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Encoding politeness in African urban youth languages: Evidence from Southern Africa

Gibson, Hannah; Marten, Lutz; Ndlovu, Sambulo

Encoding politeness in African urban youth languages: Evidence from Southern Africa Thumbnail


Authors

Hannah Gibson

Sambulo Ndlovu



Abstract

African urban youth languages (AUYLs) often function as languages of resistance and “anti-languages”, establishing alternative semiotic spaces. In this paper, we analyse the encoding of politeness and respect in AUYLs, drawing on examples from Southern Africa, and show that they have complex systems of politeness marking, comparable to the matrix languages on which they draw. This includes different types of address forms, polite reference forms, and the use of avoidance language. There are lexical and morphological strategies to achieve politeness in AUYLs and these can be used to express both negative and positive politeness. The picture that emerges from this study is consistent with previous findings showing the structural complexity of AUYLs. However, the paper suggests that the presence of complex politeness marking in AUYLs may reflect the complex, and at times ambiguous, relation of AUYLs with established, mainstream norms.

Citation

Gibson, H., Marten, L., & Ndlovu, S. (2024). Encoding politeness in African urban youth languages: Evidence from Southern Africa. Linguistics Vanguard: A Multimodal Journal for the Language Sciences, 10(S4), 331-341. https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2022-0147

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Feb 9, 2024
Online Publication Date Jun 24, 2024
Publication Date Jun 24, 2024
Deposit Date Feb 24, 2024
Publicly Available Date Jun 30, 2024
Electronic ISSN 2199-174X
Publisher De Gruyter
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 10
Issue S4
Pages 331-341
DOI https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2022-0147
Keywords politeness marking; African urban youth languages; language contact; Sheng; S’ncamtho; Tsotsitaal
Publisher URL https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/lingvan-2022-0147/html

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