South Africa Continues....

August 11, 2013

South Africa

This has been a busy, busy time both the last two and a half months in Pretoria working on the Research Proposal for the Doctor of Theology in Missiology degree and also here in Johannesburg at the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians.

I have learned, for instance, that Africa has Francophone speakers in countries that were colonized by France, such as Congo; and Congo is distinct from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) {that has been in world headlines for having a tremendous problem with the raping of women).  In countries that were colonized by Portugal, such as Angola, there are Portuguese-speaking people.  We have had one woman here at the Circle Conference from Angola.  We communicate with her primarily by smiles and hugs.  And then there are Anglophones, those who speak English because they were colonized by Great Britain, also popularly known as the United Kingdom (UK). 

It appears from what I have been able to glean that those with languages other than English may not use tribal languages within the countries.  The French speakers, for instance, that we have here at the Circle Conference (CC) appear to speak even with one another in French and not in yet another tongue.

I knew that South Africa (SA) had been colonized by the Dutch in the Netherlands.  I did not know that then the British had colonized some parts of SA, they were known as the Boers.  The Dutch lineage appears to have become the Afrikaans, a spoken language that is somehow similar to both Dutch and German and yet is uniquely South African.  I have also found that the French Huguenots and Germany have had a hand in South Africa.  This is along with 11 official indigenous languages.  Someone said to me, “No wonder SA is known as the Rainbow Country!”  The United States is known as the Melting Pot, I guess that is a different root concept than Rainbow Country.

The racial divisions between white and black South Africans are palatable.  I sense that the different population segments live totally separate lives.  I even sense this in the shopping malls.  It is as if each people group lives in its own bubble and they just pass each other without interacting at any meaningful level.  This is most similar to the experience I had with Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland.  It is less so in the Republic of Ireland because it is a majority Catholic country and there did not appear/or feel to be as much polarization between the two populations as there is in Northern Ireland that is definitely a Protestant majority country.  The Protestants seemed to be wealthier than the Catholics and the two factions had very different cultures, even within the same country.  This is how I am experiencing South Africa.

More to come….

Blessings,

Debbie