I’ve now watched “Brother with Perfect Timing“–the 1987 documentary on Abdullah Ibrahim, directed by Chris Austin–several times. (Ibrahim, if you haven’t figured it out by now is one of the most influential jazz musicians of our time.). Everything I see the film, I see something new. Like in this clip which is of a live performance of the tune “Tuan Guru”with his band Ekaya in the mid-1980s at his New York City Club, Sweet Basil (used to be on 88 Seventh Avenue South, above Bleecker Street in Manhattan). Normally I concentrate on the music. This time I also listened closely to what Abdullah is saying. In the clip, the band’s playing is interspered with Abdullah telling the rich (if often violent) history of the Cape, focusing on the life of Tuan Guru, banished from Indonesia to the Cape as a political prisoner by the Dutch and who became a key figure in establishing Islam in South Africa. It’s then that Ibrahim makes a linkage between Tuan Guru and the origins of Afrikaans. It’s worth watching.
* BTW, I only know of one other documentary about Ibrahim by a German production company which revolves a trip he makes to South Africa to see old friends: “Abdullah Ibrahim a struggle for love“
Great stuff!
Each one ,Teach One,die man is aan die Brand,but it is an internal flame,jy is self n Guru Abdullah!
Have also just come across Kintone,Tony Cedras’group on Wax Poetics as a download,good stuff.
Hei Samboerou,
Teach one indeed. I did not know about the Kintone album. I’ll get it. Just have to check if the Wax Poetics digital music software is compatible with iTunes. — Sean
It’s an interesting observation, given that most linguists focus on Afrikaans texts written in Arabic, not the other way around.
I think Tuan Ibrahim has it the wrong way round. The point of the connection between Arabic and Afrikaans is that the earliest evidence of written Afrikaans (distinct from Dutch) uses Arabic letters – Arabic orthography to phonetically spell Afrikaans words. The origin of Afrikaans can’t lie with the transliteration he speaks of: Roman alphabet (what Ibrahim calls Dutch alphabet) to spell Arabic words. An Afrikaans orthography would then already have had to exist; thus Afrikaans pre-existing the origin of Afrikaans. Arabic transliterated with Roman alphabet (but distinctly Dutch or Afrikaans spellings) could only develop once the Dutch-Afrikaans orthography is established.
Prior to that written Afrikaans (Arabic orthography), Afrikaans would be still an oral language, but Muslims (or a section of them, and thus a proportion of the slave population) would have literacy in Arabic. So, Arabic literacy, at a time when Afrikaans is still oral – it makes more sense that it’s written origins lie with Arabic (Afrikaans transliterated via Arabic), rather than the other way round.
Somewhere in a box at my mom’s home are some books (kitaabs) that are religious instruction manuals in Arabic (I think they’re late 19th century). I don’t know where my dad got them from or who wrote them, but it contains (legacy) samples of such Afrikaans words in Arabic orthography.
BTW, Africa is a Country gets a plug as one of the best 100 educational blogs about Africa (#89). Good job:
http://www.bachelorsdegreeonline.com/blog/2009/100-best-blogs-for-learning-about-africa/
I think there is also the question of access to education/literacy to consider – since an official Afrikaans orthography was a relatively late development in the formation of language. Given the religious emphasis on learning the Q’uran, I would speculate that Muslim Afrikaans speakers would more likely to be literate in Arabic characters than High Dutch (especially since many burgers were barely literate themselves and most instruction was likely to be through the NGK).
Rustum (who I wanted to meet in Cape Town on my recent trip, but did/could not) and Steve spoiling it.
Ha ha.
Musicians take poetic license remember. Rustum should know that. He is a poet. Thanks for the clarification.
Nevertheless, I think Ibrahim’s point should be taken in the context of a larger conversation/attempt to popularize the varied origins ofAfrikaans. I know some of you may say that debate was raised and possibly settled in the 1980s. My response would be probably among academics working with/in Afrikaans and perhaps literate Cape Town progressive elites. I am curious how people see the place of Achmat Davids in telling such a different history of Afrikaans.
Sean, sorry I missed that party. I was sick and, once I saw the pics, quite disappointed that I couldn’t make it – next time.
I don’t think it’s a matter of poetic license; I think Ibrahim is trying to say something interesting, but gets it mixed up. I imagine he would get miffed if I started pontificating about jazz and screwed it up. He can use his license to improvise on the piano.
Ideologically, I think it’s more interesting in any case that the written origins of Afrikaans lie in Arabic, that Afrikaans was quite literally sounded through Arabic (imagine the Nats trying to deal with that), than that Arabic was transliterated via Afrikaans. Once a language has an orthography, any such language can be used to transliterate X into Y, so it’s nothing special. Also, isn’t it quite poetic that Arabic letters were used to produce Afrikaans sounds?
At least as I understand it, the issue of whether Afrikaans is a creole from the perspective of linguistics scholarship has been resolved resoundingly in favor. But the social context and dynamics that gave rise to the process of creolization are less clear, and reconstructing the history of the Cape Colony is still a work in progress. Correct me if I am wrong.
