A group of inspiring creatives have come together on a pro-bono project called Reach All South Africa. The project is aimed at getting coronavirus educational material translated into African languages so it can be shared with and understood by all South Africans.
“The need to translate Covid-19 related information was initially discovered when my father, who is a farmer in Eastern Cape, asked me to help him source video and audio information on the coronavirus for him to share with his staff who speak predominantly Xhosa, whereas he speaks mostly English and Sotho,” explained Moira-Gene Sephton Gous.
After an extensive search, she could only find one or two videos which were not sufficient, predominantly focused on the most basic safety measures, the ‘how’, which is fine, but it did not address the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of the situation.
“I realized that the available materiel does not explain what the virus is and why prevention is so important. There was very little coronavirus education or empowering information available in Zulu, Xhosa, Sepedi and Sotho,” said Gous.
Official communication like prevention material, national addresses and procedures are delivered predominantly in English. However, English is only the sixth most spoken language in South Africa, with only 8.1% of individuals speaking English at home. The most commonly spoken languages at home are Zulu (25%), Xhosa (15%), Afrikaans (12%), Sepedi (10%) and Sotho (8%).
According to Reach All South Africa, “many behavioural studies have shown, it is very hard to change behaviour or introduce new behaviour without explaining why the new behaviour is needed and why the preventative measures work and are important.
Gous decided to edit the existing video content into understandable materiel for people who speak African languages. “I am a big believer in getting the why what and how into the message, and using the first language where it is possible, “she said. She teamed up with Amy Bell, Marie-Louise Botha from the Bothabile African Language Institute, Modikwe Mofokeng and Helien Gous to create the videos.
Bothabile Language Institute donated all the translation work and advised Reach All South Africa to focus on Sotho and Zulu. These two languages cover the Nguni group of languages, Zulu, Ndebele, Siswati and Xhosa and the Sotho group, Tswana, Sotho, Sepedi and allow for a wider understanding.
“We are creating a series of educational videos in Zulu, Sotho (and in English, as the base video) with titles, subtitles and audio. The format aims to be inclusive, also catering for people who are deaf or illiterate,” concluded Gous.
The first Zulu video is due out in the next few days, as well as a series of eBooks that help parents explain the coronavirus to kids, also translated into Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho and Afrikaans.
