|
RESEARCH
HIV/AIDS AND AFRICAN LANGUAGES
Tessa has recently researched and written an article on HIV/Aids and African languages. The article examines the way in which language specific customs translate into interpreting contemporary life.
Here is the article - please feel free to use or quote from it as long as you acknowledge the author and her company.
UQEDISIZWE - THE FINISHER OF THE NATION
Naming and talking about HIV/Aids in African languages
This article examines the way HIV/Aids is named and talked about by African language speakers. Because the study was confined to areas in Cape Town there is a predominance of Xhosa and Zulu words.
Naming in African languages is always significant, with most given names having a meaning. So, for example, we get names like Lindiwe - Expected, which parents may give to a long-awaited child, Ntombizodwa - Girls Only for a girl child born into a family that has no boy children and Nondanele - Enough for the last child in the family.
In addition to the names given to them when they are children, people also inherit clan names, and the praises of those clans. Many individuals also have personal praise names which refer to their deeds and spiritual and physical attributes. Here is an extract from Bongani Sitole's praises of Nelson Mandela:
A Dalibhunga!
Hail Dalibhunga!
(in Kaschula and Matyumza 1996:56-57)
Mandela is referred to as Ngusixwexwe samaz' adandalazile, literally meaning He is words of truth have been exposed, the u- of usixwexwe telling us that the noun is in Class 1a, a class of nouns in African languages that contains mainly proper nouns and kinship terms.
Great attributes and brave deeds are personified and become metaphors for the person. These names can be coined by a single individual (the praise poet) and then become part of the general discourse about this person.
The names given to HIV/Aids are similar to those used when talking about powerful leaders and outstanding personalities - complex, compound names normally heard in praise poetry, in the reciting of genealogies.
Compare the praises of a great fighter, Mqikela Ndayi:
with this name for Aids, the great killer:
People react emotionally to praise names which invoke respect and, in some instances, fear. HIV/Aids must be feared and therefore its personification and praise names are appropriate.
Interestingly, however, in ordinary discourse and in marketing and educational campaigns, no-one has thought to give the condom a praise name. There are no advertisements or posters that refer to the condom as UMsindisi weSizwe - The Saviour of the Nation or other similar praise names that could so easily be coined.
In fact, not only are condoms not given praise names, they are rather trivialized, likened to everyday, commonplace objects such as jackets idyasi, gumboots igambutsi and baby bags mokotsla wa bana. Similarily, while there are ways of talking about people living with Aids, there are no praises for them. There are no names to inspire, to suggest strength and survival in the face of all odds. Rather, an Aids sufferer is someone who has caught it ubhaqile, or who has had a hot coal fall upon himself or herself uwelwe lilahle.
Just as a praise name can refer both to the conqueror and to the victim, eg. USibinz' amaMfengu The One who stabs the Mfengu (Opland, 1998:304), so does the name given to Aids refer to both the killer and the nation: UQedisizwe The One who Finishes the Nation. The word for nation is isizwe in Xhosa and Zulu and setjhaba in Sotho. Thus HIV/Aids is:
The Killer of the Nation - UMbulalasizwe (Xhosa); Mmolai wa Setjhaba (Sotho)
These nouns are all either in Class 1a (proper nouns) or Class 1 (only people). They are compound nouns (using more than one part of speech) made up of powerful transitive verbs such as bulala kill, shaya beat and qeda finish, portraying composite pictures of a dominant personality. They can also consist of a whole noun phrase, such as in the Sotho Mmolai wa Setjhaba The Killer of the Nation. So HIV/Aids has become a famous African personality, feared and hated, but to some extent wondered at for its power and ability to wreak havoc on a nation.
In both Xhosa and Zulu dictionaries the word for plague is given as ubhubhane. The root of this noun is taken from the verb bhubha die. In this way HIV/Aids is named primarily in relation to death. On the website of the Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology (DACST) there is a special section on HIV/Aids terminology for South Africa's eleven official languages. Here, the English gloss for Aids, being a disease for which there is no cure, is translated into Xhosa as a disease which kills and which cannot be cured isifo esibulalayo nesinganyangekiyo. All the other African languages add this killing aspect of Aids, which is absent in the English and Afrikaans translations.
HIV/Aids is seen as a plague because it seems able to subjugate a nation by dramatically reducing its numbers. It rips indiscriminately through the land of the living, contaminating an area like KwaZulu-Natal, which is now referred to as KwaNyama-ayipheli at the place where the meat does not end. The area has been given this name because there are so many funerals there for which slaughtering has to be done. KwaZulu-Natal is also Sodom and Gomorrah, a place from where you will not return - Akuyilubuyayo (Xhosa/Zulu). A young Xhosa speaking woman told me: Hayi, soze ndiye kulaa ndawo! Andifuni ukufa. No, I will never go to that place! I don't want to die. When I asked her what her reason was, she replied KukwaZembe litshona nomphini. It is the place where the axe sinks with the handle. The meaning of this figurative expression can roughly be translated as If you put one foot there you are lost.
