WORDS OF BATSWANA, letters to "Mahoko a Becwana", 1883-1896

374 pp., maps, illus., hardback, d.w., Van Riebeeck Society, Second Series no.37, Cape Town, 2006

A selection of letters and articles written for "Mahoko a Becwana" ("News/Words for Batswana"), a Setswana-language newspaper published by missionaries of the London Missionary Society at Kuruman between 1883 and 1896. Most of the writers were members of congregations in what are today South Africa's Northern Cape Province and Northwest Province, although many wrote from further afield. Topics included mission work, theology, standardization of written Setswana, cutural change and colonization. The writings are reproduced in their original Setswana alongside English translations.

Part Themba Mgadla is Associate Professor and Head of the History Department at the University of Botswana. Stephen Volz is Assistant Professor of History at Kenyon College in Ohio.