The aim of this research is to give a literary accountable description of the development of the short story in Sepedi. In order to achieve this, the descriptive as well as the expository and comparative method are used, while the short story is seen as a unit consisting of a content layer, a structural layer and a stylistic layer. With these three layers as focus points in the research, the researcher is not to include the socio-cultural circumstance in which the work has its origin, as final criterium in his research. Firstly, the modus operandi of English and American researchers in their descriptions of the history and development of their literatures is reviewed (or traced). The division here into development periods, is based to a large extent on pragmatic grounds, although literary merit was considered too. In the case of the literature in Sepedi, Mokgokong, Serudu and Groenewald separately gave an overview of the history of this literature and divided it into development periods (or periods of development). They, however, do not indicate the grounds (basics) on which these periods are based. The historical and socio-cultural circumstances of the Bapedi are taken into consideration, but how they lead to a literary accountable division, is not indicated. A short overview of the history of the short story in Sepedi is given as introduction to this study. Thereafter the development of the short story in Sepedi is divided into three phases, namely: (a) The moralizing or didactical phase. (b) The experimental phase. (c) The phase of growth. In the first period the works of Ramaila, who is a skilled writer, dominate. He was a teacher and a man of the church, and was moved by the fate of his people when the Western lifestyle in the process of urbanization left them without anchors in life. The stories from this period therefore have a strong moralising and didactical flavour (tendency) which detracts from the merit of the work. Works from the second period place less emphasis on the clash between the traditional and Western philosophies of life. The stories are mostly constructed untidily, the characterization is one-sided and unconvincing, while the conclusions are not motivated satisfactorily. The short stories from the third period portray a reconciliation between the traditional and Western lifestyles. This phase includes short stories which are structurally and stylistically rounded. The detective stories, for example, have highly complex structures which lead to surprising solutions to the story problems, while an ironic situation in life is described with the greatest ease and skills especially in the stories of (N.S) Nkadimeng and Mpepele. The chief merit of these works lie in the characterization and building of atmosphere. In the final or summarising chapter there is reflection on the importance of Ramaila as short story writer, while the possibilities of the short story in Sepedi in the future are touched upon. / Thesis (DLitt (African Languages))--University of Pretoria, 2000. / African Languages / unrestricted

Thesis (DLitt (African Languages))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007. / Definiteness is generally viewed as a morpho-syntactic category. It is grammatically marked by articles in languages such as English, but not all languages have a formal grammatical encoding for this category. The nominal preprefix (NPP) in languages such as Dzamba is not an equivalent to the English article system; however, it displays a close association with definiteness. Northern Sotho is non-articled, and it does not possess the NPP in its grammatical system. As a grammatical category, definiteness is the grammaticalisation of a pragmatic category of identifiability, which is present in all languages. Identifiability, as a means of referent tracing, plays a vital role in communication. The main aim of this study is to investigate how the phenomenon of definiteness manifests itself in Northern Sotho. The introductory chapter describes the purpose and aim of the study, its theoretical approach and methodology, as well as its organisation. The second chapter presents an overview of the previous major works on definiteness. It begins with the literature on the category in general, and moves on to the literature on definiteness in African Languages. These previous studies agree on the central issues of this category. The speaker utters a definite noun phrase (NP) if he presupposes that the addressee will be in a position to locate and to identify the referent of the NP uniquely or inclusively. Chapter 3 examines noun phrases that are regarded as definite in Northern Sotho; and the factors that contribute to such a reading. Pragmatic factors, i.e. existential presupposition, transparent contexts and anaphoric reference make major contributions to the interpretation of a noun phrase as definite. Nominal determiners and quantifiers whose semantic content suggests locatability, uniqueness and/or inclusiveness give a noun phrase definite reference. Such determiners and quantifiers include the demonstrative, possessive with locative gona/ntshe, the universal quantifier, etc. Proper names and pronouns have unique reference. Chapter 4 investigates indefinite noun phrases in Northern Sotho. Bare noun phrases in this language such as mang (who), lefeela (nothing) and aretse (unknown thing/place) are incompatible with definiteness. Their semantic content suggests that their referent cannot or should not be uniquely identified. Nominal modifiers such as -ngwe (another/different/ a certain), -fe (who/which) and šele (another/different/strange) are also incompatible with unique identifiabilty and they, therefore, accord a noun phrase indefinite reference. Nouns with generic interpretation and nouns in idioms do not uniquely refer to particular individuals. Chapter 5 looks into the ambiguity of bare noun phrases in Northern Sotho. It examines such a phrase in the subject position, the object position and the complement position of prepositional phrases. Nominal modifiers such as the adjective, the relative and the possessive are incorporated into noun phrases to see how they affect the reading. The question of subject inversion (SI) is also investigated. Lastly opaque contexts are discussed, and the ambiguity created by opacity-creating operators is examined. The final chapter of the study presents the main findings.

