historical and political events over the last 200 years, power is ... nationalists won favour in 1948, and White Afrikaans speakers have been in ..... and Xhosa accents shared the honours equally, and the Afrikaans accent ..... New York: Harper.
LINGUISTIC STEREOTYPES:
NICE ACCENT - NICE PERSON?
Vivian de Klerk and Barbara Bosch
1
Language attitudes and stereotyping Ryan et al. (1982:7) define language attitudes as 'any affective, cognitive or behavioral index of evaluative reactions toward different language varieties or their speakers', and any such reactions would naturally be closely tied to emotions and beliefs. Attitude is a deep-seated and private 'state of readiness rather than an observable response' (Fasold 1984:147) and is often distinguished from consciously held opinions, which are more public, more dependent on the context of elicitation and more easily expressed. As humans we have a powerful ability to detect correlations and build schemas or knowledge structures, which help us to recognise objects, make judgements and make sense of the complex world around us. In the abstract, we think of people as comprising sets of features, a set of schemas formed from numerous interactions; these impressions about groups are stereotypes, a word used to refer to 'sets of beliefs about ... groups that the believer has little good reason for holding but that often serve to justify bigotry'. (Anderson 1980:154) A stereotype is a socially shared belief that describes an attitude object in an oversimplified and undifferentiated manner i.e. the
2 public opinion of society in general as contrasted with the opinion of each individual. Stereotypes are very important in the formation of the social climate within which language preferences act. (Hauptfleisch: 1977:13) How do such stereotypes arise? One might assume they result from one's experiences with people from the group, but this is not so, as is shown by studies which reveal huge discrepancies between stereotypes and reality (Smith 1979; Petersen & Wittig 1979). More important than experiences are the media, films and in-group stories; the development of stereotypes seldom has a basis in direct experience, and is usually filtered through biased secondary sources. When such impressions are built on first-time interaction, such first-time encounters are seldom genuinely revealing of the true individual. While stereotypes need not necessarily be false or negative (though many are both, as Cameron (1985) points out), typically they represent the dark side of the human abstraction process; they are often inaccurate because they simplify what otherwise might have overwhelmingly diverse meaning, and indirectly influence the perception and categorisation of people. Apart from examining the public ways in which language varieties are treated, one can use the direct approach of asking people about their opinions and beliefs or use indirect techniques (developed mainly in the field of social psychology) to measure subconscious or private attitudes. Among these is the matched guise technique, which
3 involves the reactions of listeners (judges) to the taped recordings of a number of perfectly bilingual speakers reading a passage at one time in one of their languages and later a translation equivalent of the same passage in their second language. 'Judges are asked to listen to this series of recordings and evaluate the personality characteristics of each speaker as well as possible using voice cues only.' (Lambert, 1967:336) There is no shortage of evidence that, as members of particular linguistic communities, we have stereotyped ideas about voice, intonation, paralinguistic signs, phonology, lexicon and style, all with evaluative connotations. (Smith 1985) These preconceptions have a profound influence on our subconscious attitudes to languages and to speakers of these languages, and there is therefore much potential for research into the validity of these stereotypes. How do people recognise and evaluate speakers of different languages and different accents? Do they share common schemas of evaluation? Are the same features salient markers of all languages? Does the recognition of speaker mother-tongue cause reassessment of the speaker in terms of character, status, level of education and so on, or is it the way s/he speaks that causes the reassessment? It was questions like these which led us to devise a matched-guise attitude survey among speakers of the three main languages of the Eastern Cape: English, Afrikaans and Xhosa. 'If attitude is an internal state of readiness, rather than an observable response, we must depend on the person's reports of what their attitudes are or infer attitudes indirectly from observable behaviour patterns.'
4 (Fasold 1984:147) We wished to investigate the extent to which speakers in the area were using language and accent to make judgements about people. 'Language is seen as a means of expressing, together with a message, a personal and/or a group identity' (Schmiedt 1991:185), and we were interested in finding out how Eastern Cape people perceived these identities. Power and stereotyping: Power is unequally distributed in most societies, and depends not only on the personal qualities of the individual, but on social position. There is a relationship between power, stereotypes and language, and linguistic differences which arise in any community can generally be attributed to factors such as social status, solidarity, the forces of socialisation and identification and modeling - all of which are directly influenced by stereotyped beliefs within the society. In South Africa, as a result of historical and political events over the last 200 years, power is very unequally distributed, and social position depends primarily and significantly on race and linguistic affiliation, which have determined education and employment opportunities in the first instance for the past few hundred years (although the situation is rapidly changing). Language use therefore reinforces the existing status differential and one can expect, as a result, a relationship between the social and political value of a group of speakers and the social value of languages (and accents) associated with that group.
