All language comes with a historical mix of oppression and sense of community. And its no different for one of South Africa’s national languages, Afrikaans. It’s derived from the Dutch and English that forcibly used their language on indigenous people and slaves. Renowned black consciousness, critical race theory, gender and decoloniality scholar, Professor Rozena Maart contends that Afrikaans is treated with more scorn than English. She was speaking to Radio 786 as Taaldag or Language Day was celebrated earlier this month in Orania. The town is notorious for claiming to be separate from the rest of the country, and based its ethos on “Afrikaner” culture. However, historical research proves that Afrikaans was predominantly spoken as a creole language amongst slaves. But people of colour are slow to reclaim it.