Ten years of democracy: attitudes and identity among some South African school children

Abstract

Ten years into South Africa’s democracy, how do school children feel about themselves as part of specific groups, and what is the role of language in their socio-cultural identities? This paper looks at the ways in which two groups of fourteen-year-old Xhosa-speaking and mixed-race ‘Coloured’ South African secondary school learners in a new housing area near Cape Town negotiate their identities through language in a context of rapid social change. It analyses their beliefs and attitudes about the languages and speech communities to which they are exposed.