Afrikaans, noun and & adjective

Forms:
Formerly also Africaans, Afrikaansch.
Origin:
Afrikaans, DutchShow more Afrikaans, from earlier Dutch Afrikaansch ‘African’.
A. noun A language of southern Africa, and particularly South Africa, which has evolved from dialects of seventeenth century Dutch; Afrikander noun sense 6; taal sense 1 a. Also attributive. See also kitchen Dutch (kitchen noun sense 2), South African Dutch noun phrase sense 1.
Note:
With English, an official language of the Republic of South Africa until 1994; now one of eleven official languages. Frequently abbreviated to Afriks by English-speaking schoolchildren when referring to the school subject.
[1900 A.H. Keane Boer States: Land & People p.xixTaal, Cape Dutch, called by the Netherlanders Afrikaansch.]
1908 E. London Dispatch 20 Oct. 4 (Pettman)I have always regarded (high) Dutch as my mother tongue and Africaans (low Dutch) as a hodge-pot sort of a language.
1924 G. Baumann in Baumann & Bright Lost Republic (1940) 103Over a pipe of tobacco we spoke to each other freely in Afrikaans.
1925 Act 8 in Stat. of Union 24The word ‘Dutch’..is hereby declared to include Afrikaans.
c1928 Botha & Burger Grammar of Afrikaans 1What is Afrikaans? It has been called by all sorts of names — a patois, a debilitated form of Dutch, a Hottentot language, kitchen Dutch,..a mere dialect spoken by the uneducated, etc., etc. Its official recognition as a language came very long after it had in reality been the spoken tongue of the population.
1936 Cambridge Hist. of Brit. Empire VIII. 859In 1925 a joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament resolved to amend the Act of Union so as to make Afrikaans one of the official languages, co-equal for all purposes with English and Dutch.
1948 A. Paton Cry, Beloved Country 265Afrikaans, The language of the Afrikaner, a much simplified and beautiful version of the language of Holland, though it is held in contempt by some ignorant English-speaking South Africans, and indeed by some Hollanders.
1949 L.G. Green In Land of Afternoon 90The people who spoke the pre-Afrikaans of that period were the farmers of Stellenbosch and the Drakenstein valley.
1954 H. Nxumalo in J. Crwys-Williams S. Afr. Despatches (1989) 31The fat Zulu warder said in broken Afrikaans: ‘He’s mad, sir,’ He gave the man a hard slap in the face..‘On your way...voetsak!’
1960 G. Lister Reminisc. 5He also wrote humorous verse, and an effort in Afrikaans, called Kaatje Kekkelbek, is almost the earliest printed example of the language.
1960 in J. Crwys-Williams S. Afr. Despatches (1989) 334A helmeted European miner..took turns with the Basuto boss-boy to shout down the microphone in Afrikaans, English and Basuto.
1968 J. Lelyveld in Cole & Flaherty House of Bondage 18Many Africans pass as Coloreds. Ernest was too dark to expect to have an easy time but..his Pretoria upbringing had made him perfectly fluent in Afrikaans, the language most Coloreds speak.
1973 Informant, Grahamstown (now Makhanda, Eastern Cape)My matric subjects are English, Afriks, Geography, Agrics, Biology and Maths.
1976 N. Ashford in J. Crwys-Williams S. Afr. Despatches (1989) 412Up to 10,000 students..carried banners with slogans denouncing the use of Afrikaans such as ‘Down with Afrikaans’, ‘We are not Boers’ and ‘Viva Azania’.
1977 Sunday Times 29 May (Mag. Sect.) 4There is no longer even a pretence of language equality in official and semi-official circles, and most of the communication, both written and oral, is blandly conducted through the medium of Afrikaans.
1987 Frontline May 24That the so-called coloured immigrants are present in Australia in some force is evident from the fact that Afrikaans is listed as a community language in Melbourne along with Italian, Greek, Croatian, Vietnamese etc.
1990 R. Gool Cape Town Coolie 97‘Why aren’t you working?’ he asked, in the racy sing-song Afrikaans peculiar to Malay fishermen.
1990 W. Smith Golden Fox 142Nobody in South Africa with political aspirations could survive without fluency in Afrikaans, the language of the politically dominant group.
1990 Informant, Grahamstown (now Makhanda, Eastern Cape)I’ve only got Afriks composition next, so I can’t swot.
B. adjective Of or pertaining to the Afrikaner people, their way of life, ideas, or language; African adjective2; Afrikaner adjective. See also Afrikaner noun sense 2 a.
1916 E. Prov. Herald 24 Dec. 7He dwelt on the change from the time when it was an offence if one dared to speak of an Afrikaans people or nation.
c1928 Botha & Burger Grammar of AfrikaansPref., This Afrikaans Grammar..is intended to supply the long-felt want of some kind of guide to the study of Afrikaans by English-speaking people.
1940 Forum 7 Sept. 3Let us forget the bioscopes in the city and visit the Reddingsdaadbond-bioscopes. There is no ‘God Save the King’ there, and the atmosphere is genuine Afrikaans.
1940 Forum 13 Oct. 19Several new Afrikaans student organisations had sprung up as a result of a dislike of ‘the totally un-Afrikaans fuehrer principle’ introduced by the O.B.
1957 D. Jacobson Price of Diamonds 124A deep Afrikaans voice at the other end of the line had said: ‘Good morning, Mr Gottlieb, we picked up a kaffir last night for not having a proper pass.’
1963 S. Cloete Rags of Glory 235Afrikaans words like trek, kop, donga, dorp and drift — hill, gully, village, and ford — used by the war correspondents, brought the African veld into the parlours of Brixton and the pubs of Highgate.
1973 Star 8 June 13It has been said our tendency to apologise for things that are Afrikaans is proof of this inferiority complex. We are ashamed, for instance, of Afrikaans music.
1978 P.-D. Uys in S. Gray Theatre One 141He was so Afrikaans — Rugby-God-Rugby-Beer...He even spoke English like a Van der Merwe joke — ‘Ag no sis man Anna sis.’
1988 S. Afr. Panorama Feb. 24It was an experience to behold — in the heart of a Black state in southern Africa, homage being paid to the Afrikaans language and the voice of Black choirs singing traditional Afrikaans songs at the top of their voices.
1990 D. Beckett in Frontline Jan. 12There are people who are so Afrikaans that you could pick them out in the street in Alaska.
1990 M. Van Rensburg in Style Nov. 119Personally, I don’t lead a particularly traditional Afrikaans life.
A language of southern Africa, and particularly South Africa, which has evolved from dialects of seventeenth century Dutch; Afrikander noun sense 6; taal sense 1 a. Also attributive.
Of or pertaining to the Afrikaner people, their way of life, ideas, or language; African adjective2; Afrikaner adjective.
Derivatives:
Hence Afrikaansness  noun, the state of being Afrikaans.
1978 A.P. Brink Rumours of Rain 162I know you’re trying to free yourself from your own Afrikaansness, but you won’t ever succeed.
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