Die Taalkommissie


Die Taalkommissie is an arm of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns that serves as the technical committee of the Nasionale Taalliggaam vir Afrikaans, which is the language regulator of the Afrikaans language. The Akademie was founded in Bloemfontein in 1909, and its arm, the Spellingskommissie, was formed in 1914 and renamed in 1964.
The Language Commission focuses mainly on the revision and publication of the Afrikaanse Woordelys en Spelreëls, a standard guide to the spelling and related writing conventions of the Afrikaans language. It is held as an authoritative source for the spelling of Afrikaans words, of which several, such as "baie", were spelled in multiple ways up to 1917. Ten editions of the AWS have appeared up to 2009.
Furthermore it takes cognizance of Afrikaans grammar and the natural developments in the Afrikaans language community, such as new terminology which emerges in technology and other disciplines. Its coverage of varieties of Standard Afrikaans is being expanded, which includes the Nama, Griekwa and Kaaps varieties. A large corpus of the words used in the Afrikaans Muslim community is also included in the AWS.
Ernst Kotzé of the NMMU was chairman from 2003 up to March 2012, when he was succeeded by Tom McLachlan, a linguist at UNISA.