Language Loyalty or Ethnicity? A Comparative Study of isiZulu- and Afrikaans speakersin South African Higher Education

关于南非语言和种族之间的联系的文献很多，但还没有一项全面的研究在高等教育双语的背景下探索这种联系。本项目借鉴后结构和后殖民身份理论，旨在通过考察两个研究地点的语言和种族结构之间的关系，并参照两种语言，来填补这一研究空白：1)夸祖鲁-纳塔尔大学(UKZN)的IsiZulu语；2)斯泰伦博什大学(SUN)的南非荷兰语。这个项目调查了南非高等教育领域，在那里英语的主导地位渗透到学术生活中，是否是一个非洲种族可能不那么明显、更具可塑性和争议性的领域。通过复杂和跨学科的方法，包括焦点小组、辅导录音、个人访谈和参与者观察，本研究旨在询问语言忠诚度和语言意识形态与当地种族结构和其他社会认同的关系。在一个不同的高等教育环境中，通过定性的方法，探讨了isiZulu(在UKZN)和南非荷兰语(在SUN)相对于英语的地位和意义。尽管这两种语言在语言地位、语料库发展、习得规划历史以及它们在两所大学中的相对地位方面存在很大差异，但这两种语言的使用者都在努力在高等教育系统中找到仅次于英语的语言认可和支持。在种族隔离后的国家，特别是讲南非荷兰语和伊西祖鲁语的人公开宣称自己的族裔身份，这一事实为对这两种语言群体进行社会和民族语言比较分析提供了丰硕的基础。这些研究成果将有助于更广泛地研究语言和种族的关系，更具体地说，将有助于非洲语言的研究。这项研究还将开辟新的视角，从全球角度研究多方面的社会语言相关性如何影响高等教育领域。

There is an extensive literature on the link between language and ethnicity in South Africa but no comprehensive study has yet explored this link against the background of higher education bilingualism. Drawing from post-structural and post-colonial theories of identity this project aims to fill this research paucity by examining the relationship between language and constructions of ethnicity at two research sites and in reference to two languages: 1) isiZulu at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), and 2) Afrikaans at the University of Stellenbosch (SUN). This project examines whether the South African higher education sphere where the dominance of English permeates academic life is one domain where African ethnicities may be less pronounced and more malleable and contested. Through a complex and interdisciplinary methodological approach, including focus groups, tutorial recordings, individual interviews and participant observation, this study aims to interrogate language loyalty and language ideologies in relation to local constructions of ethnicity and other social identities. The status and significance of isiZulu (at UKZN) and Afrikaans (at SUN) are explored vis-à-vis English through a qualitative approach in a heterogeneous higher education environment. Although these two languages greatly differ in terms of language status, corpus development, acquisition planning history and their relative position in the two universities, both of their speakers struggle to find linguistic recognition and support next to English in the higher education system. The fact that especially Afrikaans and isiZulu-speakers have publicly asserted their ethnicities in the post-apartheid state offers fruitful ground for a comparative socio- and ethno-linguistic analysis of these two language groups. The research findings will contribute new insights to the relationship of language and ethnicity more broadly, and to African languages more specifically. The study will also carve out new perspectives on how multifaceted sociolinguistic correlations affect the higher education domain from a global perspective.