Africa Month Announcement

Khoisan activist Bradley van Sitters (second from left) was one of two guest speakers who discussed the future of Khoekhoegowab, the indigenous Khoisan language, at CHED’s Africa Day celebration, part of UCT’s Africa Month programme. PHOTO: BRENTON GEACH.

The Aboriginal /Xarra Restorative Justice Forum, in partnership with CHED, is rolling out the teaching of Khoekhoegowab in the Year of World Indigenous Languages.

Khoekhoegowab is the erased indigenous African Language of the Western Cape.  The Aboriginal /Xarra Restorative Justice Forum is an established community knowledge partnership network with the Centre for African Studies. The forum has established a number of research commissions, one of which is the Language Commission.

The teaching of Khoekhoegowab for the first time at the University of Cape Town is one of the direct outcomes of this commission's work in the forum. The Khoekhoegowab course will be directed by a leading Namibian language teacher and mother tongue speaker Dorothea Davidson.

Scheduled to start on 10 June, the UCT-certificated course will run for three months until September and it is planned to be offered as a periodic three-month short course into the future.

The Centre for African Studies has worked in partnership with the Centre for Higher Education (CHED) - with African Languages Professor Mbulungeni Madiba and Dr Medee Rall of Extra Mural Studies (EMS) - in rolling out this historic teaching programme.  The /Xarra Language Commission's Forum members include Khoekhoegowab teacher and activist Bradley Van Sitters (co-presenter with Davidson) and Paramount Chief Marthinus Fredericks, who represents also indigenous language community knowledge and research networks in Namibia and Botswana.

For those interested in the course, please contact Dr Medee Rall at medee.rall@uct.ac.za or on 021 650 2885.