Rustum – what’s more interesting is that the vernacular written in Arabic was employed in the aim of Muslim education. There’s clearly a distinction between narrative language, and language used to systematically communicate fairly complex theological ideas.
Ja,ok n skoen in die gevriet gekry,but a very interesting discussion.And as with a note,there is still no sound,without Afrika there is no Afrikaans.Not to negate the Arabic’s role,but which in itself most likely in this case returned back to its cradle from Tidores.”Water from an ancient well,oh beautiful Africa,thats where I’ll always dwell”
Steve, I don’t know enough about the resolving of the issue among sociolinguists at present, but I know that at least up until the late 1980s, most Afrikaans sociolinguists couldn’t countenance the idea that Afrikaans was a creole, which, in sociolinguistic terms simply means that a pidgin has become a mother tongue (i.e. the pidgin speakers have children who learn the pidgin as a mother tongue or first language; ‘creolisation’ as mixing – in the non-linguistic meaning – happens in the development of the pidgin: simplification of an unknown language as lingua franca). It’s easy to see the ideological reasons for not wanting to acknowledge creole status.
I also remember reading somewhere that the original meaning of ‘Malay’ was primarily linguistic and referred to the mixed group of people (slaves of varying origins and different religious persuasion) speaking a language known as ‘Malay’. I.e. ‘Malay’ didn’t mean ‘Muslims of a certain ethnicity who make nice food’. So it could be that the language was from South East Asia, but now spoken by all who shared the economic and geographical situation at the Cape (slaves, the poor, black, white, etc). Or it could be that it was already mixing it up with Dutch; a kind of Dutch-Malayo pidgin, again spoken by slaves and the poor, and distinct already from Dutch and Malayo (I don’t have dates, sorry; so can’t think about the when and where wrt slaves and freemen).
As to informal, daily, narrative use vs formal, ‘high’ use: it’s difficult to think in these terms because, from my experience, there was little distinction in informal-formal modes of language in mosque or madressa when I was a kid. While in Arabic there may be such distinctions in Arabic speaking countries, in South Africa, the majority of Muslims do not know Arabic (Muslims typically can parrot Arabic (read and mouth it), but not know what they are saying). So I imagine the scenario must have been: the imam or khalifa can speak and write Arabic, the lay audience can read Arabic (i.e. read the letters that make the sounds), but they speak Afrikaans. But there’s no orthography for Afrikaans. Khalifa comes up with a solution: Afrikaans with Arabic letters.
These manuals of instruction also would not necessarily be in complex theology, but more about guidelines to ethical and practical behaviour. I’m reconstructing backwards from my own memory reading such literature as a kid in madressa, but I don’t doubt that my contemporary experience preserves the genealogy well. It is well known that SA Muslims are theologically conservative and in a place like Paarl, my hometown, even more so. Templates that were laid down centuries ago endure. Imams when I was a kid, for instance, never wrote their own sermons, but read sermons (and then translated them) from 18th, possibly 17th century (and possibly even earlier) anthologised sermons from Saudia Arabia! Practice and educational material in madressah may well then still follow what was going on back in the early days of Afrikaans.
So all in all I don’t think there would have been a divide between the levels of language in everyday use and in religious instruction. Remember also that this is about the early days of Afrikaans, a language developing in any case at a substrate of society. There’s no codification, so no rules to distinguish between ‘low’ use and ‘high’ use. Those khalifas were really the voortrekkers.
Die Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners of course couldn’t pay attention to them in the GRA’s late-1700s anti-Dutch activism in starting such codification – they couldn’t read Arabic, and besides, those books would have been guarded jealously.
I really should get those books left by my father and have an Arabic scholar look at them…
Samboerou, it’s not about negation or eclipsing the role of X or Y; it’s not to say that ‘without Afrika there is no Afrikaans’. It’s just a matter of history. Afrikaans was being spoken at point A, whatever its origins (but I take that as read; even the Taalmonument – opened on the centenary of the establishment of Die Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners – acknowledges the influence of African languages, for instance), but Afrikaans had not appeared in any WRITTEN form until point B. That point B is then the earliest EVIDENCE of its written form, which happens to be in Arabic, and which is interesting given the way that the later cultural history of the language was twinned with purist Afrikaner identity.
“So it could be that the language was from South East Asia, but now spoken by all who shared the economic and geographical situation at the Cape (slaves, the poor, black, white, etc)”
That came out wrong. I meant, spoken by all of the poor who shared economic conditions and geographical space with slaves and freed slaves. I.e. a mixed group of people, black and white, but all poor and mixing it up, and speaking the same tongue.
Sorry,”not to negate Arabic’s role”.Have never for a moment doubted the creolized origins of my tongue,but I must say that it is a totally new thought to me that it might have existed on another continent before and then underwent further evolution in Africa.When speaking of a Dutch-Malayo Pidgin though,where does this put people like Tuan Guru,who came from the Sultanate of Tidore,Molluccan Islands,Indonesia and the colonial tongue switching all the time between Dutch,Spanish,Portuguese and English.Having spent some time in Indonesia,I remember that BahasaIndonesia has a lot of Dutch words,but mostly for modern consumer goods and also recognised some Malay words that we also use in Afrikaans.But this language is pretty new and outside of urban areas only spoken as second or third language.