5 As Smith (1985:27) says, the problem with stereotypes is that they rarely carry connotations of 'different but equal' - people have definite and conspicuous attitudes about which speaker or language is 'better' or 'superior'. Stereotypes tend to persist for as long as they reinforce important social inequalities. (Cameron 1985:33) It is common (especially in writings about sexism in English) to come across the idea that, in general, the in-power group's linguistic characteristics will tend to be positively valued, regardless of what these characteristics are, but the matter is not that simple in South Africa, and an understanding of linguistic stereotypes today requires an historical perspective: after an extended period of English domination in the country, the Afrikaner nationalists won favour in 1948, and White Afrikaans speakers have been in power politically ever since then. On the face of it, this would imply that their language and accent should stereotypically be positively regarded. However the recently abandoned apartheid policy of the (Afrikaans) National Party led to enormous injustice and bitterness. Attempts by black pupils to reject enforced instruction through the medium of Afrikaans in their schools resulted in the bloody Soweto riots of 1976 - evidence of the resentment fostered against Afrikaans and all it represented. It seems that Afrikaans has acquired some very negative connotations, despite the fact that there are huge numbers of Afrikaans speakers who are other than white and many white Afrikaans speakers who have never supported apartheid. In addition one needs to realise the complexity of the linguistic
6 situation in South Africa. Figure 1 reports the 1991 preliminary Census figures for home language distribution, showing that the speakers of the two offical languages, English and Afrikaans, are very much in the minority. Unfortunately independent homelands were excluded from the census and no statistics have yet been provided regarding regional distribution. .M:1 Table 1: 1991 Census Results White Coloured Afrikaans: 2 602744 2 432132 English 1 751968 441718 Both 35986 21567 Xhosa 1035 7003 Ndebele (N&S) Sotho (N&S) Tswana Tsonga Venda Zulu
Asian 11304 820687 1980 369
Black 72990 37369 680 2 281774
Total 5 119169 3 051742 60141 2 290181 371171 4 780602 1 237930 1 090760 96935 6 972714
.M:2 A Brief overview of attitude studies to date: Attitude surveys carried out in South Africa to date have tended to focus on the two official languages (English and Afrikaans) and there is little material available regarding attitudes to other languages. Vorster and Proctor (1976) examined the attitudes to English and Afrikaans of 200 black first year students (all Eastern Cape Xhosa speakers) at Fort Hare University. They perceived English speakers as better-looking, kinder, more likeable and sociable, and with a higher status job than the Afrikaans speaker, who was seen as a 'strong' person. Hauptfleisch (1977) surveyed the attitudes of White urban adults to English and Afrikaans as official languages, and to bilingualism in
7 these languages; speakers from the two groups reported very different needs, applications and motivations. He found Afrikaners more proficient in English than vice versa, and English respondents reported a very low motivation to learn or use Afrikaans. The research highlighted the relative ease with which the urban Afrikaner forsakes the mother tongue (49 of his informants reported a permanent shift to English), the problems of maintaining language purity, the falling number of immigrants who select Afrikaans schools for their children, and the way in which Afrikaans speakers in other-than-white racial groups are turning to English as an elected language of identity. Schuring et al. (1983), using 100 Black fieldworkers, examined the language habits of over 3000 Black informants in 25 districts country-wide and report no marked imbalance in their use of English and Afrikaans (for speaking, reading, radio listening etc.) apart from a tendency for preference for English to rise with socioeconomic status. According to Ridd (1981:194) 'District 6 people see Afrikaans essentially as a hard language of command, such as they hear it spoken to them by die boere (Afrikaners). The use of suiwer (pure) Afrikaans ... by 'coloured' people is associated with the servility of the plaasjapie ( a derogatory term for a farm worker) to the White baas (master)' (cited in Wood 1987:78). The tendency is to prefer English, and McCormick (1983) affirms this tendency among coloured Afrikaans speakers in the Cape Peninsula, who see English as a signal of urbanisation and sophistication, and of education as
8 well. Wood (1987:79-80) reports that 'there is an increasing trend towards introducing English medium of instruction in schools which were previously more Afrikaans orientated, so that most coloured schools in the peninsula are now dual medium, with the parents being able to choose which language their children are to receive instruction in. It is a common phenomenon that children who speak mostly or even exclusively Afrikaans at home receive instruction in English at school.' He notes a massive swing to English in one generation, as far as language preference in education is concerned, and declining support for Afrikaans among certain Afrikaans speakers. Harlech-Jones (1990) reports a largely positive attitude among teachers towards the use of English as medium of instruction in Namibian secondary schools, who were doubtful about the acceptability of using vernaculars (1990:204). Finally, pupils from a range of 29 Western Cape secondary schools (private and government) favoured English as the major (but not the only) medium of instruction in schools, and as the major or even sole official language (Young et al. 1991); Xhosa scholars displayed surprisingly little hostility to Afrikaans, (Afrikaans is a major language in the Western Cape, used not only by Whites) and were not as strongly in favour of mother-tongue instruction as the other informants.
