'Quite an achievement': Afrikaans officially celebrates its 100th anniversary
It was recognised as one of South Africa's national languages on 8 May 1925.
FILE: The Taal Monument in Paarl, in the Western Cape, was erected by architect Jan Van Wyk in 1975 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the official recognition of Afrikaans. Picture: MAISANT Ludovic / hemis.fr / Hemis via AFP
CAPE TOWN - Afrikaans is officially 100 years old.
It was recognised as one of South Africa's national languages on 8 May 1925.
Emeritus professor of literature and literary theory in the Department of Afrikaans at the University of Pretoria, Professor Hein Willemse: "There are about 6,000 to 7,000 languages and dialects in the world and very few of those language are standardised and codified, I think there are about 110 all together, so when one looks against that background, it's quite an achievement to have a language that started out as an informal language, as just one of the dialects to be standardised in that form."
When asked about his favourite Afrikaans phrase, Willemse had this to say.
"As someone who works with words every second of the day, I actually don't have a favorite phrase or word but probably a word that I remember from my university days is a word that is probably not recognised, and we as students used the word 'molefisie' and every Capetonian will know that word, and it means 'what's your problem?'"
He said this captured the essence of Afrikaans.
"Namely its informal nature among its various speakers and the fact that a large chunk of that world hasn't been captured in formally recognised Afrikaans, it's not written up in the dictionary, formal phraseology and so forth, but it lives among people, I think that word probally captures, in a sense, the relationship between formal and informal."