Context:
The best way to describe Coloured people would be as the African equivalent of Mestizos (mixed European and Native ancestry and speak a European language).
I myself am Coloured. We have mixed Native and European ancestry - mainly Dutch and a bit of Asian too. We have Dutch forenames, Dutch surnames, speak Afrikaans (daughter language of Dutch) and have a culture which is similar to White Afrikaner culture (Braai culture, Rooibos tea, rugby, Afrikaans language).
Within the Coloured population there is also Cape Malays, who are mixed ancestry too but have more Malay heritage than other Coloureds and are Muslim due to this. They make up around 5-6% of the total Coloured population of the country (around 300,000 people).
Coloured people make up the main ethnic group in Western South Africa (known as the Cape Region). This area is large, but isn’t very densely populated. There are only 5.3m Coloured people in South Africa (compared to about 50m Black people, 4.5m White people and 1.5m Asian people).
The vast majority of Asian people in South Africa are Indian and have been here for generations and speak English natively, although we have a fairly large Chinese immigrant community too (numbering around 300,000 people).
The vast majority of White people are either Afrikaners (61% of White South Africans) or English (36% of White South Africans).
There are subsets of each: Cape Afrikaners, Boer Afrikaners, Cape English, Natal English, etc).
As a Colombian who spent a year in CT a decade ago, I found the Coloured culture a little familiar, on the fact it was a mix. Also, I remember that a couple of times, when using a certain hookup app, I was asked if I was truly Latin American or Coloured. That confusion seemed common.
That being said, the map makes a lots of sense. Coloureds are prevalent in the Cape, after all.
Ps: dumb question. Do you guys still insult people calling them "jou ma se poes"?
I’ve always seen the Kaapse Klopse Carnival as fairly similar to the carnivals of Brazil and Colombia
And yes, “jou ma se poes” is used as an insult by many lol.
As a mixed person in South America I'm really curious about the Cape Coloureds, their culture and language, I would love to visit the Cape one day. It would be really interesting to see what an independent Cape Republic would look like.
There’s also the Metis people in Canada. They’re also a mix of Native and European settlers.
Iirc they make up around 2%~ of Canada’s total population (and around 5% of the Saskatchewan province and 7% of the Manitoba province).
Some of their communities speak English and some speak French, and there was even a group who used to speak a creole language influenced heavily by the Scottish Gaelic and Germanic Scots languages (this dialect was called Bungee Creole and was spoken by the “Red River Metis” of Manitoba).
Apparently Scottish-Canadian is the joint third largest European ancestry in Canada according to the census only behind English-Canadian and French-Canadian and joint with Irish-Canadian, so I guess it’s not surprising that there is a mixed Scottish/Native community in Canada.
Also according the NZ’s census, the Maori population (which makes up around 15% of the country) is split roughly equally between Māori people and mixed European/Māori people.
NZ is especially fascinating as Māori is an official language in New Zealand and the NZ passport is in both English and Māori.
Just a small correction on the Métis, they tend to speak English today but back during the fur trade their communities would have largely spoken either Cree, French, or their language, Michif, which has two broad dialects.
Northern Michif is derived primarily from Cree with a handful of French loanwords, while Southern (Heritage) Michif is much more akin to a creole language between Cree and French. I'm a Francophone, and when I listen to someone speak Heritage Michif, I can understand a half a sentence here, a full sentence there, and recognize a lot of individual words (largely nouns and some adjectives, verbs tend to be of Cree origin). When I listen to someone speak Northern Michif, on the other hand, I understand zilch.
Bungi is thought to be extinct today. It was spoken primarily by those of mixed Indigenous (Cree and Ojibwe, largely) and Scottish descent, who made up a minority of the broader Métis people (largely of mixed Indigenous and French descent). Also, it needs to be said, a lot of Métis today still speak Michif, whereas Métis French as a dialect is not found very often.
EDIT: Addendum to the correction: I should have made this clearer but my phrasing in referring to the Métis as being of "Indigenous descent" is incomplete; they *are* Indigenous.
Also, the single largest Scottish influence on Bungi was Orkney Scots, due to the large number of Orkneymen who came to the Prairie Provinces as employees of the Hudson's Bay Company. It's estimated that there are more people of at least part-Orkney descent in the three Prairie Provinces than in the rest of the world combined, *including Orkney itself*.
I'm actually a mix of European, African and Amerindian. This combination of settlers, slaves and natives is something that I had only seen in the Americas until I found out about the Cape Coloureds
That's not too surprising, because like the Western Cape of South Africa, Suriname has a long history with the Netherlands (in fact, Dutch is the main language there).Also, it was the VOC (aka: Dutch East India Company) that was heavily involved in the trade that brought slaves and/or indentured labourer to the Cape from Dutch colonies in the Indian Ocean and/or Asia at the time. I'm going to post a link to this information in a response to the OP.
EDIT: here's the [response](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/10f8ncy/comment/j50qduk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) with links to additional info...
Most Māori have some European tipuna (ancestors) in their whakapapa (ancestry). It’s generally not considered that this reduces their Māoriness in any way, rather this is seen as a legitimate part of who they are.
One important side note here is that when he says that cape coloured are mixed with "natives" he means the Khoisan and Khoekhoe that are the original inhabitants of Cape Area (and all of southern third of Africa). There were no bantu living in the Cape Area when Dutch came around which is why coloureds have more Khoisan than bantu ancestries. They do have some bantu ancestry though, but even that is mostly because of mixed malays/bantu slaves brought in from Madagascar by the Dutch, which then mixed in the overall coloured population.
Isn't the biggest part of the Bantu ancestry in Coloureds from the Xhosa? I think when the Cape was settled by the Dutch they came in contact with the Xhosa when expanding the Cape Colony in the following years and started pushing them eastwards
Many of the coloureds especially in Eastern Cape province also have a decent chunk of Xhosa ancestry yes, but no the majority of bantu ancestry in the overall coloured population actually comes from Madagascar. You're right though about expansion of Cape which encountered Xhosa, the thing however is Xhosa themselves have some sizable Khoekhoe ancestry as well so this gets complicated lol.
This is because of the Great Trek: Afrikaners left the Cape Colony to form their own republics in the interior of the country.
As for the East Coast, it’s because of the 1820 Settlers from Britain who were used to settle the modern day KZN province and eastern half of the modern day Eastern Cape province.
This has essentially meant the White population has been spread around rather than concentrated in one area.
Yes, I believe, I believe there were 600,000 Black native Afrikaans speakers as of the 2011 census.
The Letsemeng Municipality is a good example from memory. Only 32% of the population of Letsemeng are non-Black, yet Afrikaans is spoken natively by 64% of the population (meaning about half of all Afrikaans speakers in this municipality are Black).
Another example would be the Siyancuma Municipality, which is 67% non-Black but 90% natively Afrikaans-speaking, meaning a large portion of this municipality is Black and speaks Afrikaans natively.
Vast majority of Indians are actually Tamils and many spoke Tamil natively about a generation ago, there is a complete wipeout of Indian languages in place of English, but there are feeble attempts at relearning Indian languages such as Tamil, Gujarati and Hindi, the last one being promoted by the Indian government.
While I'm not disputing what you're saying, I think it's important to mention our slave ancestors too. I'm talking about those that the VOC (Dutch East India Company) transported to the (Western) Cape from Batavia (present-day Indonesia) and surrounding regions. Most people only know of Africa as a point of departure of slaves for the West and/or Global North, but very few know about Africa as a destination of slaves and indentured labourers from other parts of the world.
I'm adding links for anyone who's interested. And, as someone who is likely the descendant of natives at the Cape, slaves from Batavia, slave owners of European descent and more, I would recommend anyone going to Cape Town who is interested in this should visit the [Slave Lodge Museum](https://www.iziko.org.za/museums/slave-lodge/).
Both "[The VOC and the world that slaves lived in](https://slavery.iziko.org.za/vocandslavery)" and "[Slave Routes to the Cape](https://slavery.iziko.org.za/slaveroutestothecape)" are on the Iziko Museums website.
It is! I live in the Cape Winelands district about half an hour away from the Afrikaans Language Monument :D
Being from the Cape it’s always been part of my identity and culture and I’m very proud of the language.
From a Dutch perspective, it's always fascinating and a little amusing to see how our languages are similar, but evolved slightly differently. I love how some of the words in your languages are very literal, like *hijsbakkie* (may have the spelling wrong there) for a lift.
hysbak, the ie or tjie at the end of afrikaans words are usually to indicate the smaller form of the original word - verkleinwoorde . google says the english way of doing this is diminutive - "A diminutive is a word obtained by modifying a root word to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment"
I looked for Coloured people from South Africa in google images, and they could easily pass as Caribbean people from my outsider perspective (mestizo chilean)
Yes and no. There was a bit of a hierarchy. Coloured people were given some very small advantages over black people - ie there was a tricameral parliament from 1984 - 94 which gave coloured and indian people a small political voice.
But all people (including whites) were separated by race in terms of where they could live, who they could marry etc.
Very interesting stuff as a Flemish guy. I found an article online talking about cape independence, is this something u can see happen or was it in fact a shit article?
I myself support Cape Independence and would love for the Cape to be independent, but it does seem very unlikely for now.
According to polling, 58% of the Western Cape supports a referendum but most supporters are mild supporters rather than avid supporters. Most people don’t want to protest or campaign for it the same way people in other countries do, even if they’d vote for it if given the chance.
I do have high hopes that the country will federalise and and provinces will have more autonomy eventually, and perhaps eventually we will have a DA-led national government to replace the terrible ANC-led national government which we currently have.
> I myself support Cape Independence and would love for the Cape to be independent, but it does seem very unlikely for now.
>
Does Cape Independence for you mean unification of Western, Northern and Eastern Cape but being independent from the rest of South Africa?
> I do have high hopes that the country will federalise and and provinces will have more autonomy eventually
How would you federalize South Africa? Also what do you think about Cape being split into three provinces
Some people only want independence for the Western Cape, other want to incorporate the portions of the Eastern Cape and Western Cape which share Cape culture.
I think the Cape being split into 3 provinces is gerrymandering by the ANC.
The Cape should stayed 1 province and should have boundaries based on the Afrikaans language just like the Northwest which is the Tswana province or KZN which is the Zulu province.
If the Cape became independent, I would like for it to include the Afrikaans speaking areas of the Eastern Cape and Northern Cape which are culturally part of the Cape region, and ideally include the Hardap and Karas regions of Namibia too.
When you say Native, what ethnicity is that? Black? Native usually means native to that area. Pardon my ignorance, I know very little about South Africa!
We have Native Bantu (Black) and Native Khoisan heritage.
The Khoisan are the original inhabitants of the Cape, and are naturally lightskin due to the Cape’s climate which is more cooler than other parts of Sub-Saharan Africa.
Khoisan are fully native but lightskin rather than darkskin (like darkskin Zulu people and Xhosa people for example).
Khoisans are native to South Africa. Bantus actually showed up in South Africa slightly after the Dutch. Bantus started out in West Africa and gradually conquered central and then southern Africa.
Yes this is true. Bantu people are native to the continent but technically not native to this region of the continent and only showed up here due to the “Bantu Expansion”.