9 Reasons for this study: One of the reasons why it is vitally important to assess language attitudes and stereotypes is the fact that they lead to overgeneralisation, to overlooking individual differences, and they most often relate to minority groups. It has been shown, for example, that the language of women has been devalued as a result of the entrenchment of the stereotyped views held by members of society. And these views are very real, as shown by Goldberg (1968), Addington (1968) and Broverman et al. (1972) all of whom endorse the idea that men and women are strongly associated with stereotyped characteristics in people's minds. The expectations stereotypes generate can have undesirable constraining effects on person-perception, and have behavioral consequences. They are manifested in comic strips, cartoons and novels and these folk-linguistic beliefs about language are often accepted as common sense in a society. Such pervasive, widely shared expectations about people in a linguistic category inevitably exert subtle pressure on those people to display behaviours, traits and attitudes consistent with them. The danger of stereotypes is that they can be self-fulfilling prophecies, guiding not only thinking, but linguistic behaviour as well (Cameron 1985:155.) Questions concerning the influence of stereotypes and values on the interpretation and perception of linguistic behaviour are relevant to any research which compares the speech of the statusful dominant group in society with other groups. As Smith (1979) points out,
10 these speech stereotypes merit study in their own right for the insight they give into what is assumed by listeners, and will tend to be expected until disconfirmed. These attitudes and assumptions may define listeners' predispositions towards speakers, and this could influence interaction patterns, particularly in gate-keeping encounters, where power comes into play. Such attitudes will also have educational consequences, influencing teachers' expectations and pupils' success, especially in second-language teaching and learning. South Africa now stands on the brink of a new dispensation, and has the opportunity to establish a new language policy; democracy and consultations at all levels should form the foundation stones of any decisions which are made concerning language policy. There has been no recent survey of opinions about language in the Eastern Cape and this research project aims to provide some insights in this area. A few caveats should precede further discussion: the susceptibility of scientific inquiry to personal bias, especially in the field of sociolects and ethnic dialects, requires scientists to admit that their ethical commitment to objectivity often falls short of the goal. It is acknowledged that stereotypes do have a possible subconscious influence on researchers, subtly determining their choice of data (Cameron 1985:44); reports and summaries often involve generalisations and simplifications which result in too narrow a view of the functions served by particular linguistic forms, and the type of question researchers ask and the answers they find are liable to be influenced by the values and stereotypes
11 which prevail. 'Quite clearly the eye of the beholder can make a dramatic difference to what is perceived and presented to the reader.' (Holmes 1986:18) Indeed, some have argued that a study of language attitudes is inherently biased and lacks explanatory power (Bernard 1975; Unger 1978); others assert that such research only reinforces the very stereotypes it is trying to get away from (Bart 1971). Whatever the case, it is vital that the political and societal implications of research findings be addressed in a responsible fashion, so that potential misuse of data is avoided. Methodology: English, Afrikaans and Xhosa are the three major languages of the Eastern Cape. This paper reports on an attitude survey undertaken in order to gauge the attitudes of 298 adult English, Afrikaans and Xhosa speakers in the Eastern Cape to each of these three languages, and to the accents associated with each of them; de Klerk and Bosch (in press) reports on the statistics in terms of language and accent preferences and this paper focusses specifically on the stereotyped views of respondents regarding personal characteristics of speakers. The selected instrument for this research was the matched-guise technique, in order to elicit responses to all three languages used by three male tri-lingual speakers. All were in their midthirties, and they were mother-tongue speakers of English, Afrikaans and Xhosa respectively.
