Afrikaans facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Afrikaans |
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| Native to | South Africa, Namibia | |||
| Native speakers | 6.86 million (South Africa) (2011 Census) Total: 15–23 million |
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| Language family |
Indo-European
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| Official status | ||||
| Official language in |  South Africa |
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| Recognised minority language in |  Namibia |
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| Regulated by | Die Taalkommissie | |||
| Linguasphere | 52-ACB-ba | |||
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Afrikaans is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in South Africa and Namibia. It was originally the dialect that developed among the Afrikaner Protestant settlers, the unfree workers, and slaves brought to the Cape area in southwestern South Africa by the Dutch East India Company (Dutch: Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie - VOC) between 1652 and 1705. Most of these first settlers were from the United Provinces (now Netherlands), though there were also many from Germany, some from France, a few from Scotland, and various other countries. The unfree workers and slaves were Malays, and Malagasy in addition to the native Khoi and Bushmen.
Research by J. A. Heese says that until 1807, 36.8% of the ancestors of the White Afrikaans speaking population were Dutch, 35% were German, 14.6% were French and 7.2% non-white (of African and/or Asian origins). Heese's figures are questioned by other researchers, however, and especially the non-white component quoted by Heese is very much in doubt.
A sizeable minority of those who spoke Afrikaans as a first language were not white. The dialect became known as "Cape Dutch". Later, Afrikaans was sometimes called "African Dutch" or "Kitchen Dutch". Afrikaans was considered a Dutch dialect until the early 20th century, when it began to be widely known as a different language. The name Afrikaans is simply the Dutch word for African, and the language is the African form of Dutch.
Related pages
Images for kids
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Standard Dutch used in a 1916 South African newspaper before Afrikaans replaced it for use in media
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"Dit is ons erns" ("this is our passion"), at the Afrikaans Language Monument
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The side view of the Pretoria Art Museum in Arcadia, Pretoria, with its name written in Afrikaans and Xhosa.
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The geographical distribution of Afrikaans in Namibia.
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A warning sign in Afrikaans: Gevaar Slagysters or "Danger, Traps".
See also
In Spanish: Afrikáans para niños
 | Janet Murguía |
 | Nelson Merced |
 | Jovita Idar |
 | Dolores Huerta |
 | María Teresa Kumar |
