This dissertation seeks to address the multiple ways face or one’s public self-image is attacked, supported and maintained in Athol Fugard’s The Road to Mecca, My Children! My Africa! and Valley Song, and through this discussion demonstrate how the notion of face can make a contribution to the study and understanding of Athol Fugard’s work. In the pursuit of their goals/objectives, interactants perform speech acts which may threaten the face of other participants. The choice of strategies available to participants in the performance of these face-threatening acts (FTAs) includes going on record, off record (indirectly) or avoiding the FTA altogether (saying nothing). Each text offers a fresh perspective from which face can be analysed: rebelliousness against conformism (The Road to Mecca); the perspective of the cross-racial, cross-cultural relationships (My Children! My Africa!); and the context of a closely-knit family relationship (Valley Song). / English Studies / M.A. (Theory of Literature)

The purpose of this study is to explore the nature of socio-cultural rules underlying address behaviour in face-to-face interactions in Xitsonga. In the study, a socio-pragmatic approach is used. This approach is a combination of sociolinguistics and pragmatics. Data are collected using semi-structured interviews from 29 participants in Hlanganani region. Hlanganani is a Xitsonga speech community located in Limpopo Province, South Africa. The participants were selected in terms of five variables, namely their age, gender, marital status, educational status and occupation. Five theories are tested in this study, namely Brown and Gilman’s (1968) theory of power and solidarity, Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory, the theory of accommodation, the theory of universal grammar and the Gricean theory of conversation. The study finds that Hlanganani is an age-set society in that the age of a person is the primary determiner of address choice. The male gene also receives superior status in address behaviour in Xitsonga. It is also found that women are given the same lower status as children. It is observed that women’s statuses reflect their graduation in terms of marriage and the production of children. It is recommended that more studies of a similar kind should be undertaken based on either different speech communities or on a comparative basis of particularly African languages. Such studies will go a long way in describing similarities and differences in both the linguistic and the social structures of different cultures. / African Languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (African Languages)

The purpose of this study is to explore the nature of socio-cultural rules underlying address behaviour in face-to-face interactions in Xitsonga. In the study, a socio-pragmatic approach is used. This approach is a combination of sociolinguistics and pragmatics. Data are collected using semi-structured interviews from 29 participants in Hlanganani region. Hlanganani is a Xitsonga speech community located in Limpopo Province, South Africa. The participants were selected in terms of five variables, namely their age, gender, marital status, educational status and occupation. Five theories are tested in this study, namely Brown and Gilman’s (1968) theory of power and solidarity, Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory, the theory of accommodation, the theory of universal grammar and the Gricean theory of conversation. The study finds that Hlanganani is an age-set society in that the age of a person is the primary determiner of address choice. The male gene also receives superior status in address behaviour in Xitsonga. It is also found that women are given the same lower status as children. It is observed that women’s statuses reflect their graduation in terms of marriage and the production of children. It is recommended that more studies of a similar kind should be undertaken based on either different speech communities or on a comparative basis of particularly African languages. Such studies will go a long way in describing similarities and differences in both the linguistic and the social structures of different cultures. / African Languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (African Languages)