Thesis (M. A. (African Languages)) -- University of Limpopo, 2004 / Refer to document

M.Ed. (Curriculum Studies) / It would appear that the task of the school in a multi cultural society is becoming more complex. It is not only expected of the school to educate the children of the society in totality towards the accepted particular adulthood, but the task of the school is also to provide for the current needs of society, and to anticipate possible problems of the future. In the context of human relations an African Language was introduced into White Schools on a regional basis in an attempt to bring about better understanding among the population groups. This was also done in order to provide the White child with the opportunity to communicate with the Black in his own language. After considering the current subject - curricula for Sepedi (Spoken Language) and the related teaching practice, the conclusion was made that the subject does'nt succeed in accomplishing its aims. No evidence could be found of an thorough situation - analysis in which the nature of society, the nature of the learner and the subjectcontent have been considered. Some deficiencies in the curriculum resulted from this. An evaluation of the subject curricula showed that one of the most important shortcomings seemed to be that the curriculum was'nt planned and designed to accepted curriculum principles. A further shortcoming was that no attention was given to the linguistic - phenomenon of pragmatic interference, which implies that the child, while learning Sepedi (Spoken Language) should not only learn the language, but also gain experience in the culture, rules of discourse, behaviour, norms and values underlying the target language...

M.A. (African Languages) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

The study was aimed at establishing in a scientific way the extent to which Sepedi is able to fulfill its role as one of the official languages in South Africa. The primary research question was whether Sepedi could function as a medium of communication in all the higher domains of life. The research question was addressed by firstly making a study of the language clauses and the language stipulations of the South African Constitution. The second step was to situate the research within the theoretical paradigm of language development and language planning and to take cognizance of both international and local perspectives in this field. In order to plan the way forward it was necessary to determine the exact position of Sepedi as far as the adequacy of its lexicon was concerned. As a result of the fact that there are very few written sources in Sepedi regarding some of the high function domains it was decided to compile a corpus of South African English high function words to form the basis for determining the lexical capacity of Sepedi in higher function domains. The procedure for building a corpus was determined by studying the methodology and praxis of three well-known international corpora of English. Following the same basic strategies as the compilers of these corpora an English High Function Corpus was compiled. By making use of standard techniques in computational lexicography frequencies and spreading were determined, and keywords were studied in context. In order to establish whether Sepedi does indeed have translation equivalents for the English high function words, and has the lexical capacity to act as a fully-fledged official language, the most appropriate sources to be used as diagnostic instruments were found to be the existing bilingual English-Sepedi dictionaries. The treatment of lexical items in the English-Sepedi bilingual dictionaries led to the conclusion that only 8 of the English high function words were not entered in any of the three dictionaries studied. The investigation also provided valuable insight into the quality and comprehensiveness of these dictionaries and indicated that they are in dire need of revision. Language planners and lexicographers of Sepedi are advised to make use of the heuristic and diagnostic tools available in modem-day metalexicography, but also to make sure that all lexicographical work reflects the linguistic reality within the speech community. / Thesis (DLitt (African Languages))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / African Languages / unrestricted

M.A. (African Languages) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

Thesis (M.A. (Northern Sotho)) -- University of the North, 1977 / Refer to the document

Thesis (M.A. (African Languages)) -- University of the North, 1988 / Refer to the document

M.A. (African Languages) / Please refer to full text to view abstract