The poem Christmas Carol by DJ Opperman was originally an Afrikaans poem. It was translated in to English by Anthony Delius. The fact that they went through all the trouble to translate it from Afrikaans to English, shows the significance of the poem for South African History. The poem takes the biblical story of the birth of Jesus and relocates it to District Six and the birth of a small brown child. In this essay I will discuss what function place has on the setting and the language used in this poem in order to help us understand what the relevance and significance of this poem has as a social commentary on the racial and cultural division that still continues in South African even two decades after Apartheid had ended.
The place in which this
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They use language in this poem to create a culture and portray the community they are talking about. They replace a lot of the words from the biblical story with South African words to make it more suitable and relatable. They use ‘’outas’’ instead of wise men as in the biblical story, which refers to them being very common people and not very special which emphasizes the birth of this boy not being an fancy event. They refer to ‘’High Karoo’’ and use the words ‘’knob-sticks’’ and ‘’jackal path’’, which is a South African things and brings the place in to context and reminds the reader where this event is taking place in and the history that needs to be kept in mind when reading this poem. He also ends the sentence with ‘’with’’ which is a South African thing to do and not finish your sentences. The language helps to bring place into perspective and make it clear that he is referring to South Africa. Language is also an important factor as it helps us as South Africans relate to the story more and view it from an South African view which bring culture and race considerations in to the picture and helps us see the bigger message of this poem ((Moffett,