Critical analysis of the role played by PanSALB in the Lexicography development of the South African official languages

DOI: 10.5176/2251-3566_L31258

Authors: Dr.VM Mojela

Abstract: Before 1994 the Republic of South Africa had two official languages, i.e. English and Afrikaans. The negotiations for the establishment of a ‘New South Africa’ at CODESA led to the end of the Apartheid regime and the drafting of a new South African Interim Constitution of 1993 and A final Consti-tution IN 1996, which declared the eleven (11) South African languages official, i.e. English, Afrikaans, Sesotho sa Leboa, Setswana, Sesotho, Isizulu, Isindebele, Isixhosa, Isiswati, Tshivenda and Xitsonga. All the eleven languages were de-clared equal in status. English and Afrikaans, which used to be only official languages before 1994, were, and still are, far more developed than the other nine indigenous Languages. The new government considered as one of its top priorities, the devel-opment of the nine previously marginalized indigenous lan-guages to bridge the gap between these marginalized languages and the other two languages, i.e. English & Afrikaans. In order to monitor the implementation of developing all the official languages, the Constitution provided for the establishment of a Pan South African Language Board (PanSALB) which re-placed all the previous Language Boards which were struc-tured on the basis of race and ethnicity. To facilitate this devel-opment, the Constitution provided for the establishment of the South African National Lexicography Units (NLUs) for the eleven South African official languages, each with its own NLU to compile dictionaries for the respective languages. The main objective with this research is to give critical assessment of the extent to which the Pan South African Language Board suc-ceeded in the development of lexicography in the South African official languages. This assessment will be based on the suc-cesses and challenges for PanSALB in the execution of its con-stitutional mandate of developing lexicography in South Africa during the 18 years of its existence, and the significances of this to the development of multilingualism in South Africa.

Keywords: LEXICOGRAPHY; NATIONAL LEXICOGRAPHY UNITS; PANSALB; MONOLINGUAL DICTIONARIES; MUL-TILINGUAL DICTIONARIES; MULTILINGUALISM; MAR-GINALIZED LANGUAGES