남아프리카공화국의 언어정책과 국가통합

Since democratic election in 1994, South Africa has manifested multilingualism as a national language policy. Nine African languages along with previous two official languages, English and Afrikaans, have been assigned as national languages. The national goal of language policy has been focused on the degree of harminisation and equity among various races and ethnic groups. This has been inscribed on the clauses of the constitution of 1996. Nevertheless, in reality, the social position of languages in South Africa is in hierarchical order. English has been the dominant language of the country, although Afrikaans had challenged its social position during the apartheid era. African languages, once known as kaffir languages, have been historically undervalued both in sociocultural as well as economic perspectives. Therefore, without a proper compensation, constitutional justice on the matter of African languages is just a rhetoric. ANC lead government has embarked various policies concerning national languages. However, partly due to bureaucracy and partly due to the lack of attention, the national language policy has not achieved its goals manifested in the constitution. The erosion of PANSALB is the victim of South African language policy. South African national language policy has been greatly deb ted to the past: 19th missionaries classification of African languages and Apartheid's language policy. Nine official African languages are the legacy of apartheid policy: Bantustan languages. In that sense, ANC led government has failed to redress the past and social inequality and unjustice are still alive. To redress the past legacy, this paper supports Alexander's agenda of 'harmonisation of the Nguni and Sotho languages'. Official African languages which are identified with ethnic groups need to be reorganised into two language groups: Nguni and Sotho. A language policy is more than linguistic categorisation. It is about social and political concern. The social position of individual language must be guaranteed. Nevertheless, in order to build up a national unity and democracy, restructuring of language policy must be considered.