Trailblazing dictionary published
OXFORD University Press South Africa launched its first Xhosa-English school dictionary in Chintsa East on Thursday.
Speaking at the event, managing director of Oxford University Press Steve Cilliers said the publishing house began working on the dictionary in 2010.
A hand-picked team were involved and a number of schools visited where both pupils and teachers were asked to suggest definitions for inclusion.
A Xhosa corpus was then built, which was a first for bilingual dictionaries in South Africa.
A corpus is a selection of words chosen according to the frequency of use in texts like novels and textbooks.
“This will ensure that the dictionary only features words which are in current use,” Cilliers said.
Publishing manager Megan Hall said the idea for the dictionary came up in 2005. After getting the necessary approval, Hall said, she assembled a team of 35 people and began with preliminary research.
“The years of hard work and dedication really paid off. We are so proud of the completed version.
“I think after this an audio version should follow, although that’s still in the pipeline. It would be nice to have a version that pupils can hear in order to get the pronunciation right.”
Guest speaker at the event, United Democratic Movement leader General Bantu Holomisa, said the dictionary came as a welcome relief to the older generation of the Xhosa clan.
“This will ensure our children engage with their indigenous languages in a balanced manner and ensure that they don’t lose their culture,” he said.
The dictionary not only contains word definitions but also has writing exercises and illustrations of people, animals and objects complete with labels.
Guests at the event included several well-known personalities such as Putco Mafani and Mandla Mandela. — zisandan@dispatch.co.za
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