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International Mother Language Day Celebration 2021

23 March 2021 | Story Mbali Moiketsi

The Office for International Affairs recently celebrated International Language Day. This year, we invited all faculties to submit the names of people who would be willing to contribute video clips to educate us about their mother tongue. The videos submitted were from diverse academic staff members and postdoctoral fellows currently based in different parts of the world. Extensive research has created this edutainment video, featuring famous language quotes, indigenous languages across the African continent, and business languages used across the African continent. Some of the indigenous languages on the African continent are fading away, caused by colonial influence.

Fun facts:
From 1994 to 2013, South Africa was in the Guinness Book of World Records for most official languages. These are Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Sepedi, Sesotho, Swati, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa, and Zulu.

Since the adoption of the 2013 Constitution, Zimbabwe now holds this title with 16 official languages, namely Chewa, Chibarwe, English, Kalanga, Koisan, Nambya, Ndau, Ndebele, Shangani, Shona, Sign Language, Sotho, Tonga, Tswana, Venda, and Xhosa. Zimbabwe therefore now holds the Guinness World Record for the country with the largest number of official languages.

Albeit the main languages in Zimbabwe are English, Shona and Ndebele, the minor languages are Chewa, Chibarwe, Kalanga, Koisan, Kunda, Lozi, Manyika, Nambya, Ndau, Nsenga, Tsonga-Shangani, Sotho, Tjwao, Tonga, Tswa, Tswana, Venda, and Xhosa.

WATCH: International Mother Language video

News Archive

Bram Fischer Memorial Lecture – Reflections of a historical icon

2015-04-28

The Annual Bram Fischer Memorial Lecture was held at the Bloemfontein Campus on 22 April, 2015 hosted by the Faculty of Law in collaboration with the Mangaung Metropolitan Municipality.

The theme of this year’s lecture was “Pillars of The Constitution”. In his keynote address, the Executive Mayor of Mangaung, Cllr Thabo Manyoni described the exemplary life of Bram Fischer and the incredible sacrifice he made for the emancipation of the people of South Africa by his opposition to a system of injustice.

He further described the character of Bram Fischer as one of outstanding leadership that was close to the hearts of the people: “Bram Fischer sincerely believed in the foundation laid in Jefferson’s “all men are born equal”. This idea was later articulated in the Freedom Charter’s preamble “that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white, and that no government can justly claim authority unless it is based on the will of all the people”, he said.

The lecture was attended by the university community, members of the public, and the Fischer family. This was one in a series of lectures held in Bloemfontein throughout the memorial week. Some of the speakers include; Prof Jonathan Jansen, Vice-Chancellor and Rector, Prof Caroline Nicholson, Dean of the Faculty of Law, Prof Neels Swanepoel, who introduced the Department of Public Law, and Lindokuhle Ntuli, who introduced the recently re-opened Student Court.

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