The infectious nature of HIV/Aids is also reflected in the Sotho word for the disease, which is kwatsi - a name which originally referred to anthrax, a disease of cattle which can spread to human beings. Sotho speakers say O tshwerwe ke kwatsi, which literally translates as S/he is being held by HIV/Aids.
Language Creating Victims and Reflecting Popular Culture
Staiano (1992:173), discussing the semiotics of illness, argues that We create categories of illness and are in turn victimized by them. In African languages, I would argue, there are two categories for HIV/Aids that encourage the victim view, those being HIV/Aids as personified killer and HIV/Aids as taboo. There is yet another category that takes its references from popular culture, and almost pokes fun at the prevalence of the disease, branding it as a game, a ride on an overcrowded train.
Examples:
Names for HIV/Aids falling into this category are often compound nouns made up of verb-verb combinations, for example bulala kill + bhuqa trample down, break down, cause havoc, or verb-noun combinations such as bulala kill + isizwe nation.
"There is such a sense of awe surrounding taboos that they may not be named or discussed. This has led to the development of a special language called (uku)hlonipha ... it is made up of substitute words and is a polite and reverent language used only for taboos and the ancestral spirits." (Pinnock 1988:61).
People use hlonipha in many different areas of life. For example the initiants abakhwetha will learn a set of new hlonipha words for commonplace objects, while married men should not call the names of their parents-in-law. The most profound and complicated form of hlonipha, however, is that of a married woman, who traditionally would be punished if she uttered any of the syllables in her husband's name or in any of his family's names.
Breaking with the hlonipha custom was seen as invoking chaos and undermining the dignity and stability of the home. There is a Xhosa poem by W. S. Nkuhlu about the importance of hlonipha that ends with the line Hloniphani, mzi wasetyhin', isidima sakhiwa ziintloni. You must respect, ladies, dignity comes from respect. It is seen as all-important for the woman to uphold the tradition: elsewhere in the poem we have Hloniphani, bafazi, sakhiwa njal' isizwe. You must respect, women, that is how a nation is built.
Interestingly, just as women are responsible for maintaining the hlonipha tradition, so too, in some communities, women are more often cited as being the ones responsible for HIV/Aids, those who bring it about because they are the abantu abangakwazi ukuthi cha kumuntu wesilisa people who cannot say no to men.
Two of the reasons women give for using the hlonipha language, apart from it being an important part of tradition, are to stay accepted by the homestead and to avoid bad luck. While researching the language for my Master's thesis I was told: Ndisahlonipha nangoku, mna, ngoba andifuni kugxothwa emzini okanye ndibe namashwa. I still hlonipha now because I don't want to be cast out of the homestead or to be unlucky. (Dowling 1988:116)
Hlonipha is also viewed as an important traditional custom which demonstrates respect for the ancestors and for the institution of marriage. Rosalie Finlayson, who has done extensive work on Xhosa hlonipha, refers to Herbert's thesis that "avoidance practices such as hlonipha occur only in societies with a high incidence of unique names and where names are derived from ordinary words of language" (Finlayson 1995:149). She quotes him further as arguing that:
"What seems to be crucial to an understanding of this process [hlonipha] is the attention calling function of personal names, i.e. the fact that the uttering of someone's personal name directs their attention to the speaker. Nguni men will not have their attention called by the outsider living within their midst, i.e. they will not be forced to focus upon this potential threat to the harmony of the homestead. The avoidance of all words containing any of the syllables of the male names that is enforced upon a wife ensures that a senior male's attention, including the attention of the ancestral shades, will not be focused upon her." (Herbert 1990: 467)
In the same way, talking about illnesses generally, and HIV/Aids in particular, is seen as focusing attention on the speaker, making him or her vulnerable to disease, so euphemism is used instead. Thus, for example, in Xhosa, syphilis is ihashe elimhlophe the white horse and cancer and TB both refer to the bigness of the wound or of the affected area, cancer being known as isilonda esikhulu a big wound and TB as isifuba esikhulu a big chest.
Although it is common to refer indirectly to illnesses, HIV/Aids has a special status in the hierarchy of diseases. It is the new threat to harmony, and if one breaks with the hlonipha custom of avoiding this name with its close relation to another taboo, sex, one is invoking chaos and adversity. This time, however, the chaos and lack of stability extends from the homestead umzi to the nation isizwe. You must keep quiet to keep a dignified, stable nation. Just as the woman had to think of ways of talking about her male relatives without using their names (not to mention the everyday objects in her life that even had the syllables of their names) so too do people avoid talking about HIV/Aids and instead invent different ways of referring to it without actually mentioning its name.
