Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-6grmk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-04T15:47:29.051Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

10 - English in Africa

from Part II - World Englishes Old and New

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2019

Daniel Schreier
Affiliation:
Universität Zürich
Marianne Hundt
Affiliation:
Universität Zürich
Edgar W. Schneider
Affiliation:
Universität Regensburg, Germany
Get access

Summary

English was transplanted to Africa in three different ways. First, through trade contacts along the African West coast, which occurred from the fifteenth century onward, giving rise to pidgin Englishes in West Africa. Second, native varieties in Africa are spoken by descendants of British settlers and others who shifted to English as their native language. The largest settler population is to be found in South Africa where settlement started in the early nineteenth century, alongside Zimbabwe and Kenya. Resettled slaves in Liberia and Sierra Leone developed their own varieties, giving rise in Sierra Leone to Krio, a creole variety that influenced the preexisting pidgin varieties in West Africa. Third, exploitation colonization from the late nineteenth century led to the development of non-native, indigenized varieties of English. Initially, only a small local elite gained access to high proficiency in mission schools but, after independence from the mid-twentieth century, a massive expansion of the national school education granted access to English-language education for a larger part of the indigenous population, albeit with less proficient teachers providing the input, resulting in lower levels of attainment than among the local elites.

Information

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×