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Speakers of German and Afrikaans have been interacting with one another in Southern Africa for over three hundred and fifty years. In this study, the linguistic results of this intra-Germanic contact are addressed and divided into two sections: 1) the influence of German (both Low and High German) on Cape Dutch/Afrikaans in the years 1652-1810; and 2) the influence of Afrikaans on Namibian German in the years 1840-present. The focus here has been on the lexicon, since lexemes are the first items to be borrowed in contact situations, though other grammatical borrowings come under scrutiny as well.The guiding principle of this line of inquiry is how the cognitive phenonemon of Herbartian apperception, or, Peircean abduction, has driven the bulk of the borrowings between the languages. Apperception is, simply put, the act of identifying a new perception as analogous to a previously existing one. The following central example to this dissertation will serve to illustrate this. When Dutch, Low German, and Malay speakers were all in contact in Capetown in the 1600 and 1700s, there were three mostly homophonous and synonymous words they were using. The Dutch knew banjer 'very', the Low Germans knew banni(g) 'very, tremendous, extraordinary', and the Malays knew banja(k) 'many, a lot, often, very'. All of these words can be considered the source for the modern Afrikaans hybrid word baie 'many, much, often, very', based on earlier banja or banje. These two forms are very close in sound and meaning to banjer, banni(g), and banja(k), and consequently when, for example, a Malay speaker heard a Low German say banni(g), he apperceived it as Malay banja(k). Likewise when a Low German speaker heard the Dutch word banjer, he apperceived it is as banni(g), and so on with all potential interlocutors. The ultimate form of the word is a compromise hybrid between them all, namely banje, which was motivated by the ease with which these three source words were apperceived by the respective speakers, as well as by their semantic similarity, which was also easily apperceived. Bearing in mind the workings of apperception, Cape Dutch/Afrikaans and Namibian German are perfect case studies for intra-Germanic linguistic contact. Parallel developments, whether arrived at independently or by shared genesis, will reinforce one another when brought into contact, a situation which must have played itself out all throughout the history of contact between Germanic languages. Whether it was Burgundian influence on Franconian, Old Frisian on Old English, Danish on Faroese, or Dutch on East Frisian, the role of apperception must have been great in these cases of linguistic contact, whether we can show it or not, as is the problem with Langobardic, Vandalic, Burgundian and, to a lesser extent, Franconian. In the case of German and Afrikaans in Southern Africa, the well-documented archival and printed texts put the linguist in a favorable position to examine and elucidate the nature of this linguistic contact, as one will note in the study at hand.

The degree to which the SABC (South African Broadcasting Corporation) as public broadcaster gives shape to its language policy and language mandate, against the background of an investigation of language rights, establishes the central problem statement of this research.It is widely acknowledged that it is difficult to define the concept of language rights. Although the language-sociological literature associates this concept with minority and cultural rights, it can also be seen as individual rights. According to the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, it is clear that language rights should be seen as individual rights that can be exercised within a particular community. Although this dissertation provides an extensive juridical and language sociological explanation of the concept of language rights, the description by Judge Albie Sachs will be used as a working definition for this research. His division between the following four fundamental language rights, viz.: (i) the right to use your language; (ii) the right to develop your language; (iii) the right to be understood and to understand other languages as well as (iv) the right not to be discriminated against because of your language, provides a useful investigation instrument with which the degree to which the SABC-TV acknowledges and protects language rights can be measured.It is found that despite the policy documents on national and corporate level that has equal consideration and treatment of the diverse South African languages in mind, it still happens that the SABC-TV fails to give form to the language rights of individuals that belong to indigenous minority language groups in South Africa. Due to this, the research suggests that the extensive implementation of subtitles, as a form of screen translation that differs from lip synchronised dubbing, can make a significant contribution to the acknowledgement and protection of language rights by the SABC-TV.In addition to a discussion on what subtitles entail, the technical nature and specific parameters thereof, a feasibility study is included within which the affordability of this project for the SABC-TV is indicated. It is found that this form of screen translation is ideal for the South African situation because it is cheaper than both lip synchronised dubbing and the creation of new television programmes, but also because it can effectively be employed in regional broadcasts. Furthermore, the use of bilingual subtitles and pivot subtitles are also alternatives that may be considered. It is essential though that subtitles can indeed contribute to the way in which the SABC, as a public broadcaster, acknowledges and protects the fundamental language rights of the multitude of South Africans that belong to different language communities in South Africa. (Written in Afrikaans)