue that the latter, pointing to a common Nilotic proto-source, represents the most plausible explanation for the origin of cattle colour terminology shared by amongst others, the South African Bantu and Khoikhoi languages.

On the generic nature of common Northern Sotho bird names: a probe into the cognitive systematization of indigenous knowledge

A major claim made here is that, in the categorization of plants and animals by peoples living in traditional societies, there exists a specifiable and partially predictable set of plant and animal taxa that represents the smallest fundamental biological discontinuities easily recognized in any particular habitat. This large but finite set of taxa is special in each system in that its members stand out as beacons on the landscape of biological reality, figuratively crying out to be named. These groupings are the generic taxa of all such systems of ethnobiological classification, and their names are precisely the names of common speech (Berlin, 1992:53). Two questions are addressed in this contribution, namely why Northern Sotho speakers tend to name birds at the generic level by grouping different species together under one and the same common name, whereas common names exist for each and every species in English and Afrikaans; and secondly, whether the Northern Sotho data support the thesis that the human mind is innately structured to organize knowledge about nature taxonomically. Regarding the first question, it is shown that there are very sound cognitive and psychological reasons why natural phenomena such as species are grouped together at the generic level under a single common name. As far as the second question is concerned, it is concluded that the Northern Sotho data do not support the widely held view that the human mind is innately endowed with the capacity to organize knowledge about nature in this way.

On the modal status of Northern Sotho conditionals

This article opposes the view that the conditional verb form of Northern Sotho should be regarded as an autonomous mood, and shows that the notion of condition is nothing but one of several modalities which can be expressed by indicative verbs. It is argued that although both situative and conditional verb forms can be used in conditional clauses, they differ in respect of the factuality versus non-factuality of the conditions they express. Despite this difference, it is nonetheless suggested that both situative and conditional verbs are subsumed under the broader category ‘indicative mood’, since strong evidence exists in languages across the world of a direct discourse-pragmatic link between the modality of condition and declaratives. Proposals put forth in this contribution effectively reduce the number of moods in Northern Sotho to three, namely the indicative, subjunctive and imperative.