12 The aim was to interview a wide range of people, (in terms of sex, age and educational level) all of whom had been resident in the Eastern Cape for a minimum of 5 years. A short text (see Appendix 1) on the culturally neutral topic of getting up in the morning was translated into each of the languages under investigation and each reader was taped reading each text (approximately 60 seconds per text). The 9 recordings were heard by informants in random order. 'The average person's ability to identify a dialect is based more on overall impression than on conscious knowledge of the vowel and consonant sounds which characterise particular dialects' (Lanham 1967:14). In a study concerned with perceptions and attitudes, the factor of overall impression is important, and of particular interest were the attitudes to the various accents, as determined by each reader's mother-tongue. A questionnaire was prepared, after trialling on 10 people, which asked informants to rate voices in terms of 10 personal traits, each to be judged on a scale of 1 to 7. (See Appendix 2). This questionnaire was translated into the three languages under investigation, so that informants could respond in their respective mother tongues. Informants were requested to write down a hypothetical occupation for each voice as well. The final section requested some biographical information from informants and asked questions about their language preferences (results not reported in this paper). Fieldworkers were recruited on the basis of their mother tongue (equal representation from each language group was desirable) and of
13 their geographical origins (Eastern Cape informants were required). Careful training, stressing the need for informants to be assured of the good intentions and solidarity of the interviewers, preceded the administering of any questionnaires, especially in view of the sensitive and personal nature of the topic. Each interview lasted approximately twenty minutes. The personal characteristics Lambert (1967) categorised the personality dimensions on which judges rate speakers into three groups: competence (intelligence, industriousness) personal integrity (honesty, helpfulness) and attractiveness (friendly, sense of humour). The studies reviewed in Edwards (1985) show that different accents and languages get rated differently along these dimensions, showing covert and overt prestige markers. Standard accents and dialects usually connote high status and competence; regional, ethnic and lower-class varieties are associated with greater speaker-integrity and attractiveness. Traits (see Appendix 2) were selected to conform with Lambert's (1967) categories, and were restricted to 10 after trialling, in order to avoid tedium and boredom on the part of informants, and to avoid duplication. These traits were randomly ordered on the questionnaire, in order to avoid clustering of similar traits; physical or external characteristics (e.g. attractive) were mingled with more intrinsic or personal traits (e.g. honesty). Respondents were asked to follow their intuitions when hearing the voices, 'not to think too hard', and to leave out any categories where they felt
14 unable to make a judgement. Results: Of the 298 respondents, 131 were English, 69 Afrikaans, 73 Xhosa and 26 spoke two or more of these languages. They were fairly evenly distributed in terms of sex, age, background and length of domicile in the area and analysis of responses in terms of these factors revealed no significance (details are reported in de Klerk and Bosch 1993 (in press). Educational backgrounds varied more and did have a significant influence (Chi-square 0.0059, val 27.804, Df 12). Ease of response: Despite the option not to judge every voice on every trait, most informants gave a response; the table below reflects the relative ease with which the different traits were judged, as well as the average rating assigned overall by all informants across the board for each trait (a score of 4 is neutral, lower than 4 is a positive judgment). Traits are numbered in order of appearance on the questionnaire, and subsequent references in this paper will be to these numbers. .M:1 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. .M:2
Reliable: Honest Friendly Intelligent Attractive Competent Educated Leader Confident Entertaining
% of responses 89,4% 87,9% 88,8% 92,6% 78,7% 86,8% 93,9% 85,7% 92,3% 91,2%
Average rating 3.75 3.54 3.83 3.86 4.49 3.93 3.73 4.50 4.07 4.70
15 As far as ease of response is concerned, the ranking appears to be fairly random, apart from the fact that informants clearly had greater difficulty in rating speakers in terms of 'attractiveness', perhaps because this term is ambiguous in its reference to external, physical characteristics or more intrinsic qualities. When one compares average ratings with response rate, there is a pattern of correlation: with some exceptions, a high response rate is matched with a positive response and vice versa. One can therefore assume that the easier it was to make a judgement, the more positive that judgement was likely to be. It is also very noticeable that the items ordered last in the questionnaire tended to get the most negative ratings. Either the position of these categories is responsible for their low overall average scores, or the topic of the text might have had an influence on the respondents judgements: it was not particularly interesting or entertaining. Figure 1 illustrates the overall trends for each language group in choice of rating categories (1 is highly positive, 7 highly negative) and it reveals an overall tendency across the board for informants to cluster around a neutral judgement for all traits. There were more extremely negative judgements than extremely positive ones. Figure 1 about here
