By Tore Janson

When young Wayeyi are asked what languages they use they say that they mostly use Setswana, and sometimes English, but almost never Shiyeyi. But if one asks them what they think about the Shiyeyi language it turns out that they think very highly of it and that they consider it important that it continues to be used, as it is an integral part of their own culture. Actually, the people who are least proficient in the language appreciate it the most.

It may seem that these people are irrational or insincere, but neither judgement is correct. The young ones identify with the group they belong to, the Wayeyi, as is normal for everyone to do. They know that the language is one of the main characteristics of the group and they appreciate it, which is just as natural. The fact that they do not speak it much depends on circumstances that are not of their own making.

One of these circumstances is that the parents spoke mainly Setswana at home, possibly for reasons of convenience but perhaps out of consideration for their children. They probably valued Shiyeyi just as much, but thought that it was of overriding importance that their children learnt the language of the school as early as possible. If many parents act in the same way it may mean that the language disappears, although the individual parents or the individual children in no way wanted that to happen.

This seems to be the usual situation. A language vanishes not because the speakers want it to but in spite of the fact that they do not want it to. It also seems that the speakers themselves usually do not realize that their language is in danger until very late, when the young generation has already almost lost it. Some Wayeyi see this now. An association with the objective of furthering the language has been founded recently; one of its goals is to work out an orthography. It remains to be seen what will come out of this effort.

If the speakers almost always think it is a bad thing that their language dies, are there other people who want to murder it? The answer is yes, in many cases at least. In all states there are governments, and the great majority of governments believe it is an advantage to the country if there are few ethnic groups and few languages.

Partly this is because so many people believe that the ideal political organization is the nation state with just one ethnic group and one language. This idea became strong in Europe, where several states also developed in that direction, as has been seen above. In many of the states of the world, though, the reality is quite different. Partly the aversion of governments is also caused by the practical problems encountered in a multilingual community. It may be hard or impossible to organize elementary education in many languages. It is not possible to write laws and conduct discussions in parliament in many languages, and it may be impracticable to employ policemen and health personnel mastering a number of languages.

For these reasons state authorities almost always dislike all except one or two of a country’s languages. Their main concern may be not with small minorities but with large ones, because they are politically dangerous. On the other hand, the small ones may often be shoved aside without political risks.

In Europe, nation states have been strong for a long time and so they have managed to eliminate many languages. Harsh methods were often employed. In countries such as France and Sweden, pupils could be severely punished not so long ago if they spoke their native language rather than the official one during breaks in school. In most European states minority languages are now tolerated and sometimes even supported. This may possibly be because of a more developed concern for the rights of minorities, but more probably it reflects the fact that these minorities are not perceived as a threat any more.

In Botswana, where Shiyeyi and Thimbukushu are spoken, there is one majority language, Setswana, and about twenty other languages. Most of these have very few speakers. Even if the government wanted to, it could not possibly provide elementary education in all those languages, or provide any other meaningful service in them. They are left out of the radical changes of society, for there is nothing else to do. No languages are actively repressed, as was the case in Europe, but they are also not supported in any way. If they cease to exist there will undoubtedly be fewer problems for many government officials.

In addition to the speakers and the governments, there are others who express opinions on this matter. Researchers in linguistics and anthropology have realized what is happening, and are of course very upset about the fact that hundreds of languages are disappearing. Each one of them is a cultural product, formed by the experiences and the creativity of many generations of speakers. However, there are different ideas about what should be done. Some researchers feel that one should alert public opinion and the speakers themselves to what is going on and try to reverse the trend. Others feel it is the business of researchers to describe what is happening and to document the disappearing languages in so far as it is possible, but not to intervene.

Probably it does not matter very much what researchers do or do not do. Under the social and economic conditions that prevail today languages will continue to disappear. Few people actually like the fact that it is happening, but there are such substantial advantages in shifting from a small language to a larger one that very many will do it themselves or encourage their children to do it.