He attended a primary school at Riebeek West, Cape Colony, and in 1911 graduated from Grey University College[1] at Bloemfontein with a distinguished B.A.

degree at the University of Amsterdam,[1] but the outbreak of the First World War caused him to return to South Africa.

[3] In 1915 Boshoff obtained a temporary position as a successor of professor Jan Kamp at the Teologiese Skool at Potchefstroom.

[1] In 1920, he went on leave to the Netherlands to obtain a PhD degree with his 1921 dissertation Volk en taal van Suid-Afrika, a historical description and linguistic analysis of the Afrikaans language.

[3] Boshoff was a member of the Taalkommissie (Language Committee) of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns (SAAWK, South African Academy for Science and Art) from 1922 up to 1969 and with D. F. Malherbe and T.H.