Fanagalo and the Bantu languages in South Africa

Abstract

SYNOPSIS Extravagant claims have recently been made for Fanagalo as the “lingua franca of Southern Africa”. Attempts have been made to popularize it as “Basic Bantu”, and its introduction as a school subject has been advocated. This hybrid of Zulu, English and Afrikaans teas probably originated by the Indians in Natal during the latter half of the nineteenth century, and has since spread to the rest of the Union and to the Ehodesias. Its vocabulary is roughly 70 per cent Nguni (mainly Zulu), 24 per cent English, and 6 per cent Afrikaans, in origin, but it retains hardly any of the unique phonetical, morphological and syntactical characteristics of the Nguni and other Bantu languages. It therefore lacks the main features by which Bantu languages are identifiable as such. Furthermore, the Bantu themselves do not automatically understand Fanagalo, but must learn it just as the Europeans do. “Basic Bantu” is therefore a ridiculous and presumptuous misnomer. Fanagalo fulfils a real need on the mines and in cer...