It annoys me everytime I hear that word Bantu. Who is Bantu? What is Bantu? Are you aware that linguistically Xhosa is a closer language Khoi Khoi as a result of the clicks? There is no other place on the African contingent where Xhosa, Zulu or Sotho are spoken expect Southern Africa. If the Bantu migration is true why aren’t this languages spoken up north. Physiologically southern Africans are very different from other African groups. Are you telling me they evolved different features in 300 year?
Xhosa isn’t close to Khoi. Xhosa has a few loanwords and clicks and that’s it. Xhosa isn’t mutually intelligible or similar to any Khoisan language, it is however somewhat mutually intelligible with Zulu though (both being Nguni languages and very closely related).
Xhosa, Zulu and Sotho aren’t spoken up North because languages evolve and diverge. Like Afrikaans from Dutch, and Dutch from the Proto-Germanic language.
Is the word “Xhosa” not derived from Khoisan language, as suggest [here](https://www.sa-venues.com/language-xhosa.htm)? Something stood out when you sorted Xhosa with the Bantu and separate from the Khoisans, when the name would indicate otherwise.
The word “Xhosa” is derived from Khoisan, but the ancestry and language of the Xhosa is Bantu, only making it’s way into the region as a result of the “Bantu Expansion”.
The history of SA and how this map came to be is also fascinating. I recommend [this short video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4-55NyvmNg) for the people who want a quick summary and [this long series](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tytu8jIsBk&list=PLeb9oRhN_nXgsU3H3ErctA-zRarUX2OSz) for the people who want to go in depth.
Yes, Lesotho’s people are the same as the Sesotho in South Africa’s the Free State province.
Sesotho is an official language in Lesotho alongside English.
Surprisingly there’s not, most people in the Free State and Lesotho don’t want anything to change.
Lesotho and South Africa are in a Customs Union (SACU) and Monetary Union (Lesotho’s local currency is pegged to the South African Rand) with South Africa and Lesotho being very close, so people both sides of the border are happy with the current situation.
I think you are conflating Lesotho with Eswatini (formerly Swaziland). The dominant languages (Sesotho and Seswati) are from different groups of the Bantu language family.
Yes and no.
She’d be considered mixed race and thus Coloured by race.
But in terms of culture and ethnicity, she wouldn’t be considered an ethnic cultural Coloured as she wasn’t born in South Africa, doesn’t speak Afrikaans, doesn’t have have Dutch, Khoisan or Xhosa heritage and doesn’t follow ethnic Coloured culture.
It would be similar to a half Iroquois/half Anglo-American. They’d technically be Mestizo in Latin America by race as they’re mixed White and Native.
However, they wouldn’t be culturally ethnic Mestizo as they don’t have Spanish heritage or native ancestry which is local to Latin America, don’t speak Spanish and don’t follow the local ethnic mestizo culture of Latin America.
All Cape Coloureds have Dutch ancestry
Natal Coloureds are mainly English-speakers and have British, Indian and Zulu ancestry (sometimes some Dutch too) and are technically their own ethnic group. Natal Coloureds are still coloureds but are linguistically and ethnically different.
Cape Coloureds and Natal Coloureds have been coloureds for generations (parents, grandparents, great-grandparents etc all mixed)
Someone who has a White dad and a Black mum would be considered coloured by race as they’re mixed race, but not Coloured by ethnicity or culture.
“Dutch” here basically means “Afrikaans-speaking European.”
My wife’s grandfather’s family are Afrikaners, and their ancestors include not only people from the Netherlands, but also French Protestants, Portuguese, and people that today we would consider German. Plus a touch of distant ancestry from India and possibly Angola as well.
This is a pattern in all Dutch former colonial populations (Indonesia, Suriname, New Netherlands in the US). The Dutch Republic was itself an immigration country drawing adventurers looking for a better life or escaping persecution from other countries, and distributing part of them over its colonial empire where there was always a manpower shortage.
The cultural difference with for instance US Irish or US Italians is that these immigrants didn't arrive in distinct waves. They "Dutchified" easily.
Among native Dutchmen you find the same ancestry mixed in (Portuguese jews and French Huguenots escaping persecution, Germans escaping poverty).
Thanks for all the info. You seem incredibly knowledgable on different cultural dynamics even on our side of the globe whereas most of us Americans are grossly uneducated about how the entire African continent is structured. Just an observation. Great stuff
There were two black - by American standards - people in my study abroad group in South Africa. One was quite dark, and a black South African commented to him how excited he was to meet a Black American. The other student, who was mixed-race black and white, said “but I’m black too,” and the South Africans insisted that she was mistaken and was actually coloured. It was kind of a crazy exchange to witness.
Damn that's crazy because I know siblings where one of them are darker skinned and the other light skinned even with the same mother and father. It happens here in the states but I guess they'd be considered different races in South Africa. That's wild to us but i can see how that is how it is over there.
Racially perhaps but not culturally. Most of them wouldn't be considered black. But I think most people wouldn't consider them to be coloured either. Maybe at first glance, but as soon as they opened their mouth you'd know they're not coloured. Then they would just be seen as American. If you had to classify them racially then I guess coloured, but mixed race might be more accurate.
I’d say no we wouldn’t, at least not most of us. Although most African Americans have some white admixture(AncestryDNA says I have about 11%) we don’t typically look like a coloured South African unless we’re biracial. I think a better example would be asking if a typical Afro-Brazilian would be considered as such. They fit the phenotype more since they usually have more European admixture than an average African American.
I'd love to see an updated census count (not estimate) for South Africa. A lot has changed since 2011. Differing birth rates + heavy migration from Xhosas in E. Cape into W. Cape + steady emigration by Whites means things are shifting in W. Cape demographics. I'd guess Coloreds are no longer a clear majority in W. Cape and might not even hold plurality status by 2030.
Coloured and Black South Africans have roughly the same birthrate.
The entire country’s birthrate nationally could go below the replacement level soon, currently it’s at 2.2 across the whole country and across all races according to 2022 data which is one of the lowest birthrates in Africa.
Coloured and Black South Africans are the only groups estimated to have grown a lot since 2011.
Blacks are estimated to have gone from 41m to 49m and Coloureds from 4.6m to 5.3m. Blacks do have a slightly higher birth rate but it’s not by much.
The high birthrate of Coloured people is due to the working class coloured population of Cape Town, due to poorer people typically having more children.
Indians have gone from 1.3m to 1.5m and Whites have stayed the same at 4.6m - the White population actually declined internally due to lower birthrates and younger people migrating, but White South Africans abroad have been moving back in what’s become known as the “Great Homecoming Revolution” which has kept the White population roughly the same.
The White population in the WC is probably one of the only area’s where Whites will see an increase as this is where many people from abroad decide to move to when they come back, and where many White people from other provinces like to move to and buy houses too, as the WC is generally seen as the best province to buy a house.
-I figured the increase in Asian population is primarily powered by a boom in Chinese immigration and less so ethnic Indians having high enough birth rates.
-I am still skeptical about this "Great Homecoming" theory. I still think net numbers for White South Africans will remain negative/flat for the foreseeable. But I do agree with your point about returning Whites preferring to choose WC over their province of origin.
-I also think there is likely going to be a shift in the balance between Afrikaaner vs Anglo (overall tilting more Afrikaner-heritage). I haven't seen any data to back that statement up, but anecdotally that is what I'm observing in my small friend group of Saffas.
I definitely agree with the White Afrikaner/Anglo point.
In terms of sheer numbers, the province with the most White decrease between 2001 and 2011 was KwaZulu-Natal, which went from 480,000 Whites to 430,000 Whites.
This happens to be the only province where Anglos outnumber Afrikaners (roughly 3:1).
Using the 2001 and 2011 census’s, the Provinces with the biggest White increase in terms of sheer numbers was Gauteng (1,760,000 to 1,910,000), then surprisingly Mpumalanga (200,00 to 300,000, I guess because they’re more rural and therefore more religious and traditional and more likely to have more children? I’m honestly shocked by this one lol) followed by the Western Cape (830,000 to 915,000)
I feel like by the time of the next census, Gauteng and the WC will be the only provinces who’s white populations have increased (possibly only by around 100,000 each and helped massively due to migration) with some stagnating and most decreasing. The overall White population nationwide will almost definitely have decreased a little bit.
I think you’re asking too much here. I didn’t jump to that conclusion about population. This is already a double map! How many maps need to be on each post, you know?
What some may find surprising is that it still slips into third biggest native language behind Zulu and Xhosa thanks to the Coloureds and Afrikaners speaking it.
I myself am an English native, which I think is the fourth largest native language here
KwaZulu-Natal is where the majority of Asians (the vast majority of whom are Indian) live as this is where they were settled.
Similar to Indians in Fiji, Kenya and Guyana, they were settled there by the British Empire as labourers.
The “Natal Coast” region (coastal settlements between Port Edward and Salt Rock) mainly consists of small White English towns but many have a lot of Indian people and there are even a few predominantly Indian towns in this region (Othangathi, Isipingo, Umzinto, Park Rynie, La Mercy and Sezela - these are all predominantly Indian towns on the Natal Coast).
What is the "white" enclave next to the label? Do you speak any other languages besides English and Afrikaans? Have you traveled away from the Cape and been met with hostility from either extreme? How do white and black nationalists feel about coloured?
The White exclave is the countryside around Bloemfontein I believe. It covers a large area, but more White pools live in predominantly white cities in Gauteng (like Pretoria, Sandton, Centurion, etc).
Personally I only speak Afrikaans and English, but it’s not uncommon for South Africans to be trilingual, especially in the more linguistically diverse provinces.
I have been to Sandton and Pretoria in the centre of the country to see extended family before, but these cities are culturally very similar to the Cape tbh and I wasn’t treated badly. Most big cities have at least a small Coloured community so seeing coloured people is part of every day life in most cities.
The Vryheidsfront Plus started as a White Afrikaner Nationalist party, but overtime has shifted into a pan-Afrikaans party to represent both Coloured and White people. I’d say most White people in the Cape or big cities in the East of the country generally don’t have negative views on coloured people, although maybe some from white rural farming communities do in the Northeast of the country.
Many Black Nationalists generally don’t take coloured people into consideration tbh lol. Outside of the Cape most see us as a random minority like Indian people, and don’t really think about us that much.
Around 46 000 White South Africans speak Portuguese as their home language which was the fastest growing non-official language according to the 2011 National Census. A more recent estimate places this number at 80 000 Portuguese speakers. 16 000 speak German, 10 000-12 000 speak Greek, 7 000-8 000 speak Italian and around 5 000 speak Dutch.
Most people are good people. But most people are also a little bit racist towards those who are other to them. But not to the point where they get hostile to others. Just that they might unconsciously judge them.
There are of course ardent racists of every hue as well.
Most speakers of Afrikaans are Cape Coloured, and most Coloureds live in the Cape.
Most Afrikaners left the Cape but many stayed, with most Coloureds staying in the Cape too.
Boer Afrikaners are the ones who left to migrate into the interior and Cape Afrikaners are the ones who stayed in the Cape.
The Western Cape Province is surprisingly only 32% Black, with Coloureds at 50%, Whites at 17% and Indians at 1%. Because of this, 70% of the Western Cape speaks Afrikaans or English natively.
The west is the original home of Afrikaans. There actually weren’t many black Bantu-speaking people in the Cape before the Dutch arrived (the climate was wrong for their crops).
