Browsing by Author "Dowling,Tessa"

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    Isixhosa interpretations of the Nongqawuse saga: oral narratives and theatrical performances of the Nongqawuse story
    (2019) Yani, Sikhumbuzo; Dowling,Tessa; Motinyane, Mantoa
    The subject of this thesis is centred on the creative and linguistic interpretations (in English and isiXhosa) of the Nongqawuse prophecy and the cattle-killing of 1856-1857. By examining a range of historical, cultural and anthropological sources, the study foregrounds traditional African theatre elements as well as language as being important to a fresh understanding and appreciation of the Nongqawuse story. Using textual analysis as a methodological choice, the study analyses H.I.E Dhlomo’s The Girl Who Killed to Save, Xolani Mkonko’s Nongqawuse: a dissertation of true lies and Brett Bailey’s The Prophet to locate the linguistic construct of the plays as well as their theatrical and performative aesthetics. The study adopts the Afrocentric theory in order to interrogate the texts within a decolonial context and locates the Nongqawuse prophecy and the eventual cattle killing as a narrative that communicates the traditional, cultural, historical and spiritual universe that defines amaXhosa of South Africa. While taking as its subject an event from more than 150 years ago, and literary debates from shortly after, my study has been able to contribute robustly to wider conversations that relate to the Nongqawuse prophecy and cattle killing and how the history is reshaped by African voices in terms of language and performance tradition. Added to this, the study contributes to the field of African languages by critiquing how these dramatic works, which focus on Nongqawuse’s prophecy, creatively and refreshingly are inspired by Xhosa genres of orature and storytelling, set within a period of great upheaval due to missionary and colonial influences.
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    Towards the Development of an IsiXhosa Adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory for Toddlers
    (2018) Whitelaw, Emma; Dowling,Tessa; Ribbens-Klein,Yolandi
    In this thesis, I draw on experiences of the isiXhosa segment of the pre-pilot research phase and first rural, toddler pilot for the adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) into Southern African languages. 1 The adaptation stems from the growing dissatisfaction regarding the dearth of speech and language assessments and therapeutic tools currently available in South Africa for isiXhosa or other local languages (Pascoe and Smouse, 2012; Demuth, 2007). Such tools are of fundamental importance since failure to accurately diagnose communication difficulties hinders appropriate intervention. If improperly addressed, communication difficulties can hamper the essential development of literacy skills and academic success (see Shonkoff and Phillips, 2000). Reliable research on child language acquisition is thus critically needed in order to inform culturally and linguistically appropriate assessments that can lead to accurate diagnosis and treatment of communication disorders, and ultimately improve children’s early childhood development trajectories. Data from the pre-pilot and pilot study informs discussions about monolingual isiXhosa-speaking toddlers’ lexical and grammatical acquisition. I furthermore discuss the need for the adaptation of such inventories to local circumstances, and I problematise the assumption that Western linguistic constructs, ontologies, and epistemologies are appropriate for the CDI exercise as applied to Bantu languages. The findings of this study furthermore contribute to existing scholarship on how children acquire words and morphemes. Findings as such will be of use to clinicians and speech pathologists, especially in informing vital language and communication rehabilitation in early childhood development. I additionally hope that the results presented will inform cross-linguistic scholarship on child language acquisition, paving the way for future research as well as the creation of bi- and multilingual CDIs.