Chris Ellis, a doctor working in KwaZulu-Natal, notes that one of the most common causes of misinterpretation is that many African languages use metaphors, allusions and euphemisms especially when dealing with illness (Ellis 1999:45). Even on the official DACST webpage, a sexual organ is referred to in African languages as the secret member: ilungu langasese (Xhosa), isitho sangasese (Zulu), setho sa bong (Sotho). Sexual parts are also referred to as in front or the things in front: ngaphambili (Xhosa/Zulu) and dikapeli (Sotho).
The entry for sexual contact on the same page is described as ukuya ocansini to go to the sleeping mat in Zulu. The further English description bodily contact connected with sexual activity is translated as ukuya ocansini nomunye umuntu to go to the sleeping mat with another person in Zulu and as ho kenela thobalano le motho e mong to enter mutual sleeping with another person in Sotho. Obviously the translators felt it difficult to translate bodily contact and thus used euphemism instead. The difficulty arises when the euphemism is given as the only translation, crowding out and constraining more graphic descriptions. In none of the African language descriptions of sexual contact is there any mention made of the body.
Some euphemisms for HIV/Aids refer not the characteristics of the disease, but to the characteristics of the name, i.e. the fact that the acronym stands for four words:
People also speak about:
The seriousness of the disease is reflected in the use of the adjective -khulu big.
By not mentioning the disease by its name, by treating the name itself as taboo, one respects the other's choice to remain silent as well as protecting oneself. A friend of mine told me that when she went to a close family member's funeral she was bemused by the silence: We all knew she had died of Aids, but no-one mentioned it. She told me that the only indication that HIV/Aids had been the cause of death was the overheard whisper amagama amane ...
Keeping HIV/Aids a taboo, not calling it by its name, translates into reluctance to have an Aids test. I was told that Xa uyotesta i-Aids, uza kuba nayo kuba xa uyile ukuyotesta baza kukuxelela ukuba unayo, iyoze engqondweni yakho ukuba unayo, ikubulale. If you go to be tested for Aids you will get it because if you have gone to be tested they will tell you that you have it, and then it will come into your mind that you have it and it will kill you. In other words, someone will name the un-nameable, and, by that process of naming, make what was before just a symptom, a deadly disease.
"The red spots of measles serve only as an empty signifier until exposed, as Foucault says, to the gaze of the physician who transforms them by means of language into another sign." Staiano (1992:173)
A common answer given to the question Who gets HIV/Aids? is (in Zulu): Abantu abahlale besiya kuma-test. People who go for tests.
According to one of the first scholars of the hlonipha language, F S M Mncube, when people use a "taboo language" they develop an "elaborate system of substitutions" including "substitute words with no traceable associations" and "words from other languages" (Mncube 1949:53-57). In this next section on HIV/Aids as part of popular culture you will notice that most of the words come from other languages or have no traceable association with HIV/Aids.
(These words are all used in Xhosa and Zulu.)
iLotto
In line with Mncube's analysis, here we have Aids being respected and thus avoided, no longer by using euphemistic phrases but by relating the disease to everyday objects and activities: gambling (Lotto and Ace), trains (the busy Zola and uMlazi lines) and any popular group or organization with three letters in its acronym.
What is the connection between the lotto and Aids? When people play the lotto they know they only stand a tiny chance of winning. So to use the lotto as a metaphor for Aids is to say "if you have Aids you only have a tiny chance of living." The risk of losing your money by taking part in the lottery is high - as is the risk of dying from Aids. I also think that it is somehow less scary to talk about iLotto than Aids or UMbulalasizwe because it does not refer directly to death, but rather to living at risk. Another important correlation between the lotto and Aids is the number of people involved - it is a popular game just as Aids is a popular illness.
Still referring to its popularity Aids is also referred to as an overcrowded train (both the uMlazi and Zola lines are said always to be very crowded). So, ironically, although Aids is something one cannot mention, that is a taboo, it is at the same time acknowledged as being a disease with thousands of players, millions of passengers.
HIV/Aids is once again linked to popular icons when acronyms are used. TKZ refers to the well-liked and successful kwaito group TKZ named after its three members Tokolo, Kabelo and Zwayi. Young people might then say of someone they suspect of having HIV/Aids UneTKZ S/he has TKZ or Uyimemba yeTKZ S/he is a member of TKZ. This is not because the group members have HIV/Aids or even sing about the illness. It is because TKZ has three letters in its acronym, as does Aid(s) and HIV. When the ANC or PAC stand for HIV/Aids you cannot use the une- ... S/he has ... structure as with TKZ, but can only say uyimemba ye- ... She is a member of .... While there could be some ambiguity if you are told that someone is a member of the PAC, I was assured that the listener will always know from the context and the way the person speaks whether he or she is referring to the political organization or to the illness.