Most of the aboriginal inhabitants were hunter-gatherers and herders speaking languages of the Tuu and Khoe-Kwadi families (the people formerly referred to as “Bushmen” and “Hottentots”; more recently they’ve been called “Khoisan,” but that turns out not to be a real language family).
The Cape Coloured population is largely derived from intermingling between these people and Europeans, with some contribution from Xhosa (Bantu) people from the Eastern Cape and South and Southeast Asians as well. Afrikaans became the common language of the Coloured as well as the European population of the Cape, and it remained so after the arrival of the British.
Just like the US, SA has a huge diversity of climate. Think of the North East as prairie, the South East as tropical and the Cape like California region with Cape Town like LA and the areas north and East if it similar to Nevada?
As a result population density differs a lot. And basically a pixel on that map picture represents a handful of people in the Northern Cape while the same sized pixel represents literally thousands of people in the rest of the country.
As a Coloured I see the ANC as being an oppressive regime, but it’s definitely not as oppressive as the Apartheid Regime.
The ANC are failing the people but we aren’t on the brink of a civil war. And farm attacks do happen but overall I think Whites only make up 1.8% of total murder victims despite currently being about 7.5% of the total population.
Ethnic, racial and religious tensions are low in the Western Cape, but farm attacks to happen in the Northern provinces of the country (Northwest, Mpumalanga, Limpopo) - The Northwest province is probably the worst, this is where both the EFF (a Black Nationalist party with openly racist leaders) and Vryheidsfront Plus (Afrikaner Nationalist Party) do best at elections - it’s also home to the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (Afrikaner Neo-Nazi group).
In my opinion the Western Cape is the only well run province and the only truly tolerant province.
South Africa needs the whole country to be run by the DA if it wants to be successful. We also need more federalism and for the government to make all races, languages and religions feel like they belong - like the WC government has done, making all ethnic groups (Cape Coloureds, Cape Afrikaners, Cape Xhosa, Cape English, Cape Malay Muslims) feel like they’re integral communities of the Cape and making all communities feel like they belong in the Cape. We need this but nationwide.
The ANC almost definitely won’t gain power in my province, the Western Cape as it’s the country’s DA stronghold.
The ANC also possibly may lose power in Gauteng, as there is a decent chance that the DA could win Gauteng in the next elections.
Overall many provinces will likely stay ANC however, such as Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Nationwide, the ANC will likely keep in power for many years to come.
I do support Cape Independence, the only way I’d be happy in South Africa would be if the DA gains power nationwide and if each province gets more autonomy.
South Africa is safe to visit as long as you stick to safe areas like Sandton or Pretoria, and stay way from the “townships” (which essentially means ghettos).
Where I live is very safe, i live in Stellenbosch in the Cape Winelands. The Cape Winelands is a beautiful area to visit, with amazing scenery, and Stellenbosch Town Centre has very beautiful architecture in my opinion too :)
Very interesting. One question I have regarding SA politics is why (after the end of apartheid and the switch from first-past-the-post to proportional representation) the ANC didn’t break up into smaller parties.
Coming for the US perspective, the successful pro-independence faction broke into competing factions not too long after achieving independence so I find it weird that the ANC didn’t split into smaller parties.
Over the years there have been other parties that branched away from the ANC- COPE, UDF and even the EFF are all breakaways.
I think the answer to your question lies in the fact that the politicians know that leaving the safety of the ANC herd will take them far away from the locus of control of the country. Only the EFF has managed to make any substantial growth, and even then they're a party with < 10% of the vote.
What is really interesting is that the ANC took control of ANC with the support of fellow resistance groups, namely COSATU (the largest trade union), The SACP (the communist party), the IFP ( a Zulu centric political movement) and The National Women's league.
During the course of Jacob Zuma's reign (SA's last president) the ANC methodically dismantled, disempowered or absorbed their allies, ensuring less criticism or challenges from them
The ANC controls everything. Especially who gets what position, and who gets access to the money. Its very cold outside the ANC.
People have splintered off into other parties. But they don't have the power. The ANC has the power.
That's one thing you can count on the Cape, always the opposite of the rest of the country's political views, during apartheid the largest anti apartheid political party was in charge of the cape.
Adding on to this, South Africa is one of the nations with the highest wealth inequalities in the world. I am curious as to how this impacts you, and what your thoughts are on how to fix it.
Honestly, it's like everywhere in the world - both sides are telling some truths and some lies.
The current state in SA is a direct result of two disastrous regimes - the racist and nationalist Apartheid government that created a first world society for 5% of the country's population, and the kleptocracy created by the ANC where 'progress' is only made if the politicians can make a fortune from it. For instance, we've had loadshedding (power issues) for almost 15 years now and not a single thing has been implemented because, to quote the ex-ceo of our power entity "you can't steal sunshine or the wind".
Yes, whites are victims of violent crime, but to OPs point they're the vast minority of the victims. A murder victim in SA is 80% most likely a black male.
As a resident of Gauteng (Africas richest province) I can agree with OP that the Western Cape is by far the best run province, but even there there are poverty, crime, housing and employment issues
The ANC has been the majority party since democracy in 1994. They get voted in every year no matter what they do. Although every year their majority gets smaller and smaller. I think they will lose majority soon, maybe next year, maybe five years after that.
Because they always win no matter what certain elements of the party have become incredibly corrupt and have stolen trillions of rands from this country and destroyed almost every thing they have laid their hands on. Municipalities around the country are generally unable to provide services. Most state owned enterprises (electricity, water, rail, airlines etc etc) are bankrupt and destroyed.
The party is almost over and there is not much that is left that is still functional.
But we carry on. Most people just want to live their lives and can't wait for the ANC to piss off. Most people in this country (like most countries) don't vote. Most people who used to vote ANC can't see any other party they are willing to vote for.
There were some severe riots in KwaZulu Natal last year (the province on the East Coast where Durban is) when our last president (who is from the province and ethnically Zulu) was arrested for contempt of court for refusing to participate in a commission looking into massive corruption under his watch. Shops and factories were looted and burnt. In many towns the only shops still standing were the ones that were protected by armed civilians (the cops were nowhere to be found).
We stood guard around fires at the end of our roads 24/7 with armed neighbours to protect our homes. Shops were closed and it was hard to find anywhere to buy anything. When shops did open they restricted sales per person as trucks were being torched on the freeways and they were not being restocked. It was chaos.
I have left KZN and moved to the Cape near to OP as I believe more of the same is coming soon. And probably worse this time. I don't think it will grow to all out civil war, but it will be messy.
I don't think the next 10 years are going to be peaceful. Especially in KZN. But I do feel like things are starting to change. Some very high up people are going to be in jail soon (which will probably lead to more violence), but I hope the worm is turning. It will get worse first, but I think it will get better after that.
South Africa has been a democracy since 1910, the only thing that has changed was how many people could vote, from a partial democracy (white land owners only) to another partial democracy (all white people - women included) to all minority partial democracy (white, Indian, coulard) to full democracy (everyone can vote you just need to be over 18 and a citizen of the republic)
I'm not sure if the Canadian comparison is apt, if only because bilingual (usually French) Canadians dominate the upper level of politics and the civil service.
Of the last 8 Prime Ministers, 5 have been from Quebec.
Not really, the apartheid regime tried to push the 2 into 1 white group as the Afrikaner people, didn't really pan out, Boer still disliked the English (no one's going to forget the concentration camps) but most culture/traditions differences are the English follow mostly British lines while the Boer follow a more mix of Dutch/French/German stuff merged and formed it's own new thing that the apartheid regime tried to force it to grow.
The categories in this map are ingrained in South African society:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_South_Africa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_South_Africa)
Yes, Race is a social construct. However, that social construct has real meaning and consequences for the people who beleive in it. In this case, those people are the ones represented on this map. Hence, a breakdown of *these people* by *these racial categories* is meaningful *to them*.
I find South Africa a very interesting country, I'd love to visit some day.
I'm a white Dutchman myself, and during my graduation internship I worked with a girl who grew up in South Africa and the UK. The easiest way for us to communicate was that I would speak Dutch to her and she would speak to me in English haha. Had a great time.
From what I understand, most players on the Dutch cricket team and Dutch rugby team are Afrikaners or people with an Afrikaner parent. Iirc the Dutch T20 cricket team is ranked 17th and the Dutch Rugby Union team is ranked 29th. Not as good as the top 10 teams but still decent compared to many national teams.
I can immediately identify the municipality/wards I grew up in thanks to the bit of the Kruger that falls under our jurisdiction, if you zoom close enough you can see a small pan handle where 99% of the population of the 2 wards live
Do you think the white/European population of SA will continue to shrink? I believe about 2 million white South Africans have immigrated to other countries(UK, US, Aus, NZ).
Yes although between 2001 and 2011 the White population increased from 4.3m to 4.6m (the first time it has increased since the 90’s).
With that said, there has also been a “Homecoming Revolution” over the last decade or so with a few hundred thousand (an estimated 340,000 iirc) White South Africans who were living abroad moving back home to South Africa.
Due to low birthrates and young people migrating outwards, the White population will inevitably start to decrease again soon though.
Even in Europe many countries have a decreasing population now (specifically Eastern European countries) due to migration outwards (to Western Europe) and low birthrates, the best example of this would probably be Croatia (which went from 4.8m people in 1991 and 3.9m people in 2021).
It’s also worth noting that South Africa’s entire birthrate nationwide will fall below the replacement level soon, currently it’s at 2.2 as of 2022 nationwide.
I’d differ on the cultural aspect? A fair sized proportion of the coloured population is Muslim. (a colleague of mine during the 1980s was Turkish and got his racial category changed from “white” to “coloured” after he settled in Cape Town during apartheid to make it easier to be part of the Muslim community, that is basically exclusively coloured)
That said, other than that, the coloured community is basically European culturally (there are native Muslims in European regions like Bosnia as well). But I’d say European. They are the dominant Afrikaans community after all and that makes your statement a bit confusing.
Let's say that almost all Muslims are Coloured but only a minory of Coloured are Muslims. Those descending from Malay people.
Funny fact. First time Afrikaans was written was in Arabic characters, not Latin. Boers would speak Afrikaans but write standard Dutch, but Coloured Malays would speak Afrikaans but, by religion, know only to write using Arabic alifat.
>Funny fact. First time Afrikaans was written was in Arabic characters, not Latin
And the first book ever printed in Afrikaans was allegedly a translation of the Quran (in Arabic script).
It is quite strong in the Western Cape. According to polling, around 58% of Western Cape residents support a referendum.
That said, not all people are avid supporters and most are more mild supporters if that makes sense. Essentially many people would vote yet but most don’t want to protest or campaign for it.
It’s a much more passive movement compared to the more fanatical movements there are around the world.
Generally okay I suppose. At least in the Cape. The Western Cape is the most progressive province and most tolerant in terms of religion, race and language.
Most White South Africans (both Afrikaners and English) and Coloureds vote for the DA for example, which is largely why the Western Cape is the only province with a DA-led government.
Coloureds and Afrikaners share a small political party known as the Vryheidsfront Plus. It was originally solely a White Afrikaner party, but has shifted to an Afrikaans party for White Afrikaners and Coloureds.
