The acquistition of Xhosa phonemes

Abstract

Early development has been the focus of considerable research in the past few decades.However, only minimal information has been obtained on the phonological developmentamong the speakers of Southern African indigenous languages, most particularly Xhosa.This study is based on corpus collected from 10 Xhosa-speaking children aged J 2 to 36months, for the period of J2 months, recording their spontaneous vocalisations. Languageand speech acquisition of Xhosa does not seem to follow the patterns of many Indo Europeanlanguages studied. Xhosa possesses a large repertoire of phenomenon, such as clicks, whichare unknown in other languages. The similarities and differences in existing data on otherlanguages and their significance for professions such as Speech-Therapy and Education areidentified and discussed.Die afgelope paar dekades het 'n aansienlike hoeveelheid navorsing die fokus veral op vroeetaalontwikkeling laat val. Baie min inligting is egter ingewin oor die fonologieseontwikkeling van sprekers van die inheemse tale van Suidelike Afrika, veral van Xhosa.Die artikel gee in hooflrekke 'n oorsig oor navorsing wat oor 'n tydperk van J2 maande op10 Xhosasprekende kinders tussen die ouderdomme 12 en 36 maande gedoen is. Diespontane klankuitinge van die kinders is gedurende hierdie tydperk opgeneem. Dievoorlopige bevindinge gee te kenne dat dit nie lyk asof taalverwerwing van uitlatings inXhosa dieselfde patrone volg as baie Indo-Europese tale wat bestudeer is nie. Xhosa het 'nlrye repertoire verskynsels, soos klikgeluide, wat onbekend is in Indo-Europese tale.Hierdie artikel identifiseer en bespreek ooreenkomste en verskille wat tydens hierdienavorsing vasgestel is asook bestaande data oor ander tale. Dit dui ook op die belang vanhierdie navorsing vir professies soos Spraakterapie en die Onderlrys.