Page 13 - 2020 SoMJ Vol 73 No 2_Neat

4 The Society of Malaŵi Journal

Laws used pictures as visual aids to obtain vernacular translations. He went
around the mission station with the pictures, pointing at them and gesturing to the
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Africans to get translations of the object in the vernacular language . Through
this, Laws and his colleagues were able to build a Nyanja vocabulary and to
communicate with Africans. These were initial steps towards literacy
development in colonial Malawi.
In the 1920s, studies conducted by the LM, Blantyre Mission (BM),
Universities’ Mission to Central Africa (UMCA) and DRCM missions were
important in engendering an understanding of the relationships between language
groups in Nyasaland. Most studies focused on the Nyanja, Tumbuka and Yao due
to the missionaries’ belief that these were the main ethnic groups in Malawi. A
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number of LM missionaries published books on Nyanja grammar, Christian texts,
schoolbooks and related literature in Nyanja. More notable are the works of
Alexander Riddel (1880) and George Henry (1891), followed by further
publications from the BM by David Clement Scott (1892) and Alexander
Hetherwick (1929). There is, however, a scarcity of books on Tumbuka
16
grammar. The area has significantly benefited from publications of Walter Elmslie
17
and Cullen Young’s descriptive studies on the Tumbuka language. In addition
to the missionary studies were those conducted by anthropologists and colonial
government officers.
18
These publications had a considerable impact on the traditional
Malawian societies. There were no written languages in Malawi before the
European encounter. Language translation and the production of written texts,

14 MacDonald, 13–15.
15 See D Macdonald, Africana; or, The Heart of Heathen Africa. (London, Simpkin,
Marshall & co.; [etc., etc.], 1882).
16 See Livingstonia Manuscripts and Alexander Riddel, “A Grammar of the Chinyanja
Language as Spoken at Lake Nyassa” (Laws Papers, 1880), Gen 563/2 Edinburgh
University; George Henry, A Grammar of Chinyanja : A Language Spoken in British
Central Africa, on and near the Shores of Lake Nyasa (Aberdeen : G. & W. Fraser, 1891),
http://archive.org/details/grammarofchinyan00henr; D. C. R. (David Clement Rufelle)
Scott, A Cyclopædic Dictionary of the Mang’anja Language Spoken in British Central
Africa (Edinburgh: Foreign Mission Committee of the Church of Scotland, 1892);
Alexander Hetherwick, A Practical Manual of the Nyanja Language., 2nd ed. (London,
1907); Robert Sutherland Rattray and Alexander Hetherwick, Some Folk-Lore Stories
and Songs in Chinyanja: With English Translation and Notes (Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge, 1907).
17 See Walter Angus Elmslie: Notes on the Tumbuka Language, as Spoken in Mombera’s
Country. (Aberdeen, 1891); C. Young, Notes on the Speech of the Tumbuka-Kamanga
Peoples in the Northern Province of Nyasaland., 1932.
18 See H. H. Johnston, British Central Africa: An Attempt to Give Some Account of a
Portion of the Territories under British Influence North of the Zambezi (London:
Methuen & Co, 1897); Stephen Samuel Murray, A Handbook of Nyasaland, 1932.