International Journal of Language and Culture - Volume 10, Issue 2, 2023

Although names exist in all languages of the world, their formal and functional manifestations show great diversity. Due to their embeddedness in socio-cultural and historical contexts, an anthropological-linguistic approach that brings together linguistic and cultural facts is required to capture the full meaning of names and naming practices. Overall, names are given to entities of cultural importance and of significance for humans in social life; name usage and name-giving practices reflect social beliefs and cultural values; and their meaning is strongly shaped by cultural and historical contexts. This paper provides a typological, cross-linguistic overview of named entities, kinds of naming practices, and types of meanings associated with names, name giving, and name usage, which are illustrated with numerous examples from Australia, Europe, and Africa. Therefore, it also offers a structural framework for the contributions in this issue.

This chapter makes a socio-onomastic analysis of farm naming by resettled “Black” sugarcane farmers in Chiredzi District, Zimbabwe. It focuses on the beneficiaries of the Fast Track Land Reform Programme initiated by the government from 2000. The research unravels the motives behind the selection of the names and their significance. This was achieved mostly through interviewing the owners responsible for naming their farms. It was observed that most of the names are in the Shona language and only a few in English, which points not only to the ethnicity of the beneficiaries but also to the change of ownership from “Whites” to “Blacks”. These names are largely celebratory, as they reflect on the elevation of the farmers’ socio- economic status and their hopes and aspirations, whilst some names indicate racial tensions characteristic of the period, the political rhetoric of the regime and the ruling party, as well as the spirituality and identity of the farmers.

This article explores the link between sport and history. It engages the linguistic landscaping and etymological analysis approaches to trace the origins of the names of stadia and their socio-historical significance. In-depth interviews and document analysis are used in the examination of five names of stadia: Somhlolo National Stadium, Mavuso Trade Centre Stadium, King Sobhuza II Memorial Stadium, Prince Wales Stadium, and Simunye Park Stadium. The findings show that the names of these stadia are a heritage, as past history and heroes are commemorated through them. Moreover, these self-given names, most of which are in the Swati indigenous language, make sense in the context of decoloniality theory. These observations have implications for further research as well as for onomastics.

Linguistic and cultural anxieties have characterized the Ndebele language and culture due to the various hegemonies the people have gone through. The Ndebele as a nation were born out of the Mfecane migrations. In their migration up north they encountered various linguo-cultural groups that posed the risk of possible linguistic and cultural attrition. Upon settling in what is known as Zimbabwe today, the speakers of Ndebele were a minority among other language groups which they had conquered militarily. Both colonial conquest and the subsequent Shona triumphalist and nationalist discourses and policies placed Ndebele in a disadvantaged social and political position which threatened its existence. This paper establishes that all these factors fed into the Ndebele linguistic anxiety, which is manifested in various tense encounters, especially on social media platforms. Data for the study were collected through observations and unstructured interviews. Using the prisms of linguistic purism ideologies and linguistic analysis, the paper analyzes the attitudes towards and the grammar of the various renditions of the toponym. The paper establishes that, while political tensions foment the linguistic tensions around the phonology and morphology of the toponym, there are some idiosyncrasies that are influenced by the mother tongues of speakers and this creates some of the transphonological and morphological changes that infuriate Ndebele speakers.

Gin has become a very popular alcoholic drink, and is often used with various other mixers, often including fruit. The definition (Collins Paperback English Dictionary) reads as follows: “an alcoholic drink distilled from malted grain and flavoured juniper berries” (1994: 351). One of the most common drinks is gin mixed with tonic water, but there are also others mixers involved. Recently, in 2020, a competition was held in South Africa, with a panel of assessors tasting a wide variety of gins, and many who supplied their gin products with the brand names thereof achieved gold and silver medals for their entries of mainly craft gins. The purpose of this contribution is to analyze the various craft gin names in South Africa, as well as the names of the producing firms, distilleries, and estates. Within the context of onomastics, the focus is therefore on the actual name of the brand as it appears on the label, as well as on the location where it was produced, hence it is a combination of brand and location.