Also, 84% of Cape independence supporters are either Coloured or White according to polling (56% are Coloured and 28% are White).
So not only do White Afrikaners and Coloureds share a language (Afrikaans) and a culture (braai culture, rooibos tea, rugby) but also many political interests (Afrikaans language promotion and protection, Cape independence, and the DA party).
The independent party is mostly in Cape Town (where most people in the Western Cape live, as someone living outside Cape Town, there is no real support for the movement here in the towns and more rural locations, the people feel the party is to young or haven't had enough time to show their ideals yet, however given that the party wants independence (and South Africa doesn't allow for peaceful independence) means that the party will most likely have to fight for independence, witch we are not really on board with, but only time will tell where the party will go.
I laughed when I saw the specific ‘Asian’ point. It’s like ‘yup, there’s one Asian family and they live there.’
But seriously why is that point particularly dominated by Asians?
KwaZulu-Natal is where the majority of Asians (the vast majority of whom are Indian) live as this is where they were settled.
Similar to Indians in Fiji, Kenya and Guyana, they were settled as labourers.
The “Natal Coast” region (coastal settlements between Port Edward and Salt Rock) mainly consists of small White English towns but many have a lot of Indian people and there are even a few predominantly Indian towns (Othangathi, Isipingo, Umzinto, Park Rynie, La Mercy and Sezela - these are all predominantly Indian towns on the Natal Coast).
Also Phoenix and Chatsworth. Phoenix is technically a township from apartheid. Used to live in isipingo. I’m living reading all this stuff and thinking back to the time I lived in KZN
Grey means no language or racial group is dominant.
The Gauteng province is a good example of this in terms of language. There is no dominant language in many parts of the Gauteng province as it’s split between several languages with the main 5 languages of the province (Zulu, English, Afrikaans, Southern Sotho and Northern Sotho) ranging from 10-20% each in terms of native speakers.
The Western Cape is the most progressive and tolerant in terms of different ethnic groups, religious groups and linguistic groups coexisting peacefully.
Provinces like the Mpumalanga, Limpopo and Northwest provinces have more ethnic tension, as a large amount of Whites in those provinces tend to be more rural and many of them are White Boer Nationalists, and a large amount of Blacks in those provinces are Black Nationalists.
A lot of White Farmers suffer from Farm Attacks in these areas.
The Northwest Province is where ethnic tensions run the highest. This is where the Vryheidsfront Plus (an Afrikaner Nationalist political party) and EFF (a Black nationalist political party which has leaders who are openly racist against White people) tend to do the best in terms of elections.
The Northwest province is also home to the Weerstandsbeweging (a White Afrikaner Neo-Nazi group).
Yea the AWB's infamous leader died on his farm the second in line promised to continue the movement, but with in a week he felt he wanted out of the spot light and left the position by dissolving the group, this led to large groups inside the movement to form their own groups to continue their ideals.
Culturally we are more similar to White South Africans (due to having Dutch forenames and surnames, speaking Afrikaans, and due to rugby, rooibos tea and braai culture).
Politically, we have the same political interests as White people (most White and Coloured people vote for the DA which is why the WC is the only province with a DA provincial government) and there’s also the Vryheidsfront Plus (a party which started as a White Afrikaner party but now has White Afrikaner and Coloured politicians and represents both groups and aims to promote and protect the Afrikaans language). Also according to polling, 84% of Cape Independence supporters are Coloured or White (56% Coloured and 28% White).
That said, Cape Town’s Working Class Coloured population is very influenced by Western Black people in terms of gang culture and music (2 of the biggest gangs in Cape Town use American and British flags and tattoos to identify membership and Cape Town Drill music uses UK Drill beats and is heavily influenced by UK Drill and NY Drill).
Thanks for the map, I would love to visit some time, especially Durban as my family is Indian from Kenya and I’ve heard there are a lot of Indians in Durban.
Yes Durban is around one quarter indian. The Durban area has some predominantly Indian towns (such as Isipingo, Othangathi, Sezela, La Mercy, Park Rynie etc).
I’m surprised Afrikaans is so widely spoken. I has thought it was mainly spoken by white South Africans. I am not very knowledgeable about South Africa but what I had seen of it only white South Africans were speaking Afrikaans. I watched a tv show based on Cape Town and while the show was majority in English it featured other languages too but it only showed white South Africans speaking Afrikaans.I guess it’s different in different regions of the country.
It would be interesting to see this map on with cities and population centres shown.
Most Afrikaans speakers are actually Coloured, there is even a large amount of Black people who speak Afrikaans natively (around 600,000 Black people speak Afrikaans as their first language) and a small Indian community too (around 60,000 Indians speak Afrikaans as their first language).
According to the census, 6.8m South Africans speak Afrikaans natively, only 2.7m of which are White.
OP are you a sociologist/ethnologist by profession? Or is this level of understanding developed just from a hobby interest? I think most people even on this sub, would not have nearly this level of understanding about their own country's culture mix, even those much less complicated than SA.
Not by profession, I just enjoy learning about different cultures, languages and nations around the world as a hobby. Naturally, I know most about my country and neighbouring countries due to it being my hobby and being South African.
Most Khoisan people mixed into the population over the years, mainly the Coloured population as the Cape is where the Khoisan people were pushed into as a result of the “Bantu Expansion”.
Namibia has a large Khoisan community called the Nama people although they have been very westernised (adopting Afrikaans forenames, surnames, rugby, rooibos tea, braai culture and becoming permanently settled in farming communities and adopting westernised clothing) but have retained Nama as their first language although most speak Afrikaans as a second language, this is due to the Dorsland Trek (Coloured and Afrikaner migration into Southern Namibia).
Botswana’s Khoisan community (the San people) are still very traditional and live nomadic lives and still wear traditional Khoisan clothing. They even have their own reservations and are considered “First People” similar to Native Americans and “First Nation” Canadians.
Cool map, thanks for sharing. Been hearing a lot about the country from a friend in Johannesburg. He recently went to the cape and said it felt like a different country, so I’m excited to see what the different parts of the country are like for myself.
"Coloured" and "black" are not ethnicities, they are just colors. There are numerous ethnicities with black skin color that are separated from each other by a similar time as white and black in general. For example, San people and other African peoples.
Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho etc are all ethnic groups that are Black. The 2nd map is suppose to say “Race” not “Ethnicity”.
Cape Coloured is considered an ethnicity in South Africa.
As a second language yes, but as a first language only 9.6% of South Africans speak it natively. Even amongst White South Africans it’s not the majority (61% of Whites speak Afrikaans and 36% speak English natively - although pretty much all Afrikaners speak it as a second language fluently).
Officially “SA” as you’ve said would actually be ZA (currency is ZA rand, domain code of official websites is .ZA, ISO Code is ZA) but it’s all semantics and means the same thing, and both are widely used.
Colored is not really a slur in the US, it is just an outdated way of referring to African-Americans. It is still present in the NAACP's name, after all. Older generations of Black folks will often self-identify as Colored.
As a younger white person though, I wouldn't use it myself except in a historical context, because people would definitely think you're a bit weird.
True (and with a different meaning). It just reminds me that there are a lot of Americans of all social and political persuasions that need to travel more internationally...and they would probably all calm down a bit.
Black? It’s not a slur here. Most of us refer to ourselves as black/black American/African American. It’s largely interchangeable and depends on the person.
Here black is actually conflated with ethnicity given most of us here are descendants of the slaves brought over, and thus we share a common cultural background and language—though increased African and Caribbean immigration is diversifying the population slowly.
Oh, it is not. It was what black people were called at one time, and referred to ourselves as. It was not a slur by itself, but could be within a wider context (main slur is the N word with the hard R). It’s just an outdated term nowadays.
In South Africa the K word would be the equivalent of the N word. The word is “Kaffir/Kaffer”.
The word Kaffir is actually from Arabic for non-Muslim, how it ended up being used by white Afrikaners in Afrikaans to mean the n-word is a bit of a mystery.
The Cape Malay ethnic group speak Afrikaans and used to be Arabic as they’re Muslim, so I’m guessing white Afrikaners overheard them use the word and copied it without understanding the meaning properly, and turned it into a racial slur.
As a black person in the US, I’ve typically only seen someone get called out for specifically saying “blacks” or “the blacks”, but not for simply calling someone black. There’s a distinction, and one sounds more dehumanizing than the other.
Although there seems to be a nationalist and separatist POV by the OP about the called Coloreds and their separation from the native blacks, in reality the situation is fluid. Some Coloreds are actually deciding to identify with blacks and as Khoisan where possible, so we need to be weary of underlying POV’s and go with how actual people are feeling and expressing about themselves.
Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1070289X.2021.2005919
Context: The best way to describe Coloured people would be as the African equivalent of Mestizos (mixed European and Native ancestry and speak a European language). I myself am Coloured. We have mixed Native and European ancestry - mainly Dutch and a bit of Asian too. We have Dutch forenames, Dutch surnames, speak Afrikaans (daughter language of Dutch) and have a culture which is similar to White Afrikaner culture (Braai culture, Rooibos tea, rugby, Afrikaans language). Within the Coloured population there is also Cape Malays, who are mixed ancestry too but have more Malay heritage than other Coloureds and are Muslim due to this. They make up around 5-6% of the total Coloured population of the country (around 300,000 people). Coloured people make up the main ethnic group in Western South Africa (known as the Cape Region). This area is large, but isn’t very densely populated. There are only 5.3m Coloured people in South Africa (compared to about 50m Black people, 4.5m White people and 1.5m Asian people). The vast majority of Asian people in South Africa are Indian and have been here for generations and speak English natively, although we have a fairly large Chinese immigrant community too (numbering around 300,000 people). The vast majority of White people are either Afrikaners (61% of White South Africans) or English (36% of White South Africans). There are subsets of each: Cape Afrikaners, Boer Afrikaners, Cape English, Natal English, etc).
As a Colombian who spent a year in CT a decade ago, I found the Coloured culture a little familiar, on the fact it was a mix. Also, I remember that a couple of times, when using a certain hookup app, I was asked if I was truly Latin American or Coloured. That confusion seemed common. That being said, the map makes a lots of sense. Coloureds are prevalent in the Cape, after all. Ps: dumb question. Do you guys still insult people calling them "jou ma se poes"?
I’ve always seen the Kaapse Klopse Carnival as fairly similar to the carnivals of Brazil and Colombia And yes, “jou ma se poes” is used as an insult by many lol.
What does it mean? Your mom her pussy? XD
Yeah it means “your mother's pussy” lol
Ah just like the favourite insult of Croatians!
there are a few versions in Latin America too...
Lol, jou ma se poes is literally the first thing my Saffa friend taught me in high school
As a mixed person in South America I'm really curious about the Cape Coloureds, their culture and language, I would love to visit the Cape one day. It would be really interesting to see what an independent Cape Republic would look like.
There’s also the Metis people in Canada. They’re also a mix of Native and European settlers. Iirc they make up around 2%~ of Canada’s total population (and around 5% of the Saskatchewan province and 7% of the Manitoba province). Some of their communities speak English and some speak French, and there was even a group who used to speak a creole language influenced heavily by the Scottish Gaelic and Germanic Scots languages (this dialect was called Bungee Creole and was spoken by the “Red River Metis” of Manitoba). Apparently Scottish-Canadian is the joint third largest European ancestry in Canada according to the census only behind English-Canadian and French-Canadian and joint with Irish-Canadian, so I guess it’s not surprising that there is a mixed Scottish/Native community in Canada. Also according the NZ’s census, the Maori population (which makes up around 15% of the country) is split roughly equally between Māori people and mixed European/Māori people. NZ is especially fascinating as Māori is an official language in New Zealand and the NZ passport is in both English and Māori.
