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Assessment 03 (312554)

Dimitri Batis

16170202

157T

Department of African Languages, UNISA

AFL1501: Language Through An African Lens

Dr D Khumalo, Ms J Boshomane, Ms J Toffa

Mr S Cele

4 May 2024

[email protected]
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Contents page

• Contents page 2
• Task 1 page 3
• Task 2 pages 3&4
• Task 3 page 4
• Academic honesty declaration page 5
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Task 1:

Family is a difficult term to try to describe and understand as the word ‘family’ could mean
different things to different individuals. My understanding of the term family is more akin to the
traditional sense of the word and that is a mother and a father with children whom all love and
care for each other and no matter the distance in-between the bond shared cant be broken, but
although my current family is different from my definition since my father passed when I was
still young the understanding of family and the bonds we share still have not changed after all
these years. That’s not to say all families are the same as the definition I mentioned some
people consider their close friends family, others consider work colleagues family and church
goers would consider other church goers their family. Each of these examples may look
fundamentally different but the bonds shared is very similar to that of a family, there is also
always a ‘head figure’ whether it be Mother/Father, Boss/ Manager or Priest/Father, there is
always one person/s in a ‘family’ group whom the other members look up to. Another trait
amongst families is the ability to come together to overcome harsh trials that may be thrown
their way. Family is a term that can be used to describe a group of people who share a bond and
common understanding between one another blood related or not. As humans we are a very
social oriented species we thrive off of connections made and are able to gather useful
information through observing these connections, for example we all know of one group of
people who come off as annoying and bothersome either in the work environment or out in
public, we see and associate each member of the group as one under a term and in this case
the term would be bothersome, if one member of the group were to leave we would still
associate said member with the term bothersome due to past connections.

Task 2:

Clans make up an important part in African communities they are similar to families in a sense,
they share their own social identity as well as cultural values. Clans in African communities are
closely associated with totems, usually an object depicting a wild animal is used as a totem
when symbolizing a clan. This type of belief system called Totemism describes the clan
members as having a sort of ancestral link with the totem in question. This belief system makes
each clan unique as not all clans share the same totems and therefore ancestral links. This
uniqueness between clans is further demonstrated by the practice of ‘isithakazelo’ or ‘clan
names’, in Zulu each clan has its own name and members of said clan are referred to by that
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address name, for example a member of the Ndlovu clan would be addressed using the name
Gatsheni!. These clan names are used as a sign of respect and politeness when addressing a
person from another clan. The Northen Sotho clans have a different way of addressing a person,
they use a term called ‘Direto’ or greeting/praise names, these differ from clan names as they
refer to the individual instead of the clan, which is why there are masculine and feminine
variations to the names used for example Nape would be the masculine name used and
Napjadi/Napšadi would be the feminine name used. These praise names are used as forms of
greetings, referring or addressing an individual or to give praise.

Task 3:

Marriage in traditional African cultures is very different from the traditional western ways some
of as have been brought up to know. Marriage in African cultures is not seen as a coming
together of a bride and groom as it is in western cultures its more of a coming together between
both the brides family as well as the grooms family which already puts into perspective the
communal nature of Traditional African weddings. This is further shown by the fact when an
African man approaches his loves family asking for her hand in marriage it is seen as
disrespectful but instead the mans family approaches his loves family on his behalf which is
more respectful. The concept of ‘gate crashing’ is also foreign to African weddings due to the
fact that the community is usually involved with the proceedings, the women are usually in
charge of the wood gathering and brewing beer and the men are involved with the slaughtering
of animals, this in turn makes the wedding a community effort as well as a community
celebration where everyone can feast and enjoy the festivities to their hearts desire. The
ceremonies involved with traditional African weddings have also changed in some sense due to
the way the world has changed and some of the practices are a little outdated. For instance the
practice of Magadi where cattle from the grooms family is given to the brides family, now days
the practicality of owning cattle is outdated as not everyone has access to open fields to raise
cattle so when the brides family asks for ten heads of cattle an appropriate substitution of
monetary value can be accepted.
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Academic Honesty Declaration:

1. I know that plagiarism means taking and using the ideas, writings, works or
inventions of another as if they were one’s own. I know that plagiarism includes
verbatim copying and the extensive use of another person’s ideas without proper
acknowledgement (which consists of the appropriate use of quotation marks). I know
plagiarism covers using material from textual sources and the Internet.

2. I acknowledge and understand that plagiarism is wrong.

3. I understand that my research proposal must be accurately referenced.

4. This research proposal is my work. I acknowledge that copying someone else’s

5. I have not allowed, nor will I in the future, anyone to copy my work to pass it off as
their work.

6. I confirm that I have read and understood UNISA’s Policy for Copyright and Plagiarism
- https://www.unisa.ac.za/sites/corporate/default/Apply-for-admission/Master%27s-&-
doctoral-degrees/Policies,-procedures-&-forms

Dimitri Batis
16170202
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