The Influence of English on Afrikaans

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4.2 Anglicisms as complementary and competitive structures

Weinreich, in a paper written together with Labov and Herzog (1968: 100), maintains that ‘the key to a rational conception of language change - indeed of language itself - is the possibility of describing orderly differentiation in a language serving a community.’ This statement can be particularly aptly applied to the observation of complementary and competitive structures occurring in Afrikaans due to the contact with English. Many structures which presumably start as interference phenomena, begin in the course of time to compete with those indigenous structures, at which stage we can find many examples in Afrikaans. After an even longer period - it is impossible to determine how long these time spans are - the indigenous phenomena may be displaced (verdring) altogether, or the new English inspired construction may continue to coexist and begin to play a complementary role, adding an additional dimension to the language.

Bloomfield (1933: 326), although not referring to bilingualism in particular, describes the variation in the speech of individuals, which can ultimately lead to language change, as follows:

‘Every speaker is constantly adapting his speech habits to those of his interlocutors; he gives up forms he has been using, adopts new ones, and perhaps oftenest of all, changes the frequency of speech forms without entirely abandoning old ones or accepting any that are really new to him.’

In other words, in the case of the Afrikaner, his bilingualism and that of his interlocutors introduce new forms (anglicisms) which can gain in frequency over old forms (indigenous structures) and even lead to displacement of the latter by the former; alternatively the two can coexist, with or without a differentiation of meaning or function (e.g. as sulks/as sodanig). Ostyn (1972: 237) describes the process in the following way:

‘Since variation in usage is an inherent feature of bilingual speech, the transferred use as well as the correct one may be found side by side.’

He is able to use the term ‘correct’ without further elaboration because in the situation he is describing, all the phenomena under discussion are interference phenomena. This is no longer the case with many instances of English influence in Afrikaans. Ostyn's remarks are only applicable to the South African situation in the initial stages of English influence on a given

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structure; in the course of time they progress beyond this in Afrikaans because of the lack of an independent, non-English influenced norm to refer to, whereas his immigrant group is able to look back to the uncontaminated idiom of the motherland.

Ponelis (1979: 585) describes the competitive stage as part of the process of displacement:

‘Een vorm word nie oornag geheel en al deur 'n ander verdring nie; inteendeel, hulle wissel mekaar oor 'n lang tydperk af... Langsamerhand verdring die een vorm die ander dan, eers in die omgangstaal (waar die wisseling op tou gesit is) en veel later eers in die meer formele stylvlakke, soos die skryftaal.’

The literature on anglicisms in Afrikaans abounds with attitudes such as the following with regard to such competitive factors:

‘So 'n “onsuiwerheid” is net toelaatbaar indien dit 'n leemte vul in die Afrikaanse taal, m.a.w. indien dit 'n plek vul wat Afrikaans nie reeds vul of kan vul nie.’ (De Bruto 1970: 40-41, where he paraphrases Combrink 1968: 31)

The many anglicisms in Afrikaans which have either already supplanted indigenous constructions or are competing with them for a place in standard Afrikaans, are evidence that the speech community often has no regard for the sentiments expressed by Combrink:

‘Baie Engelse beelde [vul] geen leemte aan nie. Hulle word eenvoudig deur die bekendheid met Engels naas die ou Afrikaans gebruik en dreig om die laaste mettertyd te verdring.’ (Le Roux 1952: 38)

Steyn (1976: 26) supports the premise that when variants compete with one another, the result may well be displacement of one of them; he then adds ‘Hierdie variante kan egter natuurlik ook lank naas mekaar bly bestaan’, as many of his examples illustrate. Steyn sometimes implies that the variants he discusses are English inspired, but on other occasions he makes no attempt to determine the origin, although English is the most likely source of several of his examples.

Vogt (1954: 367) sees the phenomenon of coexisting varants in the following terms:

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‘At any moment, between the initiation and the conclusion of these changes, we have a state characterized by the presence of more or less free variants, so that the speakers have the choice between alternative expressions... What therefore in the history of a linguistic system appears as a change will in a synchronic description appear as a more or less free variation between different forms of expression, equally admissible within the system.’

Where anglicisms in Afrikaans are still at the stage of ‘free variation’, alternating with greater or lesser frequency with indigenous constructions, the education system may still have some success, as it seems to have had in the past, in eradicating them. Because of the conservatism of current prescriptive works, it can sometimes be difficult to ascertain when an indigenous structure has lost the race and has had to cede to the newcomer - there is often a discrepancy between what one says and hears and what one reads that one is supposed to use. Compilers of prescriptive works are usually aware of the diachronic situation and hanker after a bygone, more puristic stage of the language, whereas the speech community is only aware of the synchronic situation. Later in the same article Vogt states:

‘When it is maintained that since a language is an integrated system, any addition to it whatsoever must result in the rearrangement of previously existing patterns, this cannot be meant to be rigorously true for the vocabulary as a whole.’ (p. 369)

Applying this to the influence of English on Afrikaans, one can say with certainty that the rearrangement of previous patterns (displacement?) is not an immediate consequence of additions to the language from English because of the possible extended periods of coexistence mentioned by Steyn and that this definitely applies not only to vocabulary, but also other aspects of the language. The rearrangement of previous patterns can possibly also apply to consequences other than displacement, for example semantic shift or restriction of a structure to a particular register. In such cases constructions can be said to literally complement each other in that each new structure contributes something additional to the language, rather than them simply complementing each other in the sense of coexisting in free variation, which can always ultimately lead to displacement.

The term ‘complementary’ could also be applied to those indigenous structures in Afrikaans which resemble English structures and whose frequency in Afrikaans is thus all the more common than in Dutch, for example, because of this overlapping of English and Afrikaans idiom. In this book, however, the word ‘complementary’ is reserved for the phen-

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omena discussed here under 4.2; the others are termed ‘contributing factors’ (cf. 6.3), which is in line with common practice in the literature on the matter. Nevertheless, discussion of complementary and competitive factors can overlap on occasions with that of contributing factors. An example of this is the old bone of contention braaf where most scholars feel that the meaning ‘brave’ is foreign (i.e. competes with the original meaning ‘well-behaved’), whereas others (e.g. Le Roux 1952: 35; Terblanche, Die Brandwag 25/10/46) maintain that the word meant ‘brave’ in seventeenth century Dutch and thus in Le Roux's words ‘Engels kan hoogstens 'n behoudende invloed gehad het.’ It is interesting to note here that Le Roux, writing in 1945, considers ‘brave’ to be the normal meaning of braaf whereas HAT still disapproves of it.