Raising the profile of siSwati as a national language*

Abstract

ABSTRACT The governing framework and national ethos of the Kingdom of Eswatini are grounded in the traditional culture of emaSwati (the people of Eswatini) and their language, siSwati. At the same time, economic success is tied to knowledge of English, the former colonial language of Eswatini, which is the language of government, the media, the judiciary and formal education. One outcome of this type of bilingualism is the relative marginalisation of large numbers of citizens whose command of English is limited. While siSwati remains alive through its use by emaSwati, there are concerns that, in the long term, the dominance of English in key domains could pose a threat to the survival of siSwati. This concern is reflected in the recent creation of a SiSwati Language Board by the Government of Eswatini. Drawing on research that suggests that inclusivity and language maintenance are linked, this paper proposes that the prestige of siSwati be enhanced within the English-based globally-oriented sector of emaSwati society through activities undertaken by the SiSwati Language Board, such as a project to produce a tagged digital corpus of siSwati texts from a wide variety of genres and a monolingual dictionary based on this corpus, parallel to the construction of such corpora by the ALLEX project at the University of Zimbabwe, as well as encouraging the expansion of siSwati into new genres as well. Such activities could contribute to raising the profile of siSwati as a language that merits the same study and attention afforded to more prestigious languages such as English.