6.1 Kaaps

6.1 Kaaps

© 29.9.2022 by Peter Snyders

With the support of Unison Music and Literature

 You are supposed to do your own verification of what is presented because we are committed to nothing but the truth. So, please look to see if the rule appears in your own way of writing and speaking of Kaaps.

 After we have given the more than 3 000 Kaaps words we will be using to substantiate our understanding of how and why Kaaps is the way it is, you should look at all the renditions of Kaaps by your fellow writers. With regard to assimilations, when you read Chapter Three of Kora you will at times come across words used by Prof. Menán du Plessis like: cross-dialectal alternations, varieties, instead of, substitution, alternated and self-correction. When we deal with these, you would not even know it.

 So now we have just by way of trying to recreate how the Khoikhoi created a new word with foreign Dutch sounds, we have given an example why Kaaps say ek for ik and Dja(n) for Jan. We have given you a few examples from a long list of Kaaps words to show that it was not created by an academic person, but they are part of many people’s home language that is Kaaps. We would also have started some blog that covers many aspects of the contact between the Khoikhoi and European languages. Consult those issues if you would like to have a day-by-day European contact before Van Riebeeck came to the Cape.

 At last, understanding that Van Riebeeck had just said his name, the Khoikhoi gives in similar fashion his own name, let’s say Dzoroǃnoagu. This means ‘I am Dzoro.’ Notice, like the Nguni languages in South Africa, I am Dzoro is one ‘word.’ You are going to come across numerous examples in Kaaps where two or more words assimilate into one word.

 Van Riebeeck realizes that even if he wanted to learn Kora, that would never happen, what with the dj and click and all. So, he replies (for instance) Joro [jɔrɔ] – to which Dzoro [ʤɔrɔ] can relate albeit with a slight exchange of the first letter. If you read the early Cape history, you will see that most of the Khoikhoi who had an association with the Dutch (and the English) were given Western names. An example is Harry for Aushumao.

 Quibblers will argue that Van Riebeeck had been to the Far East and would have therefore gone directly to the point-and-name system. Since 1652, to date, there has been no attempt at understanding the fundamental processes of Kaaps. Much of that which has been said was imbued with race- and class-related ideologies. We need centuries (around 372 years) to catch up, so we have to use the adiabatic system of science where anything that is not relevant is excluded.

 Also, we have taken a worst-case scenario because we would like to return to our postulation (derivation from circumstances) like the greetings we originally attempted to use. We have to concentrate only on the linguistics and leave out unnecessary history and references, which could often be dubious.

 For us to proceed in a systematic way, we would like to be allowed to go back to just a few basic linguistic points that we shall need going forward. We will attempt, as Menán du Plessis tried to do in her book, Kora, to keep in mind our target groups and to try to remember our non-specialist readership.

 The older linguistics concentrated on the differences in languages. This probably led to the propagation of ideas about so-called “proper,” “cultured,” “pure” “superior” and “civilised” languages, among others

 The new (current) linguistics decided to change the approach to what languages have in common. To standardise the phonetics (the study and systematic classification of the sounds made in spoken utterance) they had only one criterion: only civilised languages – spoken or written – would qualify.

 They defined a civilised language as a language that is rule-governed. They discovered that all languages, with or without a writing system, are rule-governed and therefore civilised! We will linguistically show how Kaaps obey all the rules. We will prove that you cannot take Dutch, Kora or Afrikaans as a standard for a completely new language like Kaaps.

 To keep everything simple, allow us to only use the distinctive (diacritical) phonetic signs [a,] [ε] (alt + 238), [i], [ɔ] (alt + 596) and [u]. These are the first or original sounds used by the first humans to develop a language for themselves. The first three are used by a baby when she cries, and the final two are added when the child begins to speak.

 For a diacritical sign, we use the square brackets [ ]. (Some linguists use / / ) A diacritical sign says that the sign can only be expressed in one way, not always the way it is spelt. The five primary vowel sounds expressed didactically are:

 [a] Afrikaans: dag, wat, ag, kat.

[a] English:    but, tough, among, oven (Something like [ʌ] alt + 652)

 [ɛ] Afrikaans: (Alt + 603) vet, bedek, ek, wet

[ɛ] English: bet, says, guest, dead, said

 [i] Afrikaans: riet, iets, fiets, familie

[i] English: beet. beat, we, see, sea, key, believe and people

 [ɔ] Afrikaans: (alt + 596) nog, kom, bom, som, tog

[ɔ] English: bought, caught, wrong, stalk, saw, ball

 [u] Afrikaans hoed, skroef; [ū] loer, voer (longer vowel alt + 363)

[u] English: boot, who, through, to, two, move

 If you would like to type a phoneme, press and keep down the Alt key and then press the number.

 Linguists decided that the first vowel (slight positional nuances excluded) sounding like the a in words such as putt, club, rough, what and truck besides the [a] words above) should be represented by the letter a between forward slashed brackets viz /a/. So now, no matter in what language in the world this phoneme (specific sound of a letter) appears, it will always be indicated by /a/ or [a], and we will know exactly how it sounds no matter how it is spelled.

 Occasionally two phonemes are used for the same sound even though the meaning remains the same; for example, the letter j in the Dutch name Jan is written as /j/ and the letter y in you is written as /y/. To indicate the similarity, such phonemes are written in square brackets, viz. [j] x [y].

 In Du Plessis’s book, Kora, all the phonemes are written in bold, which dispenses with the slash or square brackets. Since the variants between square brackets are so minimal, we, too, will be departing from the general agreement and write all our phonemes within square brackets, [a] instead of between forward slashes as in /a/.

 One more thing before we continue. The diacritical sound [ε] in Kora is simply e (ê in Afrikaans). The [ɔ] is written o in Kora (ô in Afrikaans).

 The diacritic signs for the other letters will be pointed out later. So our extra English examples of this [a] sound are tentatively written thus: p[a]tt, cl[a]b, r[a]gh, wh[a]t and tr[a]ck. Similar examples for Kaaps are: w[a]t (what); tr[a]w[a]nte (henchmen); n[a] (to, after); [a]s (ash, if); v[a]s (fasting, if); s[a]l (shall, will); d[a]t (that); k[a]n (jug, can); l[a]g (laugh); and [a]skies (excuse, apologise).

 The phoneme [a] is also found in Dutch words such as: h[a]llo (hello); midd[a]g (afternoon); [a]vond (evening; d[a]g (day); J[a]n (a name of a person); d[a]nk; (thank you or thanks); bed[a]nkt (resign); [a]lstublieft (please); and m[a]g (power). Can you now find examples in your own writing where this sound [a] appears?

 Because this [a] is in the inventories (collections of sounds) of both the Dutch and the Kora languages, the Kora speaker immediately recognises the sound and identifies with it. Our examples in English confirm that [a] also appears in English even if the spelling of the word is sometimes different.

Edited 13.10.2024          3.10.2026