F–k, you raise some interesting questions Saamboerou, and I’ve never thought about that angle: how confluences of colonial languages in the Malaysian Archipelago may also be considered at root in the development of Afrikaans. Actually, quite a blinkered look to focus on the South African aspect while the people in whose mouths it originated were from somewhere else. But I know next to nothing about the archipelago’s history or even any real grasp of Tuan Guru and his contemporaries.
I met some Indonesian writers a few years ago in Den Haag, and also jumped and gasped when I recognised some ‘Malayo’ words when they were speaking among each other. It was a bit weird – mostly incomprehensible to me, with two or three words that I recognised. I think one was the good old ‘baie’.
The late Vernon February’s obsession with Surinamese poetry come to mind.
BTW, just a footnote of sorts: A search for Hip Hop Pantsula sounds (totally unrelated) brought me to this seamless integration into a hip hop tune by this collective of dj’s of Afrikaans as an African language. See how 1:40 into this Youtube video.
here.
I think the comparison with Papiamento is very interesting.It shows that with just a couple of diffrent spices to the stew it takes a different direction.Here the African and Portuguese elements are more pronounced and Portuguese Sephardic Jewish traders coming from Brazil and Cabo Verde played a big role in the evolution of the language there.This exchange has certainly planted a seed in me for further explorations to the roots of the language and especially ,which islands most of the slaves came from.I know for instance that some came from Bali,the only one of some 13 000 plus islands,where the religion is Hindu,and you can still find the surname Baalie in the Cape till this day.At the same time this would only partially decipher the puzzle,as on many of the Spice Islands(Main Dutch Interest) the local population was annihilated and replaced with people from surrounding islands who had been more friendly towards the colonisers.The Dutch loved spices so much,or lets say the VOC,the first Keysian brothers,that they swopped Nieu Amsterdam(New York)for a small island in the Banda group,so the English who held it ,could not attack their spice laden ships leaving the islands in the group.So we have come full circle as Abdullah said,”Julle kan ,maar New York toe gaan,ons …” I also love the sounds coming from Suriname,Kaseko and all it’s hybrids,while having strong Carribean Melange roots it also has a very strong African sound simmilar to Soukous from the Congo.Of what I’ve heard,I like Carlo Jones and the Surinam Kaseko Troubadours,De Nazaten,a Surinamese -Dutch collaberation and the jazz orientated Fra Fra Sound,who has toured South Africa in the past.They also did an album with some tracks featuring the saxophonist Joe Malinga,with one track being an Abdullah Ibrahim composition.Yes Cross Poly Nations makes the honey sweeter!
That track is hot; a real pity I cannot follow all the lyrics. I’ve always thought that younger and younger generations in SA are going to produce a seamless multi-language kind of poetry. I’ve generally been out of the loop of much contemporary music for the past 4 years (age, perhaps, but also not hanging out or not in regular contact with DJs – like Jools, Honey-B – and other music-obssessed friends), especially on the lyrical front. Any other stuff like this in SA – you know, a hiphop that has advanced a few steps away from from kwaito ito music and lyrics?
Saamboerou, this is all fascinating stuff. Any sources that you could share? You seem to be coming in on it from a musical angle, so any history or music-history sources?
Rustum,as you said I’m certainly not coming from a scolastic angle, so everything is pretty homegrown ,with help from the Net.Random entries for Tuan Guru,Sultunate of Tidore,Moluccan Islands,Slaves at the Cape,BahasaIndonesia.Just a couple of interesting sites,IslamOnline.net – rebirth.co.za – melayuonline.com – geocities.com/sa_stamouers/Slaveglossary,htm .Something interesting that I came across was that Tuan Guru was a decendent of the Sultan of Morocco,so my theory that the Arabic returned to the cradle is not that far fetched.And to connect to another thesis of mine,Without Africa,No Afrikaans,I still believe in something that would be pretty “esoteric” in academic circles,which is something that enters us from below,through the Afrikan Soil,in sounding the word,as described in the article on Brink.”My Sotho nanny who first made me concious of the rhythms of language” The more the attempt has been made to “purify” this language through intellect,the more it has creolized itself through rhythm.To come at it from a musical angle would take me a long way from this dicussion,but at best I would quote something from Henry Shields from his linernotes for the Boereqanga album,”Mankunku was leading his band on the driving township rhythm of his own composition,Guguletu.A jubilant and well- oiled party of Afrikaners stood in front of the bandstand cheering the musicians.In his inimitable and deadpan laconic manner,Mankunku suddenly shifted the typical African melody of Guguletu into the Boeremusiek melody of the time honoured tune Sarie Marais.Mankunku’s rhythm section stayed just where they were in the township groove,the Sarie Marais melody fitted on top,like a glove on Mankunku’s crafty hands…and the crowd went crazy.”
Samboerou,
I see your point, but my Brink reference was tongue in cheek.
This is greast music Thank you for nice post
canonSX230BlackFriday
[...] industry, universities, school systems, etc., downplayed and degraded the fact that Afrikaans is a creole language since it was odds with their political project of racial purity and white domination. [...]