'There is no language that is superior to another' - Ramaphosa

[Jopie Fourie]

President Cyril Ramaphosa has encouraged South Africans to embrace their heritage, emphasising that every language spoken in the country has equal worth.

"There is no language in this country that is superior to another," he said during Heritage Day celebrations in the Northern Cape on Tuesday.

"There is no language we can say belongs to the past and must stay there."

Ramaphosa paid a visit to Sandile Present Community Library in Upington where he was read to by learners in indigenous African languages, including the N|uu and Nama languages.

The session was lead by Katrina Esau, affectionately referred to as Ouma Geelmeid, a recipient of the 2014 National Order Baobab in Silver for her work in heritage preservation.

Ramaphosa then addressed hundreds of people at the Mxolisi Jacobs Stadium in the Northern Cape for the 2019 National Heritage Day Commemoration.

'There is no language that is superior to another' - Ramaphosa celebrates Heritage Day with a focus on African languages

Ramaphosa paid a visit to a local library in Upington, Northern Cape, where he was read to by learners in indigenous African languages. He celebrated Heritage Day by addressing the people of Upington on the importance of language in a diverse country like South Africa.

www.news24.com

 

[S.Claus]

I have told multiple people to F off and it always seems to work regardless if they speak English or not .

 

[Hamster]

That's what all Java devs say

 

[ponder]

"There is no language we can say belongs to the past and must stay there."

Tell that to lesufi...

 

[Milano]

More empty platitudes.

 

[Hemi300c]

There are people dying you cvnt stop this trivial shyte and address the crime in the anc and country

 

[ɹǝuuᴉM]

There are people dying you cvnt stop this trivial shyte and address the crime in the anc and country

Wishful thinking...

 

[Jabulani22]

No language superior to another , he says while in a library , home of written language ,something not achieved by some peoples in the world .
I am willing to bet not all languages have a word for every single thing we know of with an english name.

 

[Urist]

Hmm... Ramaphosa... stop pandering to the masses and have a talk with your MEC for education in GP then, he doesn't agree with you.
As long as he holds his position it means that your words and your actions are two different things.

 

[santaman202]

I've heard that there's no indigenous african word for the english word maintain. Now we know why the country's falling apart

 

[CruelBreeze]

"There is no language we can say belongs to the past and must stay there."

Tell that to lesufi...

I don't think that has ever been Lesufi's narrative though. He's always maintained that he disagrees with schools that use a language other than English as a means of shutting out non speakers of that language. If he had a problem with Afrikaans, he'd ban the teaching of Afrikaans altogether but instead he's running after Afrikaans medium schools. As much as I was and still am sympathetic to people who felt their language is being attacked (which I personally don't believe is a fair assessment), the day the same crowd was up in arms because Lesufi supported the name change of school named after Hendrik Verwoed, it very much dampened my view to them as people and unfortunately my sympathies thereof.

 

[KleinBoontjie]

"There is no language we can say belongs to the past and must stay there."

Tell that to lesufi...

Don't think he was talking about Afrikaans....

 

[ForceFate]

No language superior to another , he says while in a library , home of written language ,something not achieved by some peoples in the world .
I am willing to bet not all languages have a word for every single thing we know of with an english name.

English borrowed from Greek, Latin, French, etc. Kudos to them for merging them into the language so seamlessly.

 

[ForceFate]

Don't think he was talking about Afrikaans....

He may have...

Critical steep to promoting African languages is ensuring it’s offered in all schools - ANC

Ensuring that African languages are offered in all schools is a critical step toward actively promoting it, the ANC said on Heritage Day. “Apartheid and colonialism degraded and marginalised African languages. In this regard, we support President Cyril Ramaphosa when he says, ‘There is no...

mybroadband.co.za

 

[Jabulani22]

English borrowed from Greek, Latin, French, etc. Kudos to them for merging them into the language so seamlessly.

Yup , i used english despite it being a lingua franca or whatever .
I reckon even Japanese language has some words for things that other languages besides english have no grasp of .

 

[ForceFate]

Yup , i used english despite it being a lingua franca or whatever .
I reckon even Japanese language has some words for things that other languages besides english have no grasp of .

They also have loan words from English and their neighbours across the pond.

 

[Jabulani22]

They also have loan words from English and their neighbours across the pond.

Yeah pretty sure they would , language is so interesting in the way certain ones adapt and grow while others just stagnate and claim to be just as advanced as the other.

 

[ForceFate]

Yeah pretty sure they would , language is so interesting in the way certain ones adapt and grow while others just stagnate and claim to be just as advanced as the other.

The more the speakers of a language, the more the chances of it developing. Some of our local languages stagnate because no one pays attention to them anymore. They don't attract academics anymore due to limited opportunities they present.

 

[Jabulani22]

The more the speakers of a language, the more the chances of it developing. Some of our local languages stagnate because no one pays attention to them anymore. They don't attract academics anymore due to limited opportunities they present.

Pretty sure they stagnate because instead of coming up with real names for stuff using the language they just hitch an E/i to the english/afrikaans version and call it a day .
Im not judging , im just saying there may be more to a language than making sure you have 15 different names for purple rather than figuring out how to say multiverse in your own language.

 

[ForceFate]

Pretty sure they stagnate because instead of coming up with real names for stuff using the language they just hitch an E/i to the english/afrikaans version and call it a day .
Im not judging , im just saying there may be more to a language than making sure you have 15 different names for purple rather than figuring out how to say multiverse in your own language.

In a society where English is already dominating, there's little chance the indigenous languages will develop well enough to rival developed languages. To compound the issues, black middle class has largely adopted English as a dominant language in their daily lives.

Therefore, they're not going to bother with nuances of their L1 if they have substitute words in English.