Dat Mandarin ain't twisting my tongue

Although we in Africa have this love-hate relationship with the Americans - thanks to what we perceive as their arrogance and their jingoistic tendencies - we at least understand the language they speak.

ALTHOUGH we in Africa have this love-hate relationship with the Americans - thanks to what we perceive as their arrogance and their jingoistic tendencies - we at least understand the language they speak.

In fact, one of my friends says he will defend US imperialism with his life, because he can't imagine himself being colonised by the Chinese.

This is against the background of an announcement by the government a few days ago that plans are afoot to introduce Mandarin at South African schools next year.

Basic education spokesman Elijah Mhlanga last week said that South Africa hoped to teach Mandarin to "as many people as far as practically possible".

Mhlanga said that the programme - part of a 10-year plan signed by President Jacob Zuma in December last year - was already under way.

"There are teachers who travel to China for training while China has and will bring trainers into the country to support us," Mhlanga said, adding that China was footing the bill for the training.

But the decision to introduce the language has outraged the South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), which said it was "tantamount to a new form of colonisation".

"Sadtu rejects this imposition with the contempt it deserves," said the union's general secretary, Mugwena Maluleke.

"We will prioritise African languages in order to build social cohesion."

Echoing the sentiments of Sadtu, my friend said: "I spent almost my entire life trying to learn and understand the intricacies of English. I cannot therefore even begin to imagine myself trying to learn Mandarin, or whatever dialect the Chinese will foist upon us once they've displaced the Americans as the indirect rulers of our continent. Let's defend the Americans with our lives."

I think my friend has a point, even though he overstretches it. Americans do not even speak good English anyway.

As Bill Cosby once complained: "I can't even talk the way these people talk: why you ain't, where you is, what he drive, where he stay, where he work, who you be . And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk.

"Everybody knows it's important to speak English, except these knuckleheads. You can't be a doctor with that kind of c*** coming out of your mouth.

"In fact, you will never get any kind of job making a decent living. People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking around."

This came in the wake of a decision by the Oakland School Board in December 1996 to recognise Ebonics as the primary language of African-American students and to use it in schools.

I am raising this issue because this brand of broken English is gaining currency among our young people. You can be in Gaborone or Johannesburg, but you're likely to hear a radio airhead who thinks he's cool spewing some mind-numbing hogwash: "Yo, my n*****, thingz waz flippin' at my crib past weekend, pardee cookin' baby'."

It's so sad that we want to copy everything American. Make no mistake, there are some honourable things we can learn from them, but we tend to choose what they themselves are trying to jettison into their dustbins.

The argument put forward by those who wanted Ebonics to be part of the teaching curriculum was that because black Americans generally speak this brand of English at home it makes sense for them to be taught in the same vernacular at school so they are able to grasp proper English.

To me, a product of Bantu Education, this sounds sadly familiar. Our teachers of English were so poor in the language that they spoke to us in Zulu to teach us English. Which is why many of us still speak English based on Zulu or Setswana grammar and speech patterns: "Ngizwa iphunga [I hear a smell]".

But apartheid education was designed to make us pedagogically inferior. Our education was designed to make us receivers of instructions from white bosses. We were not being taught or trained to think creatively and independently.

But now, post-apartheid, in a country where everyone has access to the same education, surely the ideal would be perfect, standard English.

Anyway, here are some samples of Ebonics. "Yo G, you frontin' me?" English translation, "My friend, do you want to fight with me?"

Ebonics: "You gots to git those Benjamins so you cin git dat bling-bling fo yo ride" English: You must get money so you can buy expensive accessories for your car."

Ebonics: "S***, foo, I'z be doin' dat s*** an' shorty be axin me fo sum scrilla". English: "S***, friend, I'm doing that stuff and my girlfriend is asking me for some money."

Fred: "Yo G, take me lifetime to learn dat s***! Leave my standard English alone."

And, yes, struggling as I am with English, how in the hell do you think I'm going to twist my tongue alound Chinese words? Yinde lendlela [the road is long]. "

lComments: fredkhumalo@post.harvard.edu