• Historical Background The first South African colony dates back to the 1652 occupation of the cape of Good Hope by Jan Van Riebeek on behalf of the Dutch East India company, to be followed by the settlements of Dutch farmers, who generally spoke a dialect from the Netherlands (Afrikaans). Later, the 2nd Boer War in South Africa (1899-1902) extended the cultural influence of the British Empire to the southern tip of the continent. Prior to the arrival of the British there had been a consistent Indian presence. Indian English was also spoken in the cities, while Zulu and other native languages were predominantly spoken by blacks, especially since they were not considered part of mainstream society during segregation. After the removal from apartheid, however, a South African variety of black English seems to be emerging. Afrikaans continues to be spoken by the majority of Boer citizens for whom English is a second language. South African English includes phonetic and lexical traits loaned from from Dutch and the pronuciation of Scottish schoolmasters, some of which will be shown in the next chapter.

• Phonetics Diphtongs are remarkably similar to Cokney or Australian English, but other sounds have been either influenced by the African substratum (especially the black population). Afrikaans mothertongues say "day" as "die", "park the car" as "pawk the caw", although the "ow" sound of town is basically the same as in RP. However, the R of ‘Africa’ or ‘track’ is burred. The raising that we have seen in U.S. English, including the pin-pen merger (pen sounds like pin, etc., see American English) is also a tangible feature of South African English: flat A of pan is close to pen. Not unlike North America, full value is given to all syllables and not just stressed ones, as is the case of British English: extraordinary and laboratory does not sound extraord'n'ry, and lab'r't'ry but 'extraordinary', 'lab'ratory'. One thing South African speaker do often without, however, are last consonants in particularly difficult clusters, for eg. in tex(t), mix(ed). A common colloquialism consists in omitting the noun or pronoun after with at the end of a sentence in dialogues like: “Can you come with your books?” “Yes, we can come with”, also a nonstandard usage in North America.

• Lexicon The list of typically South African words is relatively conspicuous and unique. For example, when you are invited by Chinas for a jol, you may eat roasted chicken during a brai in the garden. But ... do not drive home after too many dops. Did you know that South Africans use robots to stop drivers at crossroads instead of our more pedestrian traffic lights? And, where else you can meet spotted tigers (as sometimes are called leopards) than in South Africa? And, a camp may not always full of campers as much less sociable bulls or sheep, since such is the fenced property of a farm. However, there are also words that have entered general English and even other languages: commando, commandeer, apartheid and trek are sometimes thought to have come from Britain or the U.S., but they do not. And no American cookies here: because its origin is Dutch, it was brought here by the Boer farmers. There are many more words that are known and used only by South Africans. These include veldt (or veld, a kind of elevated grassland), biltong (strips of dried meat), donga (ravine), gogga (insect), koeksisters (confection), kopje (hill), lekker (nice), ou (fellow), measlies (Indian corn), stoep (U.K. verandah, U.S. stoop).

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