Tomorrow marks the end of the day of the week, Kwanzaa. Initiated in 1966 as a means for African-Americans celebrate their cultural heritage, Kwanzaa uses language Africa East, Swahili, on behalf of his days. In a column online recently, linguist and commentator John McWhorter argues that Swahili must be removed from Kwanzaa. He tells why host Michel Martin.
Copyright ? 2010 national public radio ?. Personal use, non-commercial only. See the terms of use. For other uses, prior approval required.MICHEL MARTIN, host:
Now for another holiday story. Celebrations continue this weekend, then Christmas and Hanukkah are obviously more and New Years Eve is tonight, another holiday is still in full: Kwanzaa.
Kwanzaa was launched in 1966 to give Americans of African descent a way of celebrating the cultural heritage as well as challenging materialism that many people say they dislike Christmas. It extends from December 26 to January 1, and each day is supposed to observe a different value or principle, such as unity and faith.
The word itself, Kwanzaa, comes from a phrase meaning first fruits in Swahili, a language is used to appoint the days of Kwanzaa African. But it is a problem, says political commentator John McWhorter. It is a linguist and lecturer at Columbia University. In a recent column in the publication online of the root, m. McWhorter argues that Swahili should probably be ignored celebrate Kwanzaa.
Jumbo, habari agencies, oh wait, sorry. This is the problem.
Mr. JOHN McWHORTER (Columbia University): This is a beautiful language, Michel. I think the Swahili is great, but there is a problem with him if we're going to split hairs, and is that none of our ancestors had spoken that.
A good thousand languages are spoken in Africa, depending on the way which rely you, and if one of them spoke in Swahili, it was an accident.
MARTIN: You have a problem with Kwanzaa itself? Because some people say, why do we need another holiday really? But this is not your problem.
Mr. McWHORTER: No. Kwanzaa is fine. There - I did he celebrate, but I certainly no other problem anyone to do so. The beauty of it is clear and it is based on the Swahili and is not likely change, just the typewriter QWERTY keyboard is not going to change.
And it is not that I have a problem with the fact that Kwanzaa established relatively recently, etc., etc. It is just that part Swahili, expanded in a general sense that the Swahili is another language of the black people and that you get in touch with you through learning Swahili, language is just not accurate. And I think that there are other languages that we get in touch with that we have in fact a sort of link authentic with and are interesting in their own ways.
MARTIN: Just to clarify this. You say that you think that the ancestors of most of the people of African descent are at the United States today probably speaking Swahili because...
Mr. McWHORTER: They didn't come from...
MARTIN: East Africa.
Mr. McWHORTER: Africa. And if they spoke languages such as Walla (ph). They speak languages such as Twi. They speak languages such as the Congo. They speak languages such as Igbo. Some - very few of them - languages speaking as Yarba. And I could go on. There is enough some of them, but as it happens, Swahili - and don't forget, the Swahili is one of about a thousand of African languages - Swahili was not one of them and not even further.
This is just a kind of an accident, at this point, 40 years and after it has been established as the language to go black - that we also believe in a symbolic way of us, and we must remember that to say that Swahili is because he is African, in a way stereotypes and therefore...
MARTIN: You're nominated Twi?
Mr. McWHORTER: Yes.
MARTIN: Who is?
Mr. McWHORTER: It really Twi or Twi. It is spoken in Ghana. If you encounter a Ghanaian, they almost certainly speak Twi, and they will be happy that you've never heard of it. And Twi language that I chose because it must choose one that there is indeed a means of learning. All African languages, there are several where you can to Amazon and it is not a single book on it. You could even go to a library and it will be a book with 1942. Therefore, it is no good.
But with Twi, there are actual sources that you can buy for the moderate price where you can teach yourself some Twi and Twi speakers – there you meet people from Ghana, they probably speak a local language, and then they talk about Twi and therefore you could actually practice. And what is important, many of our ancestors did in Ghana.
And so once again, we have a real connection.
MARTIN: OK. John McWhorter is a regular contributor to the root. If you want to read her piece on why it may be time to leave the Swahili go, at least as far as celebrate Kwanzaa, we will link it on our site Web, just go to npr.org. And he is the author of "our magnificent Bastard Tongue: the Untold History of English" and a linguist as you've heard it and lecturer at Columbia University. And he was with us in our offices in New York.
John McWhorter, thank you very much we reach. And I do not know how to say happy new year in Twi, but the happy new year.
Mr. McWHORTER: Well, even to Michel, in English.
Copyright ? 2010 national public radio ?. All rights reserved. Without quotation marks in the materials contained herein may be used in any medium without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal use, non-commercial only, in accordance with our conditions of use. Any other use requires prior permission from the NPR. Visit our page permissions for more information.NPR transcripts are created on a rush period by a contractor for NPR and the accuracy and availability may vary. This text is not in its final form and can be updated or revised in the future. Please note that the registration authority of the NPR programming is audio.
No comments:
Post a Comment