South African Language Of Protest The Soweto Uprising

Soweto Uprising was over Zulu speaking Black South African schoolchildren taught reading, writing and math exclusively in the white Afrikaans language.
Soweto Uprising is the South African language of violent protests against the exclusive use of Afrikaans. Soweto Uprising official death toll was 23 South African schoolchildren.

Soweto Protest Over Language
Punt Janson, the Deputy Minister of the Bantu Education, was quoted as saying: “I have not consulted the African people on the language issue and I’m not going to. An African might find that ‘the big boss’ spoke only Afrikaans or spoke only English. It would be to his advantage to know both languages.”

The official death toll was 23, but it could have been higher than 200 because the incident triggered widespread violence throughout South Africa, which claimed more lives. The first student to be shot on that fateful day was 15-year old Hastings Ndlovu.
However, the killing in the same incident of Hector Pieterson, aged 12, and in particular the publication of his photograph taken by Sam Nzima, made him an international icon of the Soweto Uprising.
The Soweto Uprising became the major rallying point of the struggle against apartheid. June 16 marks the commemoration of National Youth Day in South Africa. The country reflects on the massacre of schoolchildren during the Soweto Uprising of 1976.
Afrikaans language has its roots in Khoisan, Malaysian, French, Dutch, English and German among other languages.