Afrikaans identity needs autonomy
DEAR SIR — Scotland wasted an opportunity to become fully independent of the UK, yet the national debate and soul-searching during the referendum had lasting effects on both Scottish and British identity.
I was struck by septuagenarian designer Vivienne Westwood’s declaration: “I hate England. I like Scotland because somehow I think they are better than we are. They are more democratic.”
Looking at the kind of ethnic discourse dished up by Jonny Steinberg (Pistorius has become a source of racial shame, September 19) and Nomalanga Mkhize (Pistorius less a source of shame than Griekwastad, September 23) on what they see as white or Afrikaner identity, it is clear that SA is in dire need of an honest debate about what it means to be “South African” and whether we would not relate better at a greater distance from one another.
“Devo max” was the term coined during Scotland’s referendum and Afrikaners definitely require it, at least as far as our schools and universities are concerned.
This society apes everything that the UK and the British do. As Hendrik Potgieter expressed to the Natal governor circa 1840, I can think of no fate worse than becoming English, yet so many people here are absolutely besotted with the British royals and regard SA as a Little Britain.
From the English point of view, Afrikaners may be a moribund minority best forgotten unless they can be slurred with perennial caricatures of apartheid or seeing Oscar Pistorius (pictured) as an Afrikaner, despite the fact that only his surname is Afrikaans.
However, just like “wee Scotland”, we have a right to exist and to speak our language.
The UK and its leaders were at great pains to “embrace” Scotland, lest it flee the union. Locally, Little Britain is so contemptuous of Afrikaners, Afrikaans, boerewors, Steve Hofmeyr, Die Stem and everything that goes with it that there seems to be a mutual feeling that more separation is not only desirable, but inevitable.
We also want devo max, and the first step would be to return our schools and universities to us. We made them, paid for them and still administer them. They do not belong to Little Britain. Dan Roodt Johannesburg