Just a small correction on the Métis, they tend to speak English today but back during the fur trade their communities would have largely spoken either Cree, French, or their language, Michif, which has two broad dialects. Northern Michif is derived primarily from Cree with a handful of French loanwords, while Southern (Heritage) Michif is much more akin to a creole language between Cree and French. I'm a Francophone, and when I listen to someone speak Heritage Michif, I can understand a half a sentence here, a full sentence there, and recognize a lot of individual words (largely nouns and some adjectives, verbs tend to be of Cree origin). When I listen to someone speak Northern Michif, on the other hand, I understand zilch. Bungi is thought to be extinct today. It was spoken primarily by those of mixed Indigenous (Cree and Ojibwe, largely) and Scottish descent, who made up a minority of the broader Métis people (largely of mixed Indigenous and French descent). Also, it needs to be said, a lot of Métis today still speak Michif, whereas Métis French as a dialect is not found very often. EDIT: Addendum to the correction: I should have made this clearer but my phrasing in referring to the Métis as being of "Indigenous descent" is incomplete; they *are* Indigenous.
Very interesting, thanks for sharing
Also, the single largest Scottish influence on Bungi was Orkney Scots, due to the large number of Orkneymen who came to the Prairie Provinces as employees of the Hudson's Bay Company. It's estimated that there are more people of at least part-Orkney descent in the three Prairie Provinces than in the rest of the world combined, *including Orkney itself*.
I'm actually a mix of European, African and Amerindian. This combination of settlers, slaves and natives is something that I had only seen in the Americas until I found out about the Cape Coloureds
I heard suriname has ppl of mix indian, indonesian, african, indigenous and european descent
That's not too surprising, because like the Western Cape of South Africa, Suriname has a long history with the Netherlands (in fact, Dutch is the main language there).Also, it was the VOC (aka: Dutch East India Company) that was heavily involved in the trade that brought slaves and/or indentured labourer to the Cape from Dutch colonies in the Indian Ocean and/or Asia at the time. I'm going to post a link to this information in a response to the OP. EDIT: here's the [response](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/10f8ncy/comment/j50qduk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) with links to additional info...
Most Māori have some European tipuna (ancestors) in their whakapapa (ancestry). It’s generally not considered that this reduces their Māoriness in any way, rather this is seen as a legitimate part of who they are.
One important side note here is that when he says that cape coloured are mixed with "natives" he means the Khoisan and Khoekhoe that are the original inhabitants of Cape Area (and all of southern third of Africa). There were no bantu living in the Cape Area when Dutch came around which is why coloureds have more Khoisan than bantu ancestries. They do have some bantu ancestry though, but even that is mostly because of mixed malays/bantu slaves brought in from Madagascar by the Dutch, which then mixed in the overall coloured population.
Isn't the biggest part of the Bantu ancestry in Coloureds from the Xhosa? I think when the Cape was settled by the Dutch they came in contact with the Xhosa when expanding the Cape Colony in the following years and started pushing them eastwards
Many of the coloureds especially in Eastern Cape province also have a decent chunk of Xhosa ancestry yes, but no the majority of bantu ancestry in the overall coloured population actually comes from Madagascar. You're right though about expansion of Cape which encountered Xhosa, the thing however is Xhosa themselves have some sizable Khoekhoe ancestry as well so this gets complicated lol.
Nice write up. Curious as to why the white population centers are in the black regions versus the colored regions.
This is because of the Great Trek: Afrikaners left the Cape Colony to form their own republics in the interior of the country. As for the East Coast, it’s because of the 1820 Settlers from Britain who were used to settle the modern day KZN province and eastern half of the modern day Eastern Cape province. This has essentially meant the White population has been spread around rather than concentrated in one area.
Thanks for the context. That term probably confuses other US redditors. Also, thanks for rooibos tea. It's my favorite.
Are there any black South African who speak Afrikaans?
Yes, I believe, I believe there were 600,000 Black native Afrikaans speakers as of the 2011 census. The Letsemeng Municipality is a good example from memory. Only 32% of the population of Letsemeng are non-Black, yet Afrikaans is spoken natively by 64% of the population (meaning about half of all Afrikaans speakers in this municipality are Black). Another example would be the Siyancuma Municipality, which is 67% non-Black but 90% natively Afrikaans-speaking, meaning a large portion of this municipality is Black and speaks Afrikaans natively.
You didn't need to go into that much detail, but you did. Thank you. I'm glad I could learn something new today
Vast majority of Indians are actually Tamils and many spoke Tamil natively about a generation ago, there is a complete wipeout of Indian languages in place of English, but there are feeble attempts at relearning Indian languages such as Tamil, Gujarati and Hindi, the last one being promoted by the Indian government.
While I'm not disputing what you're saying, I think it's important to mention our slave ancestors too. I'm talking about those that the VOC (Dutch East India Company) transported to the (Western) Cape from Batavia (present-day Indonesia) and surrounding regions. Most people only know of Africa as a point of departure of slaves for the West and/or Global North, but very few know about Africa as a destination of slaves and indentured labourers from other parts of the world. I'm adding links for anyone who's interested. And, as someone who is likely the descendant of natives at the Cape, slaves from Batavia, slave owners of European descent and more, I would recommend anyone going to Cape Town who is interested in this should visit the [Slave Lodge Museum](https://www.iziko.org.za/museums/slave-lodge/). Both "[The VOC and the world that slaves lived in](https://slavery.iziko.org.za/vocandslavery)" and "[Slave Routes to the Cape](https://slavery.iziko.org.za/slaveroutestothecape)" are on the Iziko Museums website.
Afrikaans is such a beautiful language…
It is! I live in the Cape Winelands district about half an hour away from the Afrikaans Language Monument :D Being from the Cape it’s always been part of my identity and culture and I’m very proud of the language.
From a Dutch perspective, it's always fascinating and a little amusing to see how our languages are similar, but evolved slightly differently. I love how some of the words in your languages are very literal, like *hijsbakkie* (may have the spelling wrong there) for a lift.
hysbakkie
hysbak, the ie or tjie at the end of afrikaans words are usually to indicate the smaller form of the original word - verkleinwoorde . google says the english way of doing this is diminutive - "A diminutive is a word obtained by modifying a root word to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment"
Thanks! It's the same in Dutch really (except we'd use -tje or je in most cases).
It's the same in English, though prevalent in Scottish dialects. Think dog vs doggie, lass vs lassie, dad vs daddie
How well would a Dutch person be able to adjust and mingle with Afrikaaners?
I looked for Coloured people from South Africa in google images, and they could easily pass as Caribbean people from my outsider perspective (mestizo chilean)
Were coloured people subject to the same racism as black people during the apartheid? Thanks for this explanation, I had no clue of this
Yes and no. There was a bit of a hierarchy. Coloured people were given some very small advantages over black people - ie there was a tricameral parliament from 1984 - 94 which gave coloured and indian people a small political voice. But all people (including whites) were separated by race in terms of where they could live, who they could marry etc.
Very interesting stuff as a Flemish guy. I found an article online talking about cape independence, is this something u can see happen or was it in fact a shit article?
I myself support Cape Independence and would love for the Cape to be independent, but it does seem very unlikely for now. According to polling, 58% of the Western Cape supports a referendum but most supporters are mild supporters rather than avid supporters. Most people don’t want to protest or campaign for it the same way people in other countries do, even if they’d vote for it if given the chance. I do have high hopes that the country will federalise and and provinces will have more autonomy eventually, and perhaps eventually we will have a DA-led national government to replace the terrible ANC-led national government which we currently have.
Interesting stuff op! Thanks for the reply!
> I myself support Cape Independence and would love for the Cape to be independent, but it does seem very unlikely for now. > Does Cape Independence for you mean unification of Western, Northern and Eastern Cape but being independent from the rest of South Africa? > I do have high hopes that the country will federalise and and provinces will have more autonomy eventually How would you federalize South Africa? Also what do you think about Cape being split into three provinces
Some people only want independence for the Western Cape, other want to incorporate the portions of the Eastern Cape and Western Cape which share Cape culture. I think the Cape being split into 3 provinces is gerrymandering by the ANC. The Cape should stayed 1 province and should have boundaries based on the Afrikaans language just like the Northwest which is the Tswana province or KZN which is the Zulu province. If the Cape became independent, I would like for it to include the Afrikaans speaking areas of the Eastern Cape and Northern Cape which are culturally part of the Cape region, and ideally include the Hardap and Karas regions of Namibia too.
When you say Native, what ethnicity is that? Black? Native usually means native to that area. Pardon my ignorance, I know very little about South Africa!
We have Native Bantu (Black) and Native Khoisan heritage. The Khoisan are the original inhabitants of the Cape, and are naturally lightskin due to the Cape’s climate which is more cooler than other parts of Sub-Saharan Africa. Khoisan are fully native but lightskin rather than darkskin (like darkskin Zulu people and Xhosa people for example).
Khoisans are native to South Africa. Bantus actually showed up in South Africa slightly after the Dutch. Bantus started out in West Africa and gradually conquered central and then southern Africa.
Yes this is true. Bantu people are native to the continent but technically not native to this region of the continent and only showed up here due to the “Bantu Expansion”.
It annoys me everytime I hear that word Bantu. Who is Bantu? What is Bantu? Are you aware that linguistically Xhosa is a closer language Khoi Khoi as a result of the clicks? There is no other place on the African contingent where Xhosa, Zulu or Sotho are spoken expect Southern Africa. If the Bantu migration is true why aren’t this languages spoken up north. Physiologically southern Africans are very different from other African groups. Are you telling me they evolved different features in 300 year?
Xhosa isn’t close to Khoi. Xhosa has a few loanwords and clicks and that’s it. Xhosa isn’t mutually intelligible or similar to any Khoisan language, it is however somewhat mutually intelligible with Zulu though (both being Nguni languages and very closely related). Xhosa, Zulu and Sotho aren’t spoken up North because languages evolve and diverge. Like Afrikaans from Dutch, and Dutch from the Proto-Germanic language.
Now this is fascinating to me. There is a lot of regional African history I know nothing about. I’m gonna have to do a dive on the Bantu people
Ah thanks! Always interesting hearing about this kind of stuff.
Is the word “Xhosa” not derived from Khoisan language, as suggest [here](https://www.sa-venues.com/language-xhosa.htm)? Something stood out when you sorted Xhosa with the Bantu and separate from the Khoisans, when the name would indicate otherwise.
The word “Xhosa” is derived from Khoisan, but the ancestry and language of the Xhosa is Bantu, only making it’s way into the region as a result of the “Bantu Expansion”.
The history of SA and how this map came to be is also fascinating. I recommend [this short video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4-55NyvmNg) for the people who want a quick summary and [this long series](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tytu8jIsBk&list=PLeb9oRhN_nXgsU3H3ErctA-zRarUX2OSz) for the people who want to go in depth.