Highlanders Football Club is the oldest football club in Zimbabwe. The formation of the club is intertwined with the history of the Ndebele nation. The club has changed names in response to various environments over the years, starting from being called Lions Football Club to acquiring its current name. The football club has always been associated with Ndebele royalty, an issue that excites varied responses to its presence. The supporters of Highlanders Football Club have given it quite a number of nicknames that are, mainly, endearments. The names and nicknames both bear the wishes and aspirations of the football team and its supporters. Highlanders Football Club has become a form of identity, culture, and ideology to its supporters. This chapter discusses messages that are conveyed by the names and nicknames of Zimbabwe’s oldest football club from an onomastic perspective. Bearing in mind the fact that onomastics is an interdisciplinary field, the chapter appreciates the deep-seated social and political issues that these names and nicknames raise and the aim is to bring them to the surface. It is also the aim of the chapter to unravel the myth around the craze that seems to engulf the supporters of this football club by examining the messages carried by its names and nicknames that have kept changing over the years.

The names by which luxury items are marketed are often interpreted as names that trigger forms of mimesis. By considering the connections made through naming, products such as perfumes seem to be powerful metaphors for a particular lifestyle, wealth, and specific identity constructions, thereby obviously suggesting the possibility that through owning and using such products, clients can – for a while – become what is promised on the package. The names of perfumes and fragrances in postcolonial contexts, however, are semantically more complex. They refer to various locations, languages, and narratives, serving different purposes. This contribution examines the meanings of names in African perfumery practices in order to shed light on the different connections and relations they symbolize, the ritual contexts in which they are used, and the memory-making associated with both language and sensory experience.

Naming is a common practice in all societies. In each society, naming practices follow patterns that are generally predictable within their respective and identifiable feature categories.Names come from different sources and are inspired by the lived experiences of their bestowers. Whilst some names have clear and easily traceable meanings owing to their semantically transparent morphology or syntax, other meanings are only accessible when one gleans through the histories behind the names. Such histories come from the name givers’ epistemological systems. Thus, besides being forms of identity, different categories of names perform different functions. This paper is an analysis of inscriptions written on public transport vehicles, commonly known as kombis. We argue that these inscriptions are names. Hence, the article interrogates the functions of these names and tries to unearth the philosophies contained therein. The inscriptions were gathered from kombis plying their routes on the streets of Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital city. Data relating to the origins of these names and their semantic, cultural, and social significance was collected from kombi owners and crews.

This contribution focuses on Langila, a language practice or “speech style” that emerged in the first decade after the millenium in the Congolese capital of Kinshasa, characterized by lexical creativity and specific phonological manipulative strategies. I analyze Langila speakers’ use of global place names, fashionable brands, and names of institutions, and to some extent specific (manipulated) personal names as pseudo-onomastic references from an anthropological-linguistic perspective, understanding “games with names” (Storch 2019) as a cultural practice that contributes to the novelty factor in specific ways of speaking in the Congolese capital of Kinshasa and in social media. It is crucial for the discussion of “labelling” and “branding” practices in contexts of cultural importance in African languages to consider why and how speakers use, manipulate, and recontextualize semiotic links to names of artefacts, places, and people – and how this changes the onomastic value of these named, unnamed, and renamed concepts in ludic interaction. The paper thus circles around two main research questions: How are “labels” (anthroponyms, toponyms) semantically and in terms of their referential and indexical use changed to creative lifestyle emblems and become part of the everyday lexicon? How are contexts of cultural importance named and (re)labelled by a speaker, drawing from “manipulated” repertoires that involve (partially homophonic) anthroponymic or toponymic references actually intended to mislead or to confuse the hearer? This contribution investigates the role of onomastic references that are used to denote and label central concepts in Langila.