S.P.E. Boshoff


S.P.E. Boshoff was a South African Afrikaner linguist, writer, adapter of plays and promoter of the use of the Afrikaans language.

Young years

Boshoff was born on July 14, 1891, at Senekal, Orange Free State, to Johannes Jurgens Boshoff, a Volksraad member and commander in the Second Boer War, and Jacoba Christina de Waal. Young Boshoff only went to school after the war when his mother had returned from a British concentration camp. He attended a primary school at Riebeek West, Cape Colony, and in 1911 graduated from Grey University College at Bloemfontein with a distinguished B.A. degree. He then taught school in Senekal and Bloemfontein, while studying at Grey for an M.A. degree in English and Dutch. He left for the Netherlands to obtain a M.A. degree at the University of Amsterdam, but the outbreak of the First World War caused him to return to South Africa. There Boshoff joined the Maritz rebellion under general C.F. Beyers, an experience he described in his 1918 book Rebellie - Sketse uit mij dagboek, 1914-1915.

Career

In 1915 Boshoff obtained a temporary position as a successor of professor Jan Kamp at the Teologiese Skool at Potchefstroom. Two years later he was appointed a professor of English, Dutch and History at Potchefstroom Universiteitskollege. In 1920, he went on leave to the Netherlands to obtain a PhD degree with his 1921 dissertation Volk en taal van Suid-Afrika, a historical description and linguistic analysis of the Afrikaans language. Returned to Potchefstroom, he was a municipal councilor and later mayor.
Boshoff was a member of the Taalkommissie of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns from 1922 up to 1969 and with D. F. Malherbe and T.H. le Roux advised the 1933 translation of the Bible into Afrikaans, which was considered crucial to establish Afrikaans as a separate language from Dutch. In 1950 Boshoff was chosen president of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie and continued up to 1958.
His Etimologiese woordeboek van afrikaans was published in 1936.

Awards

His awards include the 1959 and 1967 for the Humanities.

Publications

Boshoff published many books and articles, such as:

Literature on Boshoff

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