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The actor is tasked with embodying text in order to portray the characters’ intentions. This article shows that such a complex task escalates when the actor performs in a second language. In South Africa, where eleven official languages are embraced, the multiplicity and crossover of spoken languages is a daily challenge for actors and theatre makers, leading to a preference for physical performances, which limits the use of text. The production of embodied sound patterns embedded in a text informed the creative process of an experimental production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters. It was created with a second-language cast (speakers of Setswana and Afrikaans) whose over-arching goal was to consider the embodied patterns of pre-linguistic expression as a theatre-making tool. When reflecting on their work, the actors indicated that their explorations facilitated a connection with the text in English and generated the relevant dynamics for the play’s sociopolitical themes to be adequately ‘translated’ to a contemporary multilingual South African context. Karina Lemmer is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Performing Arts at Tshwane University of Technology in Gauteng, where she teaches acting and voice. She has directed a number of multilingual productions, including Buried Voices (2018) and Motlotlegi (2019), and has published in the Voice and Speech Review (2018).

The Georgian language, the official language of Georgia, is the only written member of the Kartvelian language family, the indigenous language family of the Caucasus region. Georgian philology and lexicography have long-standing tradition, English–Georgian lexicography being no exception.Given the increasing use of ample electronic text corpora for lexicographical purposes, the team of Georgian lexicographers, working on the Comprehensive English–Georgian Dictionary (CEGD), subsequently the Comprehensive English–Georgian Online Dictionary (CEGOD), decided to compile an English–Georgian Parallel Corpus (EGPC). The aim of the project was to develop the methodology of building a parallel corpus of Georgian and assess its efficiency for Georgian bilingual lexicography. The work on the corpus is going on for over a decade. The ultimate aim is to create a standard for Georgian bilingual corpora that will be compiled in future.The article describes the content and composition of the EGPC, its structure, functionalities, search engines and so on. The article also deals with various studies conducted over years in order to assess and enhance the value, applicability and efficiency of the EGPC for the automatic or semi-automatic recognition, tagging and extraction of terminology, the compilation of terminological entries, as well as the entries for the English–Georgian Dictionary and those for the Georgian–English Learner's Dictionary, etc.Particular emphasis is laid upon the actual or potential applicability of the corpus for the lexicographical activities and for the machine translation projects. The findings of the study may be interesting for other under-resourced languages like Georgian.

A return to the past has been a dominant feature of recent Afrikaans writing. This is evident in the many novels re-visiting the Anglo-Boer War or recounting incidents from the apartheid past. The approaches include the debunking of myths and a nostalgic longing for the good old days. Whether this is true of the small body of Black Afrikaans writing, given its ambivalent relationship to the canon, needs to be investigated. A number of texts that was published recently either had a clear autobiographical background or emanated from the desire and imperative “to tell our own stories from our communities”. A feature of the texts is also the way it engages with the past and makes use of diverse narrative strategies to recount circumstances and experiences and portray an image of how characters lived through the historical events during the apartheid years. The paper draws on David Scott’s distinction between romance and tragedy as two distinct narrative forms in which the past can be represented and narrated. Scott’s typology is applied to a critically reading of selected texts by inter alia Fatima Osman, Simon Bruinders, Ronelda Kamfer and Valda Jansen. In the case of the texts by the first mentioned authors the narrative is about survival, determination and the triumph of the human spirit in the face of a dehumanising system like apartheid. In the latter texts one finds elements of dystopia and disillusionment with the past as an ydill. It also gives an unsentimental view of the state of mind and events playing out in communities in the present. The texts furthermore grapples with textual strategies to represent history and the inability at times to comprehend the past.

Vanden vos Reynaerde's transformation into Reinaard die Jakkals The legacy of the Middle Dutch epic Vanden vos Reynaerde and the many ways in which we stll see traces of Reynaert the fox and his companion, Iesegrim the wolf, in Afrikaans, are discussed in this article. The indestructible fox gets a second life under the Southern Cross, perhaps most notably in the many tales about Jackal and Wolf which are well known as part of a shared oral heritage by white and Khoi speakers of Afrikaans. Our focus is not these stories, however, but rather the following question: does the Reynaert of the epic indeed live on in Afrikaans literature? We argue that the epic itself and its literary heritage has not received as much attention as did the stories of the sly jackal and the gullible, even dimwited, wolf. These extremely short stories do not exhibit the carefully planned structure, sharp social commentary and ruthless exposing of human weaknesses as does the epic. In our opinion, the only text in which the medieval epic itself functions as intertext, is in the brilliant adaptation by Eitemal. Eitemal created a story which is in many ways so different from the Dutch Reinaert, that it truly is a story written on African soil. In the Eitemal text, the sly fox becomes a typical Afrikaans crook--and what's more, he is a villain who is not foreign to modern readers due to his essentially human character. In Reinaard die Jakkals the intrepid, extremely cruel but also clever fox lives on. Keywords: Vanden vos Reynaerde, Reinaard die Jakkals, translation, Eitemal, Jakkals en Wolf.