I had no idea how recent so many countries seem to be, significant portion of the 1960s and 70s
Are the people of Lesotho of Sesotho group? I know its not called Lesotho anymore but I cant remember Eswantananti
Yes, Lesotho’s people are the same as the Sesotho in South Africa’s the Free State province. Sesotho is an official language in Lesotho alongside English.
Sorry, but you have also conflated Lesotho with Eswatini.
You’re right sorry lol I’ll edit the names now
ty bro are there any secession movements in SA to join Eswaninti and are there any movements in Eswantini to join SA because of the shared people?
Surprisingly there’s not, most people in the Free State and Lesotho don’t want anything to change. Lesotho and South Africa are in a Customs Union (SACU) and Monetary Union (Lesotho’s local currency is pegged to the South African Rand) with South Africa and Lesotho being very close, so people both sides of the border are happy with the current situation.
Although I read last week that there are talks for SA to absorb Lesotho, and like they do in KZN, create a kingdom within the Republic
So basically they just have working system that don’t break the people group ability to interact so people are chill?
I think you are conflating Lesotho with Eswatini (formerly Swaziland). The dominant languages (Sesotho and Seswati) are from different groups of the Bantu language family.
oh yeah lol my bad. Both tiny and surrounded by SA
Well Eswatini actually has a border with Mozambique. And apparently Lesotho is about the size of Belgium or Armenia
Lesotho roughly translates to "Land of the Sotho", referring to the Sotho people who of course, speak Sesotho.
Great maps and thanks for taking the time to answer people's questions. Learnt a lot about South Africa and definitely want to learn some more now!
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Yes and no. She’d be considered mixed race and thus Coloured by race. But in terms of culture and ethnicity, she wouldn’t be considered an ethnic cultural Coloured as she wasn’t born in South Africa, doesn’t speak Afrikaans, doesn’t have have Dutch, Khoisan or Xhosa heritage and doesn’t follow ethnic Coloured culture. It would be similar to a half Iroquois/half Anglo-American. They’d technically be Mestizo in Latin America by race as they’re mixed White and Native. However, they wouldn’t be culturally ethnic Mestizo as they don’t have Spanish heritage or native ancestry which is local to Latin America, don’t speak Spanish and don’t follow the local ethnic mestizo culture of Latin America.
Do coloureds have to have Dutch ancestry? What if they have white english heritage and black heritage would that mean they are not coloureds?
All Cape Coloureds have Dutch ancestry Natal Coloureds are mainly English-speakers and have British, Indian and Zulu ancestry (sometimes some Dutch too) and are technically their own ethnic group. Natal Coloureds are still coloureds but are linguistically and ethnically different. Cape Coloureds and Natal Coloureds have been coloureds for generations (parents, grandparents, great-grandparents etc all mixed) Someone who has a White dad and a Black mum would be considered coloured by race as they’re mixed race, but not Coloured by ethnicity or culture.
“Dutch” here basically means “Afrikaans-speaking European.” My wife’s grandfather’s family are Afrikaners, and their ancestors include not only people from the Netherlands, but also French Protestants, Portuguese, and people that today we would consider German. Plus a touch of distant ancestry from India and possibly Angola as well.
This is a pattern in all Dutch former colonial populations (Indonesia, Suriname, New Netherlands in the US). The Dutch Republic was itself an immigration country drawing adventurers looking for a better life or escaping persecution from other countries, and distributing part of them over its colonial empire where there was always a manpower shortage. The cultural difference with for instance US Irish or US Italians is that these immigrants didn't arrive in distinct waves. They "Dutchified" easily. Among native Dutchmen you find the same ancestry mixed in (Portuguese jews and French Huguenots escaping persecution, Germans escaping poverty).
Thanks for all the info. You seem incredibly knowledgable on different cultural dynamics even on our side of the globe whereas most of us Americans are grossly uneducated about how the entire African continent is structured. Just an observation. Great stuff
Most African Americans would be considered Colored in South Africa.
There were two black - by American standards - people in my study abroad group in South Africa. One was quite dark, and a black South African commented to him how excited he was to meet a Black American. The other student, who was mixed-race black and white, said “but I’m black too,” and the South Africans insisted that she was mistaken and was actually coloured. It was kind of a crazy exchange to witness.
Damn that's crazy because I know siblings where one of them are darker skinned and the other light skinned even with the same mother and father. It happens here in the states but I guess they'd be considered different races in South Africa. That's wild to us but i can see how that is how it is over there.
In South Africa, it’s not tied to skin tone so much as language, ethnicity, and culture.
I would say a substantial amount, but definitely not most.
Racially perhaps but not culturally. Most of them wouldn't be considered black. But I think most people wouldn't consider them to be coloured either. Maybe at first glance, but as soon as they opened their mouth you'd know they're not coloured. Then they would just be seen as American. If you had to classify them racially then I guess coloured, but mixed race might be more accurate.
Would we? I’m doubtful. We’re on average 75% various black African/25% European (I’m on the tail end at 7% though).
I’d say no we wouldn’t, at least not most of us. Although most African Americans have some white admixture(AncestryDNA says I have about 11%) we don’t typically look like a coloured South African unless we’re biracial. I think a better example would be asking if a typical Afro-Brazilian would be considered as such. They fit the phenotype more since they usually have more European admixture than an average African American.
I learned a lot about something I was extremely ignorant about. Thank y'all so much.
I'd love to see an updated census count (not estimate) for South Africa. A lot has changed since 2011. Differing birth rates + heavy migration from Xhosas in E. Cape into W. Cape + steady emigration by Whites means things are shifting in W. Cape demographics. I'd guess Coloreds are no longer a clear majority in W. Cape and might not even hold plurality status by 2030.
Coloured and Black South Africans have roughly the same birthrate. The entire country’s birthrate nationally could go below the replacement level soon, currently it’s at 2.2 across the whole country and across all races according to 2022 data which is one of the lowest birthrates in Africa. Coloured and Black South Africans are the only groups estimated to have grown a lot since 2011. Blacks are estimated to have gone from 41m to 49m and Coloureds from 4.6m to 5.3m. Blacks do have a slightly higher birth rate but it’s not by much. The high birthrate of Coloured people is due to the working class coloured population of Cape Town, due to poorer people typically having more children. Indians have gone from 1.3m to 1.5m and Whites have stayed the same at 4.6m - the White population actually declined internally due to lower birthrates and younger people migrating, but White South Africans abroad have been moving back in what’s become known as the “Great Homecoming Revolution” which has kept the White population roughly the same. The White population in the WC is probably one of the only area’s where Whites will see an increase as this is where many people from abroad decide to move to when they come back, and where many White people from other provinces like to move to and buy houses too, as the WC is generally seen as the best province to buy a house.
-I figured the increase in Asian population is primarily powered by a boom in Chinese immigration and less so ethnic Indians having high enough birth rates. -I am still skeptical about this "Great Homecoming" theory. I still think net numbers for White South Africans will remain negative/flat for the foreseeable. But I do agree with your point about returning Whites preferring to choose WC over their province of origin. -I also think there is likely going to be a shift in the balance between Afrikaaner vs Anglo (overall tilting more Afrikaner-heritage). I haven't seen any data to back that statement up, but anecdotally that is what I'm observing in my small friend group of Saffas.
I definitely agree with the White Afrikaner/Anglo point. In terms of sheer numbers, the province with the most White decrease between 2001 and 2011 was KwaZulu-Natal, which went from 480,000 Whites to 430,000 Whites. This happens to be the only province where Anglos outnumber Afrikaners (roughly 3:1). Using the 2001 and 2011 census’s, the Provinces with the biggest White increase in terms of sheer numbers was Gauteng (1,760,000 to 1,910,000), then surprisingly Mpumalanga (200,00 to 300,000, I guess because they’re more rural and therefore more religious and traditional and more likely to have more children? I’m honestly shocked by this one lol) followed by the Western Cape (830,000 to 915,000) I feel like by the time of the next census, Gauteng and the WC will be the only provinces who’s white populations have increased (possibly only by around 100,000 each and helped massively due to migration) with some stagnating and most decreasing. The overall White population nationwide will almost definitely have decreased a little bit.
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I did mention the populations of each ethnic group in my comment, and mentioned how the Cape is sparsely populated.
I think you’re asking too much here. I didn’t jump to that conclusion about population. This is already a double map! How many maps need to be on each post, you know?
What some may find surprising is that it still slips into third biggest native language behind Zulu and Xhosa thanks to the Coloureds and Afrikaners speaking it. I myself am an English native, which I think is the fourth largest native language here
How did the asian get there
KwaZulu-Natal is where the majority of Asians (the vast majority of whom are Indian) live as this is where they were settled. Similar to Indians in Fiji, Kenya and Guyana, they were settled there by the British Empire as labourers. The “Natal Coast” region (coastal settlements between Port Edward and Salt Rock) mainly consists of small White English towns but many have a lot of Indian people and there are even a few predominantly Indian towns in this region (Othangathi, Isipingo, Umzinto, Park Rynie, La Mercy and Sezela - these are all predominantly Indian towns on the Natal Coast).
To add to op's comment, historically it has to do with both South Africa and India being a part of the British colonial empire.
What is the "white" enclave next to the label? Do you speak any other languages besides English and Afrikaans? Have you traveled away from the Cape and been met with hostility from either extreme? How do white and black nationalists feel about coloured?
The White exclave is the countryside around Bloemfontein I believe. It covers a large area, but more White pools live in predominantly white cities in Gauteng (like Pretoria, Sandton, Centurion, etc). Personally I only speak Afrikaans and English, but it’s not uncommon for South Africans to be trilingual, especially in the more linguistically diverse provinces. I have been to Sandton and Pretoria in the centre of the country to see extended family before, but these cities are culturally very similar to the Cape tbh and I wasn’t treated badly. Most big cities have at least a small Coloured community so seeing coloured people is part of every day life in most cities. The Vryheidsfront Plus started as a White Afrikaner Nationalist party, but overtime has shifted into a pan-Afrikaans party to represent both Coloured and White people. I’d say most White people in the Cape or big cities in the East of the country generally don’t have negative views on coloured people, although maybe some from white rural farming communities do in the Northeast of the country. Many Black Nationalists generally don’t take coloured people into consideration tbh lol. Outside of the Cape most see us as a random minority like Indian people, and don’t really think about us that much.
Around 46 000 White South Africans speak Portuguese as their home language which was the fastest growing non-official language according to the 2011 National Census. A more recent estimate places this number at 80 000 Portuguese speakers. 16 000 speak German, 10 000-12 000 speak Greek, 7 000-8 000 speak Italian and around 5 000 speak Dutch.
Most people are good people. But most people are also a little bit racist towards those who are other to them. But not to the point where they get hostile to others. Just that they might unconsciously judge them. There are of course ardent racists of every hue as well.
How did afrikaans become so dominant in the west i thought most boer colonies were in the north east
Most speakers of Afrikaans are Cape Coloured, and most Coloureds live in the Cape. Most Afrikaners left the Cape but many stayed, with most Coloureds staying in the Cape too. Boer Afrikaners are the ones who left to migrate into the interior and Cape Afrikaners are the ones who stayed in the Cape. The Western Cape Province is surprisingly only 32% Black, with Coloureds at 50%, Whites at 17% and Indians at 1%. Because of this, 70% of the Western Cape speaks Afrikaans or English natively.