16 The effect of accent on judgements: It is important to remember that voice could not be separated from accent for the purposes of this analysis, because whenever speaker A is heard, one hears his voice and his accent. For ease of reference, the term accent will be used. The three speakers had English, Afrikaans and Xhosa accents respectively, and when scores for each speaker were analysed to determine the effect of their accents on informants' ratings, results showed that throughout, the most negative ratings were assigned to the Afrikaans accent. In contrast, English and Xhosa both received fairly low (positive) scores, with Xhosa very narrowly ahead of English. Chi square values were all highly significant. Analyses of Variance (henceforth Anovas) were applied to the overall mean ratings assigned when only accent was taken into account, and again these showed high levels of significance, as evident in Table 2. .M:1 Table 2: The effect of accent on ratings Traits: Accent: English Afrikaans Xhosa Reliability Honesty Friendliness Intelligence Attractiveness Competence Education Leadership Confidence Entertaining Sum
3.5 3.4 3.8 3.5 4.2 3.7 3.3 4.2 3.9 4.7 38.2
4.0 3.7 4.2 4.3 4.9 4.2 4.1 4.8 4.4 5.0 43.6
3.6 3.4 3.4 3.7 4.2 3.8 3.7 4.3 3.8 4.2 38.1
Anova F 28.08 15.38 62.89 56.23 46.35 26.83 49.41 27.29 40.46 45.06
(Df:2) P 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000
Where? not X/E not X/E all all not X/E not X/E all not X/E not X/E all
.M:2 Analyses to determine which accent received the most strongly positive
17 ratings (1 and 2 on the scale) for each trait revealed that the English and Xhosa accents shared the honours equally, and the Afrikaans accent was rated least positively for every single trait. Trends for the assignment of most strongly negative ratings (6 and 7 on the scale) repeated this pattern, with the Afrikaans accent receiving the most; next in line came the Xhosa accent which was perceived slightly less favourably than the English accent in 7 out of the 10 traits. Keeping in mind the fact that an average rating of 4.0 or lower is a positive one, we need to note that the English accent was most favourably regarded in terms of education, honesty, intelligence and reliability; the Xhosa speaker gets a strongly positive rating for honesty and friendliness, but the Afrikaans speaker receives only one positive rating on average: for honesty - and this score is still the least positive for that trait across all three groups. The effect of language only on ratings: When responses were analysed in terms of each of the languages heard on the tape, a clear trend was revealed: in every case English (regardless of who spoke it) was judged more favourably than Afrikaans or Xhosa, which were very close overall, although Xhosa was slightly more positively perceived than Afrikaans; chi-square tests revealed high levels of significance throughout. Table 3 indicates the results of Anovas, and for each trait there is an indication of where the significant differences lie. (Also see Figure 2) .M:1
18 Table 3: The effect of Language on ratings Traits: Language: English Afrikaans Xhosa (E) (A) (X) Reliability 3.5 3.8 3.9 Honesty 3.2 3.5 3.8 Friendliness 3.6 3.9 3.9 Intelligence 3.6 4.0 3.9 Attractiveness 4.1 4.6 4.5 Competence 3.6 4.1 4.0 Education 3.4 3.9 3.8 Leadership 4.2 4.7 4.4 Confidence 3.7 4.3 4.1 Entertaining 4.4 4.8 4.7 Total: 37.3 41.6 41.0
Anova (Df:2) F P 14.31 0.000 28.74 0.000 13.76 0.000 11.74 0.000 19.49 0.000 14.67 0.000 26.29 0.000 18.45 0.000 19.83 0.000 12.86 0.000
Where? not A/X all not A/X not A/X not A/X not A/X not A/X not X/E all not A/X
.M:2 Put Figure 2 about here Speakers who used English (regardless of their accent) were rated at 4.0 or better with regard to 8 out of the 10 traits (not 'attractive' and 'entertaining'); those who used Afrikaans received ratings of 4.0 or better for only 4 of the traits, while those who spoke in Xhosa for 5 of the 10 (though none under 3.8). Afrikaans and Xhosa speakers were consistently more negatively perceived than speakers of English, and the Anova results indicate that a high degree of significance can be attached to this difference, except in the case of the 'leadership' trait. Two-way Anovas, testing for interaction between language and accent were all highly significant but revealed high levels of interaction for every trait. Multiple analyses of variance (Manovas) were also carried out on the data, taking all the traits together and analysing them in terms of accent and language, and while the results (listed below) are highly significant, there were high levels of interaction present again.
19 Accent Language Accent/Lang
F 12.84 5.47 7.12
Df 20.34 20.34 40.65
P 0.000 0.000 0.000
Table 4 presents a cross-tabulation of all traits by accent (A) and language (L) and reveals consistently high judgements for English in most combinations, followed by Xhosa. Speakers are positively judged when using their mother tongue in every case. .M:1 Table 4: A cross-tabulation of Accent ( A ) and Language ( Traits: A L 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Eng Eng 3.0 2.9 3.3 3.0 3.6 3.3 2.6 3.8 3.3 4.3 Afr 3.6 3.4 3.8 3.4 4.2 3.6 3.3 4.2 4.0 4.8 Xho 4.0 3.8 4.1 3.9 4.7 4.1 4.0 4.5 4.4 5.1 Afr Eng 4.2 3.6 4.2 4.6 5.0 4.4 4.5 5.1 4.7 5.2 Afr 3.7 3.4 4.1 4.1 4.7 4.0 3.9 4.8 4.3 5.0 Xho 4.5 4.3 4.4 4.3 4.8 4.4 4.3 4.7 4.5 5.1 Xho Eng 3.3 3.3 3.2 3.2 3.6 3.4 3.2 3.6 3.2 4.0 Afr 4.3 3.9 3.9 4.6 4.9 4.8 4.8 5.3 4.8 5.0 Xho 3.2 3.2 3.3 3.5 4.0 3.5 3.5 3.9 3.3 4.1
L ) Avg 3.3 3.8 4.4 4.5 4.2 4.5 3.4 4.7 3.5
