African Language Studies and the NRF SARChI Chair: Intellectualisation of African Languages, Multilingualism and Education

Rhodes University has been awarded a SARChI Research Chair (2013-2018) in the field of Intellectualisation of African Languages, Multilingualism and
Education as part of the South African Chairs Initiative (SARChI). The African
Language Studies Section hosts this prestigious Chair, and Russell H. Kaschula,
Professor of African Languages and Literatures, occupies this Chair. This
initiative is funded by the SA Department of Science Technology (DST) and
National Research Foundation (NRF) to develop and promote research in South
Africa.

The aim of the Chair is to produce high-quality postgraduate students, as well as
strengthen research and scientific output in the identified thematic area of
Intellectualisation of African Languages, Multilingualism and Education.

The following are the Focus areas of the Chair:

• Corpus development in African languages
• African languages and technology
• Literary studies in African languages
• Acquisition of African languages as additional languages
• Techniques, methods and approaches to language policy implementation plan in
       multilingual higher education contexts
• African linguistic studies

The Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) – Humanities and Social Sciences Catalytic Project

The African Language Studies Section was approached to lead the DHET Catalytic Project (2013-2015). The Project’s objective is to offer solutions on how indigenous African languages could be used to inform learning in higher education in the areas of Humanities and Social Sciences. The Project is in collaboration with nine South African universities, and provides us with opportunities to entrench our research on the role of African languages in higher education, and how this can be replicated in other institutions.