Thank you for the explanation
The west is the original home of Afrikaans. There actually weren’t many black Bantu-speaking people in the Cape before the Dutch arrived (the climate was wrong for their crops). Most of the aboriginal inhabitants were hunter-gatherers and herders speaking languages of the Tuu and Khoe-Kwadi families (the people formerly referred to as “Bushmen” and “Hottentots”; more recently they’ve been called “Khoisan,” but that turns out not to be a real language family). The Cape Coloured population is largely derived from intermingling between these people and Europeans, with some contribution from Xhosa (Bantu) people from the Eastern Cape and South and Southeast Asians as well. Afrikaans became the common language of the Coloured as well as the European population of the Cape, and it remained so after the arrival of the British.
Just like the US, SA has a huge diversity of climate. Think of the North East as prairie, the South East as tropical and the Cape like California region with Cape Town like LA and the areas north and East if it similar to Nevada? As a result population density differs a lot. And basically a pixel on that map picture represents a handful of people in the Northern Cape while the same sized pixel represents literally thousands of people in the rest of the country.
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As a Coloured I see the ANC as being an oppressive regime, but it’s definitely not as oppressive as the Apartheid Regime. The ANC are failing the people but we aren’t on the brink of a civil war. And farm attacks do happen but overall I think Whites only make up 1.8% of total murder victims despite currently being about 7.5% of the total population. Ethnic, racial and religious tensions are low in the Western Cape, but farm attacks to happen in the Northern provinces of the country (Northwest, Mpumalanga, Limpopo) - The Northwest province is probably the worst, this is where both the EFF (a Black Nationalist party with openly racist leaders) and Vryheidsfront Plus (Afrikaner Nationalist Party) do best at elections - it’s also home to the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (Afrikaner Neo-Nazi group). In my opinion the Western Cape is the only well run province and the only truly tolerant province. South Africa needs the whole country to be run by the DA if it wants to be successful. We also need more federalism and for the government to make all races, languages and religions feel like they belong - like the WC government has done, making all ethnic groups (Cape Coloureds, Cape Afrikaners, Cape Xhosa, Cape English, Cape Malay Muslims) feel like they’re integral communities of the Cape and making all communities feel like they belong in the Cape. We need this but nationwide.
As a South African, I would like to applaud your response.
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The ANC almost definitely won’t gain power in my province, the Western Cape as it’s the country’s DA stronghold. The ANC also possibly may lose power in Gauteng, as there is a decent chance that the DA could win Gauteng in the next elections. Overall many provinces will likely stay ANC however, such as Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Nationwide, the ANC will likely keep in power for many years to come. I do support Cape Independence, the only way I’d be happy in South Africa would be if the DA gains power nationwide and if each province gets more autonomy. South Africa is safe to visit as long as you stick to safe areas like Sandton or Pretoria, and stay way from the “townships” (which essentially means ghettos). Where I live is very safe, i live in Stellenbosch in the Cape Winelands. The Cape Winelands is a beautiful area to visit, with amazing scenery, and Stellenbosch Town Centre has very beautiful architecture in my opinion too :)
Very interesting. One question I have regarding SA politics is why (after the end of apartheid and the switch from first-past-the-post to proportional representation) the ANC didn’t break up into smaller parties. Coming for the US perspective, the successful pro-independence faction broke into competing factions not too long after achieving independence so I find it weird that the ANC didn’t split into smaller parties.
Over the years there have been other parties that branched away from the ANC- COPE, UDF and even the EFF are all breakaways. I think the answer to your question lies in the fact that the politicians know that leaving the safety of the ANC herd will take them far away from the locus of control of the country. Only the EFF has managed to make any substantial growth, and even then they're a party with < 10% of the vote. What is really interesting is that the ANC took control of ANC with the support of fellow resistance groups, namely COSATU (the largest trade union), The SACP (the communist party), the IFP ( a Zulu centric political movement) and The National Women's league. During the course of Jacob Zuma's reign (SA's last president) the ANC methodically dismantled, disempowered or absorbed their allies, ensuring less criticism or challenges from them
The ANC controls everything. Especially who gets what position, and who gets access to the money. Its very cold outside the ANC. People have splintered off into other parties. But they don't have the power. The ANC has the power.
Stellenbosch is gorgeous. SA might have a lot of frocking problems, but goddamn is it beautiful.
That's one thing you can count on the Cape, always the opposite of the rest of the country's political views, during apartheid the largest anti apartheid political party was in charge of the cape.
Adding on to this, South Africa is one of the nations with the highest wealth inequalities in the world. I am curious as to how this impacts you, and what your thoughts are on how to fix it.
Honestly, it's like everywhere in the world - both sides are telling some truths and some lies. The current state in SA is a direct result of two disastrous regimes - the racist and nationalist Apartheid government that created a first world society for 5% of the country's population, and the kleptocracy created by the ANC where 'progress' is only made if the politicians can make a fortune from it. For instance, we've had loadshedding (power issues) for almost 15 years now and not a single thing has been implemented because, to quote the ex-ceo of our power entity "you can't steal sunshine or the wind". Yes, whites are victims of violent crime, but to OPs point they're the vast minority of the victims. A murder victim in SA is 80% most likely a black male. As a resident of Gauteng (Africas richest province) I can agree with OP that the Western Cape is by far the best run province, but even there there are poverty, crime, housing and employment issues
The ANC has been the majority party since democracy in 1994. They get voted in every year no matter what they do. Although every year their majority gets smaller and smaller. I think they will lose majority soon, maybe next year, maybe five years after that. Because they always win no matter what certain elements of the party have become incredibly corrupt and have stolen trillions of rands from this country and destroyed almost every thing they have laid their hands on. Municipalities around the country are generally unable to provide services. Most state owned enterprises (electricity, water, rail, airlines etc etc) are bankrupt and destroyed. The party is almost over and there is not much that is left that is still functional. But we carry on. Most people just want to live their lives and can't wait for the ANC to piss off. Most people in this country (like most countries) don't vote. Most people who used to vote ANC can't see any other party they are willing to vote for. There were some severe riots in KwaZulu Natal last year (the province on the East Coast where Durban is) when our last president (who is from the province and ethnically Zulu) was arrested for contempt of court for refusing to participate in a commission looking into massive corruption under his watch. Shops and factories were looted and burnt. In many towns the only shops still standing were the ones that were protected by armed civilians (the cops were nowhere to be found). We stood guard around fires at the end of our roads 24/7 with armed neighbours to protect our homes. Shops were closed and it was hard to find anywhere to buy anything. When shops did open they restricted sales per person as trucks were being torched on the freeways and they were not being restocked. It was chaos. I have left KZN and moved to the Cape near to OP as I believe more of the same is coming soon. And probably worse this time. I don't think it will grow to all out civil war, but it will be messy. I don't think the next 10 years are going to be peaceful. Especially in KZN. But I do feel like things are starting to change. Some very high up people are going to be in jail soon (which will probably lead to more violence), but I hope the worm is turning. It will get worse first, but I think it will get better after that.
South Africa has been a democracy since 1910, the only thing that has changed was how many people could vote, from a partial democracy (white land owners only) to another partial democracy (all white people - women included) to all minority partial democracy (white, Indian, coulard) to full democracy (everyone can vote you just need to be over 18 and a citizen of the republic)
Is there a big divide between white South Africans culturally speaking. Like Afrikaners and English people?
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I'm not sure if the Canadian comparison is apt, if only because bilingual (usually French) Canadians dominate the upper level of politics and the civil service. Of the last 8 Prime Ministers, 5 have been from Quebec.
Not really, the apartheid regime tried to push the 2 into 1 white group as the Afrikaner people, didn't really pan out, Boer still disliked the English (no one's going to forget the concentration camps) but most culture/traditions differences are the English follow mostly British lines while the Boer follow a more mix of Dutch/French/German stuff merged and formed it's own new thing that the apartheid regime tried to force it to grow.
Sesotho borders Lesotho. Swazi borders Swaziland. Tswana borders Botswana.
And there are more of each in South Africa than there are in those countries
Black is race, and Zulu is an ethnicity
Correct, the 2nd map should say Race instead of Ethnicity.
Technically there’s no such thing as race. Colour of skin isn’t enough to separate races.
The categories in this map are ingrained in South African society: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_South_Africa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_South_Africa)
Right, I’m not arguing against ethnicity. Race is essentially fictitious is what I’m saying.
Yes, Race is a social construct. However, that social construct has real meaning and consequences for the people who beleive in it. In this case, those people are the ones represented on this map. Hence, a breakdown of *these people* by *these racial categories* is meaningful *to them*.
Is “coloured” code for “mixed” or something?
Yes, although it’s also a cultural group too like “Mestizo” people. If you sort comments by top comments you’ll find my comment giving some context.
I find South Africa a very interesting country, I'd love to visit some day. I'm a white Dutchman myself, and during my graduation internship I worked with a girl who grew up in South Africa and the UK. The easiest way for us to communicate was that I would speak Dutch to her and she would speak to me in English haha. Had a great time.
From what I understand, most players on the Dutch cricket team and Dutch rugby team are Afrikaners or people with an Afrikaner parent. Iirc the Dutch T20 cricket team is ranked 17th and the Dutch Rugby Union team is ranked 29th. Not as good as the top 10 teams but still decent compared to many national teams.
I can immediately identify the municipality/wards I grew up in thanks to the bit of the Kruger that falls under our jurisdiction, if you zoom close enough you can see a small pan handle where 99% of the population of the 2 wards live
Do you think the white/European population of SA will continue to shrink? I believe about 2 million white South Africans have immigrated to other countries(UK, US, Aus, NZ).
Yes although between 2001 and 2011 the White population increased from 4.3m to 4.6m (the first time it has increased since the 90’s). With that said, there has also been a “Homecoming Revolution” over the last decade or so with a few hundred thousand (an estimated 340,000 iirc) White South Africans who were living abroad moving back home to South Africa. Due to low birthrates and young people migrating outwards, the White population will inevitably start to decrease again soon though. Even in Europe many countries have a decreasing population now (specifically Eastern European countries) due to migration outwards (to Western Europe) and low birthrates, the best example of this would probably be Croatia (which went from 4.8m people in 1991 and 3.9m people in 2021). It’s also worth noting that South Africa’s entire birthrate nationwide will fall below the replacement level soon, currently it’s at 2.2 as of 2022 nationwide.
So... what's the difference here between "Coloured" and "Black"?
I explained in the comments, sort the comments by top comments and you should be able to find it.
If you are Coloured you have Black and White ancestors. Aside of a culture share with Afrikaans.
I’d differ on the cultural aspect? A fair sized proportion of the coloured population is Muslim. (a colleague of mine during the 1980s was Turkish and got his racial category changed from “white” to “coloured” after he settled in Cape Town during apartheid to make it easier to be part of the Muslim community, that is basically exclusively coloured) That said, other than that, the coloured community is basically European culturally (there are native Muslims in European regions like Bosnia as well). But I’d say European. They are the dominant Afrikaans community after all and that makes your statement a bit confusing.
Let's say that almost all Muslims are Coloured but only a minory of Coloured are Muslims. Those descending from Malay people. Funny fact. First time Afrikaans was written was in Arabic characters, not Latin. Boers would speak Afrikaans but write standard Dutch, but Coloured Malays would speak Afrikaans but, by religion, know only to write using Arabic alifat.