.M:2 The effect of respondent's mother-tongue on ratings: Manovas which analysed ratings (for the ten traits combined) testing for correlation between respondents' mother tongue (MT), accent and language showed high levels of statistical reliability, but on the whole no correlations. Traits in which there were strong correlations with no interaction have been listed in Table 5. .M:1 Table 5: Manovas of Accent, Language and mother tongue (MT) F Df P Interaction Accent 10.37 20.31 0.000 in all traits Lang 4.44 20.31 0.000 in all traits MT 15.02 20.31 0.000 in all traits Acc/Lang 6.25 40.58 0.000 in all traits Acc/MT 3.29 40.58 0.000 not in traits 3,6,8,9,10 Lang/MT 2.21 40.58 0.000 not in traits 2,7 All 1.70 80.98 0.000 not in traits 1,2,5,8,9 .M:2
20 Some interesting trends emerged when overall ratings were analysed in terms of the language group of the informants. Table 6 lists average ratings for each of the traits (1 to 10): .M:1 Table 6: Ratings in MT 1 2 English 3.7 3.4 Afrikaans 3.4 3.1 Xhosa 4.1 4.1
terms of mother tongue of informants 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 3.7 4.0 4.6 4.0 3.9 4.7 4.1 5.1 3.7 3.4 4.2 3.5 3.2 4.1 3.7 4.3 4.1 4.0 4.3 4.2 3.8 4.4 4.2 4.4
Sum: 41.2 37.6 41.6
.M:2 The most strongly positive responses are from Afrikaans speakers, especially with regard to honesty, education, reliability and intelligence. English and Xhosa speakers show more conservatism in their ratings. In 6 of the traits, the mode (score assigned most often) for Xhosa speakers was 5 or more , with only 2 similarly negative modes for English and none for Afrikaans. It is interesting to note that both English and Xhosa speakers had a mode of 7 for 'entertaining'. Figure 3 illustrates the percentage of ratings per category when informants' rated their respective mother-tongues spoken with a mothertongue accent. Clearly informants are most strongly positive when hearing mother-tongue accents, and there is a general bias towards the positive side (categories 1 to 4), with the English least strongly positive about themselves. Xhosa informants were particularly favourably inclined to mother-tongue Xhosa, assigning this speaker the highest percentage of positive scores except in the category of education, leadership and confidence. Both English and Afrikaans speakers were most strongly positive with respect to their mother tongues when rating speakers in terms of honesty, intelligence and education. Lowest scores assigned for each group are interesting: English and Afrikaans informants were most damning with respect to entertainment, and Xhosa
21 with respect to leadership. It is worth noting that Afrikaans speakers were the least negative about themselves, and assigned no 7's at all. Insert Figure 3 about here Occupations: Informants experienced some difficulty in deciding on hypothetical occupations for the voices they heard, 43.1% being left blank. It is worth noting that 64% of the Xhosa informants did not assign any occupation, especially when hearing Afrikaans (irrespective of accent). The reasons for this are difficult to pinpoint, but they may have lacked exposure to the wide range of occupations more commonly available to those who are socially more mobile. In general, responses were ingenious and varied, which often rendered results difficult to interpret. On the basis of the mean scores which were assigned by all respondents to the 47 most-cited occupations (mentioned by at least 5 respondents) occupations were categorised into high (a score of less than 34), medium (a score between 34 and 45) and low status (a score higher than 45). The list below indicates some of the more typical occupations in each category: .M:1 Table 7: Occupational Categories High status Medium status lecturer/teacher clerk/salesman professor bank teller businessman student accountant driver lawyer technician manager farmer doctor civil servant minister electrician broadcaster interpreter .M:2
Low status post office policeman artisan sweeper railway worker petrol attendant unemployed gardener security guard
22 The majority of English (49,1%) and Xhosa (58,3%) mother-tongue speakers assigned medium-status jobs, while most Afrikaans speakers assigned high-status jobs (45,5%). Of all three groups, Xhosa speakers (9,9%) least often assigned low-status occupations. (Pearson chisquare: Val: 38.189, Df 4; P 0.000). When listening to the English accent (irrespective of the language used) 50,7% of respondents assigned high-status occupations, while for Xhosa and Afrikaans accents, the majority (44,1% and 60,8% respectively) were assigned medium status occupations. Of the 3 languages, English was most often associated with high status occupations (40,1%) followed by Xhosa (30,6%) and Afrikaans (29,8%). As far as low-status occupations are concerned, Afrikaans was assigned most (20,7%), followed by English (15,5%) and Xhosa (14%). An overwhelming percentage (68,7%) assigned high-status occupations to the English person speaking his mother-tongue, while the Afrikaans and Xhosa speakers more frequently were assigned medium status occupations when speaking their respective mothertongues. Discussion: Despite the expectation that with power comes positive stereotyping, this survey reveals the very opposite: the language and accent of those in officialdom and power in South Africa (the White South African Afrikaans speakers) is pervasively and unambiguously rejected by all Eastern Cape informants, and those who speak it are negatively rated and stereotyped as less appealing across a range of
