AFRICANS AND LANGUAGES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20244, 2 May 1929, Page 5

AFRICANS AND LANGUAGES.

AN INTERESTING CENJiUS.;

ENGLISH AND DUTCH TONGUES.

[FROM OUB OWN COEEESPONDEIH.]

CAPETOWN, March 22. An interesting reflex of the language! position in South Africa is shown by a brief statistical summary which has been published in advance of the latest population census report. Though the figures given are somewhat tentative and vague, they have a distinct value. One of tbo indications the figures afford is that the tendency in home life in South Africa is to concentrate on one language. Another fact which emerges from the return is that a great deal more attention will have to be given to English if a just balance is to be preserved and if the new generation of South Africans are to De efficient in competition with the rest of the world. The number of children under seven entered as speaking Afrikaans only is more than double that of those oE similar age speaking English only. At the time when the census was taken the proportion of European children under seven years of ago who were reported to be bilingual was 30 per cent, of the total in that group. For persons over seven years of age the percentage was almost exactly double—sß.s per cent, to be precise. English was only spoken by something over 22 per cent, of the younger population, and almost exactly the same proportion of persons over seven years of age were purely English speaking. On the other hand, just over 47 per cent, of the children under school-going age spoke Dutch only, while not quite 20 per cent, of the remainder of the population were purely Dutch-spcaking. It is interesting to find that girls and women over seven years of age were relatively less bilingual than the males—s6 as against 60 per cent. A greater proportion of women spoke English only, and a larger percentage of men Afrikaans only.