Universities’ on-going commitment to multilingualism

As South African public universities come to terms with the complexities of multilingualism, many are making notable inroads into implementing multilingual teaching on their campuses.

At the recent meeting of Universities South Africa’s (USAf) Community of Practice for the Teaching and Learning of African Languages (CoPAL), three universities reported on their recent and current milestones concerning African languages.

Professor Rethabile Possa-Mogoera, Associate Professor and Head of African Languages and Literature at UCT, informed peers that her university Council had approved the institutional Language Policy, together with its framework, in December 2024, and that implementation had started in January. The Policy had officially been launched during UCT’s celebration of International Mother Language Day in February.

This meant UCT had adopted English, isiXhosa and Afrikaans as its official languages. UCT also recognised Kaaps, the South African Sign Language (SASL), N|uu, and Khoekhoegowab, and was committed to their development.

Possa-Mogoera added that while the university was gearing up for full implementation of its language policy, several departments showed notable strides in embracing multilingualism.

Some achievements to date:

• The Faculty of Humanities’ anthropology department has multilingual tutorials and uses multi language and translation in class, particularly for first-year undergraduate and Honours students.
• Theatre, Dance and Performance Studies students write and perform in isiXhosa.
• African languages students are required to contribute to the isiXhosa Wikipedia by writing entries on famous intellectuals and others.
• The School of Languages and Literature (SLL) offers language courses in isiXhosa, seSotho, Afrikaans and KiSwahili.
• Sociology students are introduced to relevant concepts in isiXhosa and isiXhosa text written in the late 1800s.
• Historical studies use historic texts written in isiXhosa, with English translations, in a range of courses.
• The Umthombo Centre uses multilingual essay writing and a glossary of terms while guest speakers facilitate multilingualism in class and course reading.
• UCT Opera School and Cape Town Opera produced the opera Amagokra with libretto written in isiXhosa. Postgraduate students are encouraged to write their dissertation partly in an African language.
• The Centre for Film and Media Studies is collaborating with the Centre for Multilingualism and Diversity Research at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) on the first trilingual dictionary of Kaaps.

• The School of Education’s language-for-learning research project focuses on bi/multilingual strategies for teaching science, mathematics and English in isiXhosa and English.
• Health Sciences promotes basic isiXhosa for doctors and student doctors. In addition, CALDC, a research project based in the faculty, has recently completed the data collection phase of a survey of the African languages used by the Faculty. The study is now in the data analysis phase.
• The Multilingualism Education Project (MEP) was responsible for the launch and roll-out of the Masithethe isiXhosa(Xhosa Communication) course for staff and students, offered during lunchtime. In addition, short courses in IsiXhosa, SASL and interpreting were approved in January and are now open for everyone beyond just UCT staff and students.
• MEP is responsible for several projects including the development of multilingual online glossaries designed to promote subject concept literacy among students for whom English is not their first language.

The core provisions of the UCT language policy are:

• Teaching and learning: All undergraduate students will be encouraged to take a course in isiXhosa communication if they are not already proficient in an indigenous South African language. Possa-Mogoera said that a purpose-built centre may have to be developed for this. For postgraduate students, UCT aims to require PhD abstracts to be translated into one of the marginalised indigenous languages. Additionally, it will support the use of official languages in theses and dissertations.
• Research and scholarship: The policy commits the university to support research in and about indigenous languages, providing resources for scholars and promoting the development of discipline-specific language tools.
• Communication: Internal university communications will be made available in at least two of the official languages where context allows. Language preferences of external stakeholders will also be respected in day-to-day communication.

Possa-Mogoera said UCT also wishes to grow the teaching and learning of KiSwahili. The language began being taught as an elective course in 2023, with intentions to launch it as a major in 2028.

UCT also partially funded the N|uu Audio-Visual dictionary recording as part of the UCT language development plan that identified the Khoi and San languages (N|uu and Khoekhoegowab). Recordings, in which various stakeholders participated, were held in the Northern Cape in March this year.

Dr Yolisa Madolo, academic and researcher in the Department of African Languages, said the university’s Revised Language Policy has yet to be tabled by the Senate. However, it is already being implemented with the seven WSU faculties having established Faculty Transformation and Languages Committees (FTLCs) whose mandate is to spearhead the implementation of the language policy.

WSU is currently adopting bilingual teaching and learning practices through translanguaging in tutorials. Eight postgraduate language students have been employed as translator interns with a further six due to start in April this year. They will undergo vigorous training.“WSU has also embarked on the translation of the key concepts (glossaries) for all faculties with 30% of their modules being readied for translation from English into isiXhosa. The 30% is composed of 20% first year modules and 10% ‘high risk’ modules. Meanwhile, the School of Law was chosen as the department to pilot multilingualism,” she said.

“In addition, doctoral and master’s final research project abstracts have been translated into isiXhosa, presenting bilingual abstracts for the 2024 graduates. The translations undergo verification by language and subject specialists and will also be verified by Pan South African Language Board (PanSALB) before they are given to students.”

WSU has also bought machine translation software (SDL Trados) which will be used by 20 translators who still have to be trained in its use.

Students, especially those in the Department of African Languages, have been encouraged to write their research in their respective languages. Fifteen students chose to write their Master of Arts research projects in isiXhosa. All honours students in the African Languages Department conducted their research in isiXhosa and Sesotho.

WSU hosted its first Mother Language Day celebration with the launch of four isiXhosa fiction books written by WSU academics.

UMP’s management committee has approved the language policy developed by the University’s Language Policy Task Team. The next steps will include conducting workshops to educate staff on the language policy and consultations with the Deputy Vice-Chancellor’s Office and the deans.

Lecturer, Ms Cynthia Ndlovu, said the UMP Language Policy Task Team has also developed a terminology list extracted from one of the Culture and Heritage Studies modules, and translated terms into IsiNdebele and siSwati. This, to demonstrate ongoing commitment to improve language diversity within the institution. Terminology development will next target the research methodology module.

The language team, in collaboration with the Culture and Heritage Department, has initiated a project to empower students to write poetry and short stories in their native languages as part of fostering linguistic creativity and preservation.

UMP, in collaboration with the provincial Department of Arts, Culture and Recreation, is looking to revitilise the Research Centre for African Languages with a focus on IsiNdebele and siSwati. The objective is to encourage research publications from Honours and Mas’er’s studies in these two languages.

UMP enrolled the first cohorts of Honours and Master’s students in siSwati and IsiNdebele in 2024, continuing into 2025. In 2024, there were five Honours students and five Master’s students majoring in siSwati. In 2024, there are seven Honours students and three at Master’s level.  Regarding IsiNdebele, UMP had three Honours students in 2024 and three in 2025.

Ndlovu said that the University was partnering and collaborating with other institutions on Communicative Development Inventories (CDIs). This is a collaborative research project concerning all official South African languages, between UMP and eight other SA universities and some early childhood development centres and non-governmental organisations. This project will establish the first comprehensive overview of first stages in language development, in South African children.

Other partnerships are being pursued with the African Academy of Languages and the Pan South African Language Board.

As the CoPAL Chair and her Deputy congratulated the reporting universities on their impressive milestones, they reiterated the call to share the developed resource repositories for the benefit of all institutions.

Janine Greenleaf Walker is a contract writer for Universities South Africa