23 personal characteristics. In contrast, all the analyses yield convincing evidence that in the Eastern Cape, English is very highly regarded by all three language groups. This accords with the findings of others such as Lambert et al. (1960), who found that both French and English groups in Montreal were more positive to English. Schmiedt (1991) also reports that English, across Africa as a whole, enjoys positive stereotypes, high international prestige and is an idealised world language, associated with modern successful educated elite, acting as a gateway to success, employment and education, among other things. This study endorses the views of Edwards (1985) that speech can evoke stereotyped reactions reflecting differential views of social groups. Standard accents and dialects usually connote high status and competence, and English, acknowledged as a world language, is shown to connote more than that to our informants, regardless of their linguistic background. It would appear from this study that speakers of English, particularly those who are mother-tongue speakers, are warmly regarded, and people are predisposed to think highly of them. Such positive connotations for English are not simply attributable to the social and political status of its speakers in South Africa, for they are very much in a linguistic minority and do not hold political power; the popularity of English is probably a backlash result of a rejection of standard Afrikaans, and a need for an international language which could bring with it opportunities for success in all spheres of life. In South Africa,
24 English is the language of commerce, of entertainment and of the anti-government press. It also represents upward social mobility among black and coloured speakers (McCormick 1983, Schuring 1983) It is interesting to note a more positive view of English among nonEnglish speakers than among mother-tongue English speakers, who, perhaps because of a total lack of threat to their own language, are the most moderate in rating their mother tongue. The tendency for speakers of the less prestigious languages (in this case Afrikaans and Xhosa) to be attracted to the more prestigious language is also evident, alongside the covert positive connotations they attach to their respective mother-tongues. One can see this clearly with respect to both Xhosa and Afrikaans. Xhosa, a regional, ethnic language of less privileged members of society in the Eastern Cape, emerges as a language with a number of supporters, who stereotype its speakers as reliable, honest and friendly people; it is particularly highly regarded by its own speakers, who give it strongly positive ratings, despite their attraction to English as well; it's speakers received the most positive rating of all in terms of 'entertaining'. Clearly it is associated with greater speaker integrity and attractiveness, concepts of in-group solidarity. In the Eastern Cape Afrikaans is in a double-bind: its own speakers naturally feel a strong loyalty and affection for the language which comes through in analyses of mother-tongue responses; however, they do not enjoy support beyond the boundaries of their own language;
25 there is evidence that Afrikaans speakers themselves are drawn to English, and even Xhosa in preference to their own language. Such views probably result from the increasing levels of public awareness in South Africa recently of the practical implications of impending political restructuring. It is important to remember that White Afrikaans speakers form only about half of all Afrikaans speakers in the community, and the other-than-white Afrikaans speakers have had little share in the political, social and educational advantages of their white brethren over the past 50 years; their language has become tainted, through no fault of their own, and despite their understandable emotive and intellectual bond to Afrikaans, these speakers appear to be highly amenable to linguistic adjustment. According to Hauptfleisch (1977:8) 'to the Afrikaner language loyalty is an important matter, related directly to cultural identity and the very existence of Afrikaans' - the language is a cultural treasure to be cherished, and to deny it is to deny Afrikanerhood, and therefore a heritage. The results of our survey indicate some measure of support by Afrikaners for Afrikaans, but not as much as one might expect - indeed there are clear signs of a readiness among many respondents to embrace other languages more fully. Lambert et al. (1960:49) found 'the prediction was not supported that more skill with the other group's language, which would permit more intimate interaction, would lead to .... favourableness of evaluational responses to the guises.' We would agree that competence in other languages does not appear to have influenced
26 perceptions of those languages; evidence for this comes from the fact that all South African children are obliged to learn English and Afrikaans at school, and are exposed to equal proportions of these languages in the media; despite this, attitudes held by both English and Afrikaans speakers towards Xhosa (a language in which very few are competent and to which very few are exposed daily) were very much more favourable than those towards Afrikaans. Whatever is found to be the case, it is important to be aware that discrimination against people may well be linked to the sort of language they use. Language can be linked to social and educational disadvantage, particularly in the multilingual classroom, where teachers' preconceptions, based on stereotyped assessments of pupils because of their language and accents, can become self-fulfilling prophecies. In addition, negative attitudes to a second language can interfere with successful learning of that language; the more positive motivation a learner has towards that language, the better the prospects of success. Times are changing, and language policies, particularly with regard to education in South Africa, are changing with them. Awareness among educators and language planners of the subtle power of linguistic stereotypes such as those revealed in this survey, especially if they are unjustified, may counteract their insidious power. References Addington, D. (1968). The relationship of selected vocal characteristics to personality perception. Speech Monographs 35:492-503.
