You too can — and should — learn to speak an African language

All eyes in the room were on me. I had just been handed a huge bowl of umphokoqo, a mix of crumbly mealie meal and amasi, and I was wondering how on earth I was going to finish this enormous, rich dish by myself.

One spoonful at a time I eventually managed to complete it, realising only later that probably the right cultural thing in that context was for me to have had a few mouthfuls and then passed it on for everyone else in the room to enjoy! I was new at this. I had come emaXhoseni to immerse myself in the language and was finding that there was much more than language that I needed to learn.

As an English-speaking South African one can get away with not speaking any other language. But I've found that speaking an African language is a doorway to making friends, gaining insight into cultures and overcoming fear and misunderstanding.

I was determined that my children should also have this experience. I started to use methods from polyglots - people who speak multiple languages. They all pointed back to immersion as the key. I was introduced to the idea that we need to get beyond the breakers when learning a language.

When swimming in the ocean, the most enjoyable part is when you get through the waves that break over you. People often get stuck in the breakers, learning basic grammar and vocabulary but never getting to the enjoyable part of speaking. Immersion enables you to move much more quickly through that first stage.

My son, Tim, got to be the guinea pig for implementing these ideas. Twice he spent a week in Zululand, with strict instructions to speak no English while there. Through these experiences, he broke through to being able to speak.

My two daughters have also learnt Zulu. One is now in grade 11 at school and will write matric Zulu. She's one of only a few first-language English girls in the school who's opted to take Zulu. For most people it's too much of a risk. Afrikaans is likely to give you a significantly better mark because the curriculum is geared to second-language learners.

It's a chicken-and-egg situation - not enough non-African language students take Zulu for matric, so the resources and teaching are not geared to them, so fewer of them take it. The job of the Zulu teachers in those classes isn't easy - they have a spread of eloquent first-language students to stretch and second-language students to try to teach from the beginning.

So, most English-speakers leave school without an African language, and by then they've given up. But learning a language as an adult is possible, even if you don't consider yourself good at languages.

Most of the polyglots who I learnt from had only begun to learn a second language after school and went on to speak eight or nine languages.

I only began to learn an African language after school. As an adult I was highly motivated to learn. I wasn't concerned primarily with exam results. I'd seen enough of SA to realise the value of learning to speak an African language and I had the freedom to organise my own immersion experiences.

When I started an adult Zulu class last year I was amazed how many people wanted to join. With a combination of finding a language partner to do whatever level of immersion one can manage, a structured grammar approach and plenty of motivation, getting a grip on an African language as an adult is a real possibility.

Even under lockdown or with social distancing, we can go a long way to bridge-building by learning online and speaking with a language partner via Zoom or WhatsApp.

A few months ago I arrived at the licensing department in Pietermaritzburg. I spoke to the security guard in Zulu, first greeting him and then checking that the offices were open. His face broke into a huge smile, he leant forward to greet my daughter and was thrilled when she was able to answer in Zulu. We had a connection. "I congratulate you," he said, "for speaking Zulu." The appreciation seemed out of proportion to the action.

This kind of experience has been fairly regular when I speak Zulu. Clearly learning an African language is something powerful when it comes to building bridges between communities in our nation.

• To help adults get going with Zulu, the Larsen family and their long-standing friends the Nzuza family have created an online course. For more information, visit asazane.thinkific.com

• Larsen qualified as a high school teacher with three years of Xhosa study at the University of Cape Town, and has a Cambridge iGCSE Zulu qualification.