This article introduces a prototype of a writing (and learning) assistant for verbal relative clauses of the African language Sepedi, accessible from within a dictionary or from a word processor. It is an example of how a user support tool for complicated grammatical structures in a scarcely resourced language can be compiled. We describe a dynamic light-weight tool aimed at combining user-knowledge with text production support, i.e., user-involved interactive text production of the complicated verbal relative in Sepedi. In this article, the focus is on access in a dictionary use situation. Although the tool is intended as a writing assistant to support users in text production; it also satisfies text reception and cognitive needs, but its focus is on solving text production issues related with the interaction between lexical items and complex grammatical structures in the African (Bantu) languages and for learning by users and/or training users in this interaction. Direkte gebruiksleiding in e-woordeboeke vir teksproduksie en teksresepsie - die werkwoordrelatief in Sepedi as gevallestudie. Hierdie artikel stel 'n prototipe van 'n skryf- en (leer)hulpmiddel bekend vir werkwoordrelatiewe konstruksies in die Afrikataal Sepedi, wat vanuit 'n woordeboek of 'n woordverwerker toeganklik is. Dit dien as voorbeeld van hoe 'n gebruikershulpmiddel vir ingewikkelde grammatikale strukture in 'n hulpbronbeperkte taal saamgestel kan word. Ons beskryf 'n dinamiese liggewig hulpmiddel wat gemik is op die kombinering van gebruikerskennis met teksproduksie-ondersteuning, dit wil sê, gebruikersbetrokkenheid by interaktiewe teksproduksie van die ingewikkelde werkwoordrelatiewe in Sepedi. In hierdie artikel is die fokus op toegang tydens 'n woordeboekgebruiksituasie. Hoewel die werktuig bedoel is as 'n skryfhulpmiddel om gebruikers in die produksie van teks te ondersteun, voldoen dit ook aan teksresepsie- en kognitiewe behoeftes. Die fokus is egter op die oplossing van teksproduksiekwessies wat verband hou met die interaksie tussen leksikale items en komplekse grammatikale strukture in die Afrikatale asook op die aanleer van taal deur gebruikers en/of die opleiding van gebruikers in hierdie interaksie.

Whether or not song lyrics should be translated has been debated by researchers, translators, artists and audiences. Some are of the opinion that songs should not be translated as singing in translation produces a weak version of the source text, while others argue that a song in the language of the audience fosters better understanding. The translation of song lyrics goes beyond linguistic aspects and includes musicological aspects such as the melody, rhythm and mode of presentation. Because of the interaction between the music (the melody) and the lyrics, the music in some cases obscures the lyrics and in other cases prolongs the lyrics. Therefore, the song translator faces a constant negotiation of inter-semiotic elements with regard to, among others, functionality and singability. This study provides an overview of the musicological aspects of song translation, with reference to Low's pentathlon and Franzon's layers of singability. As an illustration, this article provides a discussion of the translation of a Leonard Cohen song into Afrikaans by a South African gospel singer and preacher, Koos van der Merwe. The data have been collected from an original Leonard Cohen CD and the translated versions thereof from the Van der Merwe CD (Leonard Cohen in Afri-Kaans).

