Editor - Dr Mantoa Motinyane

Dr Mantoa Motinyane

isiXhosa Editor

Mantoa was born in the Free State in Bloemfontein. She is an Associate Professor in the Linguistics Department in the Arts and Humanities Faculty at the University of the Western Cape (UWC). She is currently the Director of the Centre for Advanced Studies of African Society (CASAS). She holds a PhD and an MA in Formal Linguistics from the University of Florida, USA and a BA (Hons) in African Languages and Linguistics, from the University of Cape Town. Her primary area of research is psycholinguistics where she looks at language and speech development in relation to psychological processes, in particular how children produce and comprehend language. Prior to joining UWC, Mantoa headed a Language Communication Project housed in the Health Sciences at UCT where she taught MBChB and Health and Rehabilitation Sciences students language and culture in the medical professions. She also taught isiXhosa language and literature for many years.

Mantoa is the lead local investigator of an European Research Council Funded Project titled Realizing Leibniz’s Dream: Child Languages as a Mirror of the Mind. She also headed an NIHSS funded catalytic project which examined how psycholinguistics research can guide some literacy practices amongst children who speak Southern African Languages. The other aspect of this project was to find ways in which Folklore can be used to encourage parental participation in developing literacy amongst children. Other areas of research focus include, morpho-syntax, critical discourse analysis and workplace multilingualism and literature. Mantoa has published journal articles, book chapters, edited books in both her primary and secondary areas of research.