27 Anderson, J.R. (1980). Cognitive Psychology and its Implications . London: Freeman and Co. Bart, P. (1971). Sexism and social science: from the gilded cage to the iron cage. Journal of Marriage and the Family 33, 734-745. Bernard, J. (1975). Women, Wives, Mothers: Values and Options . Chicago: Aldine. Broverman, I., Vogel, S., Broverman, D., Clarkson, F. & Rosenkrantz, P. (1972). Sex role stereotypes: a current appraisal. Journal of Social Issues 28:(2) 59-78. Cameron, Deborah (1985). Feminism and Linguistic Theory . London: Macmillan de Klerk Vivian A. & Bosch, Barbara. (1993) English in South Africa: the Eastern Cape Perspective English Worldwide . In press. Edwards, J. (1985). Language, Society and Identity . London: Blackwells. Fasold, Ralph (1984). The Sociolinguistics of Society . London: Blackwells. Goldberg, P. (1968). Are women prejudiced against women? Transaction 6:28-30. Harlech-Jones, Brian (1990). You taught me language: the implementation of English as a medium of instruction in Namibia . Cape Town: Oxford University Press. Hauptfleisch, T. (1977). Language Loyalty in South Africa: Vol 1 Bilingual policy in South Africa - opinions of white adults in urban areas. Pretoria: HSRC. Holmes, Janet (1986). Functions of you know in women's and men's speech Language in Society 15:1-22. Lambert, W. Hodgson R., Gardner, R. & Fillenbaum, S. (1960).
28 Evaluational reactions to spoken languages. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology . 60:44-51. Lambert, W. (1967). A social psychology of bilingualism Journal of Social Issues 23:91-109. Lanham, Len W. (1967). The Way We Speak . Pretoria: Van Schaik. McCormick, Kay (1983). Attitudes to the two official languages and their dialects in Cape Town Unpublished paper University of Cape Town. Petersen, A. and Wittig, M (eds.) (1979). Sex-related Differences in Cognitive Functioning: Developmental Issues . New York: Academic. Ridd R. ((1981) Position and identity in a divided community PhD thesis: Oxford University. Ryan E, Giles, H. & Sebastian, R. (1982). Attitudes towards language variation . London: Edward Arnold. Schmied, Joseph (1991). English in Africa. London: Longman. Schuring, G. K. & Yzel M.K. (1983). 'n Ondersoek na die taalsituasie in die Suid Afrikaanse swartgemeenskap Verslag TLK/L-9: Deel 1 Pretoria: HSRC. Smith, P. (1979). Sex markers in speech. In Scherer K. & Giles H. (eds) Social Markers in Speech Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Smith, P. (1985). Language, the Sexes and Society . Oxford: Blackwell. Unger, R. (1978). All the Sexes . New York: Harper. Vorster, J. & Proctor, L. (1976). Black attitudes to white languages in South Africa: a pilot study. The Journal of Psychology 92:103108. Young, D., Ratcliffe, P., Boreham, G. Khiba, K. & Fitzgerald, S.
29 (1991). Language planning and attitudes towards the role and status of languages, especially English, in Western Cape Secondary schools. Unpublished manuscript, Language Education Centre, School of Education, University of Cape Town. Wood, Tony M. (1987) Perceptions of , and attitudes towards, varieties of English in the Cape Peninsula, with particular reference to the Coloured community MA thesis Rhodes University.
30 Notes: 1 We would like to acknowledge the contribution made by Daryl McLean during the planning and data-gathering stages of this project, to Sarah Radloff for her statistical expertise and to our fieldworkers for the high quality of their interviews. Appendix 1: English: During the last two years I've found it more and more difficult to wake up late in the mornings. Even on my holidays, when I have time to sleep late, I still wake up early. I don't know what the reason is: I'm not working harder than I used to, I don't think my health has improved or deteriorated...I just seem to need less sleep than I used to. (Translated into Afrikaans and Xhosa)
Appendix 2: ATTITUDES QUESTIONNAIRE:
INSTRUCTIONS
Listen carefully to each of the following voices. There will be a pause after each one. Please rate each speaker on a scale of 1 to 7 in terms of the following descriptions. Only make ratings where you feel you can confidently make such judgements Voice 1 reliable 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 unreliable honest 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 dishonest friendly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 unfriendly intelligent 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 unintelligent attractive 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 unattractive competent 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 incompetent educated 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 uneducated a leader 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 not a leader confident 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 unconfident entertaining 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 boring (Repeated for the nine voices)
