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08 September 2022 | Story Rulanzen Martin | Photo Rulanzen Martin
Bartimea school outreach
Annemarie Le Roux and two of the learners from the Bartimea School for the Deaf and Blind.

It was a perfect Spring Day with laughter, cupcakes, and the brightest smiles on excited little faces of learners from the Bartimea School for the Deaf and Blind in front of the Main Building of the Bloemfontein Campus of the University of the Free State (UFS). The UFS Department of Deaf Studies and South African Sign Language hosted the school on 1 September 2022 for a day of learning, fun, and lots of games to kickstart #DeafAwarenessMonth. 

The relationship between the department and the school is stronger than ever, and after a two-year hiatus both staff and learners were basking in the excitement of the day. The school faced closure back in 2016 and it was in this year that the department and the student group Signals started a project to visit the school, which saw them participate in different activities with the learners. “We helped the school with the cleaning up of the school grounds and painting the playgrounds,” said Annemarie Le Roux, South African Sign Language lecturer at the UFS. 

UFS could set blueprint for outreach to Deaf communities 

The department and the UFS are in a unique position to set a blueprint for engaged scholarship with the Bartimea school in Thaba ’Nchu and the Thiboloha School for the Deaf and Blind in Phuthaditjhaba (formerly Qwaqwa). 

The Bartimea outreach is an important project for the department because it not only enables the students to put their teachings into practice but also demonstrates the engaged scholarship mandate of the UFS. Le Roux believes more teachers should be able to use SASL in schools, and the UFS could facilitate such training opportunities. “It would be wonderful if the university and the school could work together in engaged teaching and learning.” She added that leaners at the two schools sometimes do not get all the information they need when applying to universities. 

Le Roux thinks the relationship between Bartimea and the department could enable meaningful action to foster engaged citizenship. “We can help with fundraising, because the school is always in need of funding, as most parents cannot contribute to helping the school.” 

Putting teaching excellence into practice

This engagement with Bartimea allows students to put what they have learned in lecture halls into practice. “Students who attend the visits to the school or the school to the university understand more about the culture, and want to learn more and develop their language skills,” Le Roux said. “Before the COVID-19 pandemic we took our third-year and honours students to the school to give them access to the Deaf community.” Furthermore, the engagement helps students gain a better understanding of Deaf culture and sign language.

Also visit our Deaf Awareness Month webpage for more information.  

 

News Archive

Traffic in translation between French and Afrikaans follows unique direction
2017-11-21

 Description: Traffic in translation between French and Afrikaans  Tags: Traffic in translation between French and Afrikaans

At Prof Naòmi Morgan’s inaugural lecture were, from the left:
Profs Corli Witthuhn, Vice-Rector: Research; Morgan;
Heidi Hudson, Acting Dean of the Faculty of the Humanities;
and Angelique van Niekerk, Head of the Department of Afrikaans
and Dutch, German and French.
Photo: Stephen Collett

Translation is normally done from a so-called weaker language into a mightier one. This is one of the ways, according to author Antjie Krog in her book A Change of Tongue, which is used by a ‘weaker’ language to help it survive.

However, according to Prof Naòmi Morgan, Head of French in the Department of Afrikaans and Dutch, German and French at the University of the Free State (UFS), this is not the case with French, which is the mightier language, and Afrikaans.

Influence of translators on Afrikaans

“The number of translated titles from French into Afrikaans, from ‘great’ into ‘lesser’ language, is far more than the other way round, almost as if the translators wanted to make the Afrikaans-speaking readers literary self-sufficient, but did not feel the same need to extend the Afrikaans literature into other languages.”

This was Prof Morgan’s words on 8 November 2017 during her inaugural lecture entitled, Van Frans na Afrikaans: 100 jaar van byna eenrigting-vertaalverkeer, in the Equitas Auditorium on the Bloemfontein Campus. A PowerPoint presentation, with a symbolic background of the South African and French flags and relevant texts, formed part of her lecture. She also played video clips and pieces of music to complement it.

Among others, she has a doctorate in Modern French Literature from the University of Geneva, and her translations have earned her a French Knighthood and various prizes. She is also well-known for her translations and involvement in dramas such as Oskar en die Pienk Tannie and Monsieur Ibrahim en die blomme van die Koran.

Greater challenges in this direction

In her lecture, she looked at the two-way traffic from French into Afrikaans and from Afrikaans into French.

Three French citizens, Pierre-Marie Finkelstein, Georges Lory, and Donald Moerdijk, have translated from Afrikaans into French. Of course, their background and ties with South Africa also had an influence on their work. “In Moerdijk’s case, translation from Afrikaans, his second language, was a way in which to recall the country he left in his mind’s eye,” she said.

Prof Morgan is one of only two translators who translates works from Afrikaans into French, the other being Catherine du Toit. However, translations in this direction pose greater challenges. She said it involves “not only knowledge of the language, but also knowledge of the French target culture and literature”. In addition, there aren’t any good bilingual dictionaries, and the only Afrikaans-French dictionary is a thin volume by B Strelen and HL Gonin dating from 1950.

Prof Morgan still believes in translation

She believes there is a need to hear foreign languages such as French in the form of music in Afrikaans, and the speaking of a language alone might not be enough to ensure its survival. 

She still believes in translation, and quoted Salman Rushdie’s Imaginary homelands: essays and criticism 1981-1991 in this respect: “The word ‘translation’ comes, etymologically, from the Latin for ‘bearing across’. Having been borne across the world, we are translated men. It is normally supposed that something always gets lost in translation; I cling, obstinately to the notion that something can also be gained.”

Click here for Prof Morgan’s full lecture (only available in Afrikaans).

 

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