HERMAN LATEGAN: The taal turns verkramp again
The demise of Vrye Weekblad is fresh evidence that the narrow-minded Boers are gaining dominance in the white Afrikaans landscape
The last progressive Afrikaans newspaper in South Africa, Vrye Weekblad, published its final issue on March 28. This is a tragedy for one of the world’s youngest languages — but an even greater one is the slow return to parochialism and tribalism across all sectors of Afrikaans, particularly among the white people who speak it.
Two in five mother-tongue Afrikaans speakers in South Africa are white, and it is among this mostly resentful coterie — the previously, and still, advantaged — that the shift is taking place. You might have noticed how some white Afrikaners are rejoicing at Donald Trump’s opportunistic and misguided interest in their “long-suffering” tribe. ..
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