Namibia has one of the most dehumanising and destructive colonial pasts of any nation in Africa, or, for that matter, the world. Before colonisation, the area now known as Namibia was home to diverse cultural groups. The successive colonial regimes of Germany and South Africa inflicted genocide, brutality and apartheid on the region. Namibia finally fought for and won its independence in 1990 – over three decades after Ghana became the first independent sub-Saharan nation in 1957. Today, Namibia strives to leave behind its troubled past and harness the power of education to provide greater equality of opportunity and quality of life for all of its citizens. The concept of ubuntu, with its emphasis on inclusiveness, equity and equality, is central to Namibia's pursuit of this goal. Significant challenges stand in its way, including extreme poverty, an emerging economy struggling with drought and a competitive world market, and a populace with multiple mother tongues and cultural traditions. After a brief summary of Namibia's colonial past, this study examines these challenges, noting that the same factors that provide Namibia with a rich and diverse cultural tapestry also pose great difficulties for educators determined to provide equitable education for all. Current inequities in Namibian education are assessed, with a particular focus on the divide between urban and rural Namibia and between the four major ethnic and cultural groupings: the White Afrikaans speakers, the Black African majority, the Coloured population, and the Basters. The study concludes by suggesting multiple ways in which education could be brought closer into line with ubuntu values. The author argues that the very same factors that currently pose challenges to the quality and equity of Namibian education (ethnicity, urban/rural location, gender and socioeconomic class) might, if seen from a new perspective, become the basis for educational transformation. Entre passé destructeur et avenir décolonisé et intégrateur : le rôle d'une éducation de style Ubuntu pour élaborer une pédagogie adaptée à la culture en Namibie – La Namibie possède l'un des passés coloniaux les plus déshumanisants et destructeurs parmi les nations africaines ou même mondiales. Avant la colonisation, le territoire couvert aujourd'hui par la Namibie abritait plusieurs groupes culturels. Les régimes coloniaux successifs de l'Allemagne et de l'Afrique du Sud ont infligé à la région génocide, brutalité et apartheid. Le pays a finalement lutté avec succès pour son indépendance acquise en 1990 – plus de trois décennies après celle du Ghana, première nation subsaharienne devenue indépendante en 1957. Aujourd'hui, la Namibie s'efforce de laisser derrière elle son passé douloureux et d'exploiter le pouvoir de l'éducation afin d'accroître pour tous ses citoyens l'égalité d'accès et la qualité de vie. Le concept Ubuntu, qui met l'accent sur l'inclusion, l'équité et l'égalité, est décisif dans la poursuite de cet objectif par le pays. Sa démarche est cependant entravée par des défis considérables, dont une extrême pauvreté, une économie émergente freinée par la sécheresse et un marché mondial concurrentiel, et une population caractérisée par une multitude de langues maternelles et de traditions culturelles. Après une brève synthèse du passé colonial de la Namibie, la présente étude examine ces défis et constate que les mêmes facteurs apportent au pays un paysage culturel riche et diversifié, tout en posant de grandes difficultés aux éducateurs déterminés à dispenser à tous une éducation équitable. L'auteure procède à une évaluation des inégalités actuelles dans le système éducatif, en particulier la fracture entre la Namibie urbaine et rurale, et entre les quatre grands groupes ethniques et culturels : les locuteurs afrikaans blancs, la majorité noire africaine, la population métisse et les Basters (bâtards). L'auteure conclut en proposant de nombreuses façons de rapprocher davantage l'éducation des valeurs Ubuntu. Elle avance que précisément les facteurs qui posent actuellement des défis à la qualité et à l'équité de l'éducation en Namibie (appartenance ethnique, milieu urbain et rural, sexe et catégorie socioéconomique) pourraient, à condition d'être considérés dans une nouvelle perspective, constituer le point de départ d'une transformation de l'éducation.

Language policy debates in South Africa concern only Black African language speaking children rather than White English and Afrikaans speaking children. These debates construct Black African children as learners with deficits and fail to acknowledge their language resources. At the same time, policy makers fail to critique the unjust system to which they are subjected and of which they are victims. In this paper, I present a brief case study of children belonging to the Stars of Today Literacy Club to show the possibilities and ways in which these children are positioned as competent multilinguals and, in so doing, can resist the prevailing deficit view. The paper has three key aims: 1) to bring to light the racist ideology behind the current implementation of language policy, showing the specific ways in which, it constructs African language speaking children as inherently different from English and Afrikaans speaking children, evidenced by the fact that English and Afrikaans language speakers medium is not even debated: eventually, English becomes the preferred language of instruction from Grade 4 onwards. 2) To describe how inequality is thus created and entrenched through undifferentiated language in education policies, curriculum, textbooks, and assessments, all of which are based on the unexamined idea of the child being a middle-class English-speaking child. 3) to demonstrate how bilingual children can be positioned as capable, rather than deficient, through hybrid language and literacy practices.