He went from being a “kaalvoet laaitie vannie Bishop Lavis” to a top academic at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), dedicating his career to championing historically marginalised languages, particularly his mother tongue – Kaaps.

Despite being a distinguished linguistics scholar, Prof Quinton Williams still cannot believe that he will be a full professor in just a few days. Prof Williams will deliver his inaugural lecture on August 25 at UWC. Inaugural lectures are a significant milestone in the University’s academics’ life, held to celebrate the formal appointment of an academic to full professorship.

He firmly believes that rethinking multilingualism as a social and political phenomenon is essential, especially in a diverse country such as South Africa.

“The way we previously conceived it, or conceptualised it, was in a quantitative mode,” he said. 

The oldest of four boys, his journey into academia was unconventional. 

“I come from Bishop Lavis, down the road from here. It’s a working-class township. When I was done with matric, I thought, ‘I’m going to go and work,’ but I also wanted to study.

He got a job at Shoprite in Brackenfell, offloading trailers, which he described as hard work. While working for the retailer he also enrolled at Unisa to study law.

“I have a passion for Law, even up to this day, I listen to podcasts that analyse constitutional court cases,” said Prof Williams.

But he also applied to study at UWC, encouraged by a neighbour, Charles Davids, who was employed at the University.

“It’s a funny story. My mother knew before me that I had been accepted to UWC. One day I came back from work and I saw the envelope, because I had been waiting for the envelope. I saw that it was open, but I walked past it and went to greet my mother. I came back (to the lounge), but she was smiling and I thought,  ‘okay, fine’.”

With the prospect of becoming a full-time student, Prof Williams and his family were faced with a dilemma of surviving without his wages. Luckily, he worked as a student assistant at UWC and found a job at a call centre. In his final year, he was also employed as a tutor. 

Professor Felix Banda, a senior professor in the Department of Linguistics and a National Research Foundation B-rated researcher, encouraged him to pursue his Honours degree after pointing out that he was in the top 10 of his class.

“So I thought, okay, let me go on with honours. And I kind of got into academics,” said Prof Williams.

He also did his Master’s at UWC after contemplating a shift to the University of Cape Town (UCT). Luckily, he didn’t make the move when he learned that renowned linguist Professor Christopher Stroud would join UWC. He acknowledged Prof Stroud’s ‘enormous impact’ on his academic development. He also became Prof Williams’ PhD supervisor.

“When I finished my PhD, I did a postdoc in Norway for a year. And in that year, I prepared my first book. I turned half of my PhD thesis into a book. I wrote two new chapters to complete it.  And when I was done with my postdoc in Norway, I came back in 2014. 

And since then, every second year, I was promoted until I was promoted to a full professor. So it took me, I think, eight years to get to this particular place where I am at,” said Prof Williams.

For his inaugural address, Prof Williams will trace his journey, highlighting the linguistic hurdles he faced growing up. 

“We all grew up speaking Kaaps,” he said, but were schooled in what he termed “two foreign-sounding languages: standard Afrikaans and English”.

This early awareness of linguistic hierarchy fuelled his academic pursuits. His postgraduate research, deeply influenced by Adam Haupt’s work on hip-hop culture, language and resistance, set him on a path to challenge traditional views of multilingualism. Prof Williams argued for an approach that centres on the speakers themselves, their linguistic repertoires, and their lived experiences.

“I set the task for myself to advance an approach to multi-lingualism that emerges from society, from speakers,” he explained.

Prof Williams has been a key figure in community activism, working to codify Kaaps and advocate for its recognition. A significant achievement has been the development of the first Trilingual Dictionary of Kaaps, a project aimed at standardising and preserving the language. He has also contributed to creating the first Kaaps-English bilingual learning materials for schools.

Prof Williams said his immediate and extended family have been very supportive throughout his academic pursuits.

“I think the biggest thing for them was to experience with me the development of the dictionary because they are fully anticipating the publication of it, because they’ve spread the word, and they all are Kaaps speakers as well; they all come from Bishop Lavis as well. So yeah, I’m looking forward to it,” said Prof Williams.

He considers this work a matter of justice. He champions the “linguistic citizenship” concept, where speakers exercise control over their languages. His efforts saw a major victory when UCT included Kaaps in its revised language policy, which he hopes will be a bellwether for other institutions.

Reflecting on his journey, he credits his mother for teaching him the value of hard work. His address is a testament to that work ethic, culminating in a powerful call to action to continue the fight for linguistic equality for all marginalised speakers. – UWC

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