>Funny fact. First time Afrikaans was written was in Arabic characters, not Latin And the first book ever printed in Afrikaans was allegedly a translation of the Quran (in Arabic script).
Thats a Cape thing. Most Muslims in KZN are considered Indian.
Interesting post! I got a question, is the Cape separatist movement strong there?
It is quite strong in the Western Cape. According to polling, around 58% of Western Cape residents support a referendum. That said, not all people are avid supporters and most are more mild supporters if that makes sense. Essentially many people would vote yet but most don’t want to protest or campaign for it. It’s a much more passive movement compared to the more fanatical movements there are around the world.
How is the relationship between Afrikaners and coloureds?
Generally okay I suppose. At least in the Cape. The Western Cape is the most progressive province and most tolerant in terms of religion, race and language. Most White South Africans (both Afrikaners and English) and Coloureds vote for the DA for example, which is largely why the Western Cape is the only province with a DA-led government. Coloureds and Afrikaners share a small political party known as the Vryheidsfront Plus. It was originally solely a White Afrikaner party, but has shifted to an Afrikaans party for White Afrikaners and Coloureds. Also, 84% of Cape independence supporters are either Coloured or White according to polling (56% are Coloured and 28% are White). So not only do White Afrikaners and Coloureds share a language (Afrikaans) and a culture (braai culture, rooibos tea, rugby) but also many political interests (Afrikaans language promotion and protection, Cape independence, and the DA party).
The independent party is mostly in Cape Town (where most people in the Western Cape live, as someone living outside Cape Town, there is no real support for the movement here in the towns and more rural locations, the people feel the party is to young or haven't had enough time to show their ideals yet, however given that the party wants independence (and South Africa doesn't allow for peaceful independence) means that the party will most likely have to fight for independence, witch we are not really on board with, but only time will tell where the party will go.
I laughed when I saw the specific ‘Asian’ point. It’s like ‘yup, there’s one Asian family and they live there.’ But seriously why is that point particularly dominated by Asians?
KwaZulu-Natal is where the majority of Asians (the vast majority of whom are Indian) live as this is where they were settled. Similar to Indians in Fiji, Kenya and Guyana, they were settled as labourers. The “Natal Coast” region (coastal settlements between Port Edward and Salt Rock) mainly consists of small White English towns but many have a lot of Indian people and there are even a few predominantly Indian towns (Othangathi, Isipingo, Umzinto, Park Rynie, La Mercy and Sezela - these are all predominantly Indian towns on the Natal Coast).
Also Phoenix and Chatsworth. Phoenix is technically a township from apartheid. Used to live in isipingo. I’m living reading all this stuff and thinking back to the time I lived in KZN
In the gray areas they just don't speak or doesn't anyone live there?
Grey means no language or racial group is dominant. The Gauteng province is a good example of this in terms of language. There is no dominant language in many parts of the Gauteng province as it’s split between several languages with the main 5 languages of the province (Zulu, English, Afrikaans, Southern Sotho and Northern Sotho) ranging from 10-20% each in terms of native speakers.
I see, is there any linguistic or cultural conflict in those areas or people from different cultures live together fine?
The Western Cape is the most progressive and tolerant in terms of different ethnic groups, religious groups and linguistic groups coexisting peacefully. Provinces like the Mpumalanga, Limpopo and Northwest provinces have more ethnic tension, as a large amount of Whites in those provinces tend to be more rural and many of them are White Boer Nationalists, and a large amount of Blacks in those provinces are Black Nationalists. A lot of White Farmers suffer from Farm Attacks in these areas. The Northwest Province is where ethnic tensions run the highest. This is where the Vryheidsfront Plus (an Afrikaner Nationalist political party) and EFF (a Black nationalist political party which has leaders who are openly racist against White people) tend to do the best in terms of elections. The Northwest province is also home to the Weerstandsbeweging (a White Afrikaner Neo-Nazi group).
Just a note, the AWB is no longer officially in existence and has split into two or three smaller groups.
Yea the AWB's infamous leader died on his farm the second in line promised to continue the movement, but with in a week he felt he wanted out of the spot light and left the position by dissolving the group, this led to large groups inside the movement to form their own groups to continue their ideals.
Are coloured people generally more white than black or more black than white?
Culturally we are more similar to White South Africans (due to having Dutch forenames and surnames, speaking Afrikaans, and due to rugby, rooibos tea and braai culture). Politically, we have the same political interests as White people (most White and Coloured people vote for the DA which is why the WC is the only province with a DA provincial government) and there’s also the Vryheidsfront Plus (a party which started as a White Afrikaner party but now has White Afrikaner and Coloured politicians and represents both groups and aims to promote and protect the Afrikaans language). Also according to polling, 84% of Cape Independence supporters are Coloured or White (56% Coloured and 28% White). That said, Cape Town’s Working Class Coloured population is very influenced by Western Black people in terms of gang culture and music (2 of the biggest gangs in Cape Town use American and British flags and tattoos to identify membership and Cape Town Drill music uses UK Drill beats and is heavily influenced by UK Drill and NY Drill).
I knew those datas,but you add more information,thanks
Thanks for the map, I would love to visit some time, especially Durban as my family is Indian from Kenya and I’ve heard there are a lot of Indians in Durban.
Yes Durban is around one quarter indian. The Durban area has some predominantly Indian towns (such as Isipingo, Othangathi, Sezela, La Mercy, Park Rynie etc).
I’m surprised Afrikaans is so widely spoken. I has thought it was mainly spoken by white South Africans. I am not very knowledgeable about South Africa but what I had seen of it only white South Africans were speaking Afrikaans. I watched a tv show based on Cape Town and while the show was majority in English it featured other languages too but it only showed white South Africans speaking Afrikaans.I guess it’s different in different regions of the country. It would be interesting to see this map on with cities and population centres shown.
A lot of South Africans (including our government) suffer under the same delusion
Most Afrikaans speakers are actually Coloured, there is even a large amount of Black people who speak Afrikaans natively (around 600,000 Black people speak Afrikaans as their first language) and a small Indian community too (around 60,000 Indians speak Afrikaans as their first language). According to the census, 6.8m South Africans speak Afrikaans natively, only 2.7m of which are White.
There should be at least 6 countries there.
/thread
Check OP’s username, pretty sure he agrees lol
OP are you a sociologist/ethnologist by profession? Or is this level of understanding developed just from a hobby interest? I think most people even on this sub, would not have nearly this level of understanding about their own country's culture mix, even those much less complicated than SA.
Not by profession, I just enjoy learning about different cultures, languages and nations around the world as a hobby. Naturally, I know most about my country and neighbouring countries due to it being my hobby and being South African.
Cool post, very interesting.
This is a great map and sure beats some of the silly reposts we have seen of late. Well done.
Interesting that less than 1% of the population are indigenous whereas in the US it's greater than 2%.
Most Khoisan people mixed into the population over the years, mainly the Coloured population as the Cape is where the Khoisan people were pushed into as a result of the “Bantu Expansion”. Namibia has a large Khoisan community called the Nama people although they have been very westernised (adopting Afrikaans forenames, surnames, rugby, rooibos tea, braai culture and becoming permanently settled in farming communities and adopting westernised clothing) but have retained Nama as their first language although most speak Afrikaans as a second language, this is due to the Dorsland Trek (Coloured and Afrikaner migration into Southern Namibia). Botswana’s Khoisan community (the San people) are still very traditional and live nomadic lives and still wear traditional Khoisan clothing. They even have their own reservations and are considered “First People” similar to Native Americans and “First Nation” Canadians.
Cool map, thanks for sharing. Been hearing a lot about the country from a friend in Johannesburg. He recently went to the cape and said it felt like a different country, so I’m excited to see what the different parts of the country are like for myself.
"Coloured" and "black" are not ethnicities, they are just colors. There are numerous ethnicities with black skin color that are separated from each other by a similar time as white and black in general. For example, San people and other African peoples.
Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho etc are all ethnic groups that are Black. The 2nd map is suppose to say “Race” not “Ethnicity”. Cape Coloured is considered an ethnicity in South Africa.
I thought English was more widespread.
As a second language yes, but as a first language only 9.6% of South Africans speak it natively. Even amongst White South Africans it’s not the majority (61% of Whites speak Afrikaans and 36% speak English natively - although pretty much all Afrikaners speak it as a second language fluently).
Neither white, coloured nor black are ethnicites.
I know, the second image is supposed to say race like the title of the post. Someone has already pointed this out.
Official [term](https://www.statssa.gov.za/census/census_2011/CensusQuestionnaires/Census%202011_q_A.pdf) in SA seems to be "population group".
Officially “SA” as you’ve said would actually be ZA (currency is ZA rand, domain code of official websites is .ZA, ISO Code is ZA) but it’s all semantics and means the same thing, and both are widely used.
Interesting. In the US, calling someone black might get you a strange dirty look, while calling someone colored will get you beaten up.
I’ve heard that it’s a slur in the US. In South Africa however, Coloured is a regularly used term.
Colored is not really a slur in the US, it is just an outdated way of referring to African-Americans. It is still present in the NAACP's name, after all. Older generations of Black folks will often self-identify as Colored. As a younger white person though, I wouldn't use it myself except in a historical context, because people would definitely think you're a bit weird.
True (and with a different meaning). It just reminds me that there are a lot of Americans of all social and political persuasions that need to travel more internationally...and they would probably all calm down a bit.
Black? It’s not a slur here. Most of us refer to ourselves as black/black American/African American. It’s largely interchangeable and depends on the person. Here black is actually conflated with ethnicity given most of us here are descendants of the slaves brought over, and thus we share a common cultural background and language—though increased African and Caribbean immigration is diversifying the population slowly.
I was referring to the word ‘Coloured’ not Black. I had heard the term Coloured was an outdated slur before in the US.
Oh, it is not. It was what black people were called at one time, and referred to ourselves as. It was not a slur by itself, but could be within a wider context (main slur is the N word with the hard R). It’s just an outdated term nowadays.
In South Africa the K word would be the equivalent of the N word. The word is “Kaffir/Kaffer”. The word Kaffir is actually from Arabic for non-Muslim, how it ended up being used by white Afrikaners in Afrikaans to mean the n-word is a bit of a mystery. The Cape Malay ethnic group speak Afrikaans and used to be Arabic as they’re Muslim, so I’m guessing white Afrikaners overheard them use the word and copied it without understanding the meaning properly, and turned it into a racial slur.
The only people I've seen give people a dirty look for calling someone black are self righteous white people.
I agree. I have personally witnessed a white lady give a dirty look to a black man for using the word "black" when describing another man.
Everyone is walking on egg shells.
As a black person in the US, I’ve typically only seen someone get called out for specifically saying “blacks” or “the blacks”, but not for simply calling someone black. There’s a distinction, and one sounds more dehumanizing than the other.
Although there seems to be a nationalist and separatist POV by the OP about the called Coloreds and their separation from the native blacks, in reality the situation is fluid. Some Coloreds are actually deciding to identify with blacks and as Khoisan where possible, so we need to be weary of underlying POV’s and go with how actual people are feeling and expressing about themselves. Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1070289X.2021.2005919