Kay McCormick, Language in Cape Town's District
Six. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. xv + 253 pp.
Kay McCormick's book is a multifaceted analysis of language norms
and language practices in the bilingual District Six of Cape Town (South
Africa). District Six is probably the best-known inner city neighborhood
of Cape Town: In the 1980s the eyes of the world witnessed the forced
removal of many of its inhabitants and the brutal demolition of homes in
yet another attempt by the apartheid government to get rid of a
cosmopolitan and ethnically mixed area. The area is relatively well
defined, and its language contact situation makes it an excellent site for
the study of language alternation and code-switching.