This popularization of the name of HIV/Aids should be seen in the light of general language creativity, particularly the development and coining of new words in urban areas. Coupled with the natural creativity inherent in the hlonipha tradition, contemporary preoccupations and modern developments are integrated into everyday discourse by African language speakers, who take the new things or events in society, the buzz words and use them as metaphors for something else. So, for example, CODESA became a common verb for meet and discuss, a Zola Budd became a taxi, a Model C is a Black who attended a previously Whites-only school, a Chris Hani refers to a type of jacket popularized by Chris Hani and a 16V is a sixteen-year-old virgin!
It is common knowledge that if the person with HIV/Aids is a close relative or friend, people will usually say he or she is suffering from menigitis or cancer or some other more conventionally acceptable disease. However, a person who is only a distant acquaintance or is a famous personality can be referred to almost flippantly in the following ways (usually by younger, more urbanized people):
Heyi yena, ugibele uMlazi Train! Hey, he is travelling on the Mlazi Train [a train that carries many people = Aids]!
When udlala iLotto you play Lotto, or get on popular, overcrowded trains - ukhwele istimela saseZola he is riding on the Zola train - there is the suggestion that you could have chosen another game, another train. At the same time there is something compelling about doing something everyone else is indulging in - something attractive about risk, which is why we have the Sotho phrase Nka mpa ka bolawa ke se ntlisitseng lefatsheng I'd rather be killed by what brought me on earth.
People with Aids are also referred to metaphorically as:
And people who are open about their disease are, unfortunately, often looked down upon, the reasons being given:
People warn about getting HIV/Aids largely by referring to the dangers of promiscuity.
Ungahambi ulala. Don't go around sleeping. (Xhosa)
Warnings also contain references to the fact that you cannot see whether someone has Aids or not:
Ayibhalwanga ebunzi. It is not written on the forehead. (Xhosa)
The sickness itself is once again personified in these warnings:
Hlokomela! E teng! E a bolaya! Beware! It's real and it kills! (Sotho)
The everyday objects which provide the metaphors for condoms are useful in that they suggest protection. The examples here are from Xhosa and Zulu and would be similar in Sotho:
There is a great deal of playfulness when talking about condoms. Overheard in a clinic where a nurse was giving a demonstration of the female condom: "What do you get when a condom for men meets a condom for women? A gumboot dance!" While this playfulness may be healthy, it is an indication, especially amongst young men, of a certain lack of respect for the condom. In African languages people seldom talk playfully about what they respect. As one young man told me, "We really don't know what to do with the damn things." Other reasons given for not wearing condoms are:
Yi-waste. It is a waste.
Iyosala phakathi. It will stay inside.(Xhosa/Zulu)
O ka se je pompong e phuthetswe ka pampiri. You cannot eat a sweet wrapped in paper. (Sotho)
IBhayibhile ithi inyama enyameni. The bible says flesh on flesh.
Where and Why we have HIV/Aids
Just as people argue that the bible says flesh on flesh, so too do people tend to see HIV/Aids as the fulfilment of biblical prophesies.
Apocalyptic reasons are:
Sisiqalekiso esisuka kuYehova. It is a curse from the Lord. (Xhosa)
People also see HIV/Aids as having been brought deliberately to Africa from outside:
Abelungu bezonokudla eNingizimu Afrika okuneAids. The end of love. Finally, and most tragically, HIV/Aids is seen by many as something that has been brought to South Africa to end love:
Iphelisa uthando. It ends love. (Xhosa)
Staiano (1992:174) argues that "... the boundaries of this thing we have called culture are amorphous and always changing. The ideas, beliefs, attitudes, practices and so on, form a set of resources from which participants draw, rather than a serious set of constraints or prescriptions."
The resources available in African languages allow the participants to talk about HIV/Aids within both a culturally rich paradigm (the tradition of naming, praising and respecting) as well as by using popular contemporary discourse (words for Aids that refer to trains, kwaito groups and games).
It is important that naming and taboo traditions in African languages are understood, so that programmes can be developed that have a real prospect of influencing perceptions and behaviours. At the same time the creativity inherent in languages that reflect the "amorphous boundaries" of culture should be studied in order to determine how social preoccupations feed into perceptions of and attitudes to HIV/Aids.
Staiano (1992:174) also argues that "care must be taken to generate, organize, and display, signs which are culturally, socially, and personally appropriate". I would maintain that language is one of the most important cultural signifiers and that it is therefore vital for marketing and educational campaigns to reflect the way people actually talk about HIV/Aids in order to ensure the production of meaningful and relevant messages that are able to resonate with the target audience.
Finally, it is my personal feeling that we need to find a praise name for the condom.
Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology webpage: www.dacst.gov.za |