ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE IN SOUTH AFRICA. 157 



tlufiices at work here which are tending towards the corruption 

 ■of our EngHsh pronunciation. We have, firstly, the influence of 

 Dutch with its un-English gutturals and vowels. Secondly, we 

 have a verv strong Lowland Scotch element. Thirdly, the English 

 people themselves belong very largely to dialect-speaking families, 

 including a strong Cockney element as well as a strong \\'estern one. 



As regards Dutch, when we remember that the Dutch are in the 

 majorit}- and that they nearly all speak some English it is no- 

 wonder that the infection of mis-]ironunciation of a foreign tongue 

 spreads to the English Colonials. 



The general effect produced is that English is tending to become 

 pronounced as an Englishman pronounces French, i.e., with a 

 certain diffidence, resulting in want of easy gliding from word tO' 

 word. The individual words get unnecessary stress, and the 

 sentence accent is misplaced. 



In reference to the second contaminating inlluence. the Scotch,. 

 I feel that I must make my way carefully lest I offend the suscepti- 

 bilities of my Scotch friends. A}>art from their j)ronunciation of 

 English. I look upon the Scotch Colonists as a most valuable element 

 in our countrj'. In Boswell's Johnson we find Sir Alexander 

 ^lacdonald saying : — 



" I ha\e been correcting several Scotch accents in my friend BosweU. 1 

 'Jouht, sir. if anv Scotchman ever attains to a perfect Enghsh pronunciation." 



Johnson then replies : — 



" Why. sir, few of them do, because they do not persevere after acquiring 

 a certain degree of it. But, sir, there can be no doubt that they may attain 

 to a perfect English pronunciation, if they will. We find how near they come 

 to it ; antl certainh' a man who conquers nineteen parts of the Scottish 

 accent may conquer the twentieth. But, sir. when a man has got the 

 better of nine-tenths he grows weary, he relaxes his diligence ; he finds he 

 has corrected his accent so far as not to be disagreeable, and he no longer 

 desires his friends to tell him when he is wrong, nor does he choose to be- 

 told." 



There is much truth in this, but my own experience is that many 

 of our Scotch teachers do not conquer even the nine-tenths, and 

 as there are so many Scotch teachers in South Africa their influence 

 is very great, and it must affect in time the average of English 

 pronunciation. Now. I admit that we have no absolute standard 

 of correct pronunciation in English : no one speaks with absolute 

 correctness, but I look upon Scotch pronunciation as quite as 

 wrong as that of my own Mother Tongue, the dialect of the borders 

 of Lancashire and Cheshire. 



■To remedy this danger of Dutch and Scotch barbarising English 

 pronunciation, I should like to see a greater study of phonetics in 

 our Training Colleges and to see the Inspectors paying more atten- 

 tion to correct pronunciation in the schools. We can do nothing 

 with the old-established teachers, but much can be done at the 

 Training Colleges. Some years ago. I am glad to say, the Scotch 

 Education Department, in the face of much opposition, introduced 

 Phonetics into the curriculum of the Training Colleges. 



In the schools there should be practice in the speaking of col- 

 loquial English as well as in the reading of books aloud, for. ^s 

 Coleridge says, " reading ought to differ from talking " as regards 



