Influence of an African Language on European place names in Zimbabwe: is it language corruption, language development or resistance?

Abstract

The main focus of the paper is on the English place names in the southern parts of Zimbabwe that have been transformed or modeled along the phonological, morphological and semantic patterns of the Ndebele language. Most English place names have followed the levels of linguistic analysis of Ndebele which happens to be the dominant language in the Matabeleland region and is accorded an official language status alongside Shona. The paper scrutinizes the term creation strategies in transforming these place names from English to Ndebele from the linguistic and social perspective. Emphasis is put on whether there is a relationship between some social aspects and term creation. As the paper develops the discussions revolves around the following key questions: • Why are the English names modeled along the linguistic patterns of the Ndebele language? • What yardsticks are used in coming up with the resultant name? • Which term creation strategies are used in coming up with the resultant names and what are the implications of such strategies? • What sort of controversies result in such kind of creation of the place names? • Are there any effects on the referents when considering the names that were there prior to the European ones? After the above questions have been answered the paper will then conclude by showing the interplay between socio-cultural, socio-political, socio-economic, socio-linguistic, socio-historic and term creation.