Map showing the six traditional language families represented in Africa

There are over 2100 and by some counts over 3000 languages spoken natively in Africa^[1][2] in several major language families:

• Afro-Asiatic (Hamito-Semitic) spread throughout the Middle East, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and parts of the Sahel
• Nilo-Saharan is centered on Sudan and Chad (disputed validity)
• Niger–Congo (Bantu) covers West, Central, and Southeast Africa
• Khoe is concentrated in the deserts of Namibia and Botswana
• Austronesian on Madagascar.
• Indo-European on the southern tip of the continent.

There are several other small families and language isolates, as well as obscure languages that have yet to be classified. In addition, Africa has a wide variety of sign languages, many of which are language isolates.

Several African languages are whistled or drummed to communicate over long distances.

About a hundred of the languages of Africa are widely used for inter-ethnic communication. Arabic, Berber, Igbo, Somali, Swahili, Hausa, Amharic, Oromo, and Yoruba are spoken by tens of millions of people. If clusters of up to a hundred similar languages are counted together, twelve are spoken by 75 percent, and fifteen by 85 percent, of Africans as a first or additional language.^[3]

The high linguistic diversity of many African countries (Nigeria alone has over 500 languages,^[4] one of the greatest concentrations of linguistic diversity in the world) has made language policy a vital issue in the post-colonial era. In recent years, African countries have become increasingly aware of the value of their linguistic inheritance. Language policies being developed nowadays are mostly aimed at multilingualism. For example, all African languages are considered official languages of the African Union (AU). 2006 was declared by the African Union as the "Year of African Languages".^[5] However, although many mid-sized languages are used on the radio, in newspapers, and in primary-school education, and some of the larger ones are considered national languages, only a few are official at the national level.

Language groups[link]

Most languages spoken in Africa belong to one of three large language families: Afroasiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and Niger–Congo. Another hundred belong to small families such as Ubangian and the various families called Khoisan, or the Indo-European and Austronesian language families which originated outside Africa; the presence of the latter two dates to 2,600 and 1,000 years ago, respectively. In addition, African languages include several unclassified languages and sign languages.

Afroasiatic languages[link]

Afro-Asiatic languages are spoken throughout the Middle East, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and parts of the Sahel. There are approximately 375 Afro-Asiatic languages spoken by over 350 million people. The main subfamilies of Afro-Asiatic are the Berber languages, Semitic languages, Chadic languages and the Cushitic languages. The Afro-Asiatic Urheimat is uncertain. However, its most extensive sub-branch, the Semitic languages (including Arabic, Amharic and Hebrew among others), seems to have developed in the Arabian peninsula. The Semitic languages are the only branch of the Afro-Asiatic family of languages that is spoken outside of Africa.

Some of the most widely spoken Afro-Asiatic languages include Arabic (a Semitic language, and a recent arrival from West Asia), Berber (Berber), Hausa (Chadic), Amharic (Semitic), and Oromo and Somali (Cushitic). Of the world's surviving language families, Afro-Asiatic has the longest written history, as both the Akkadian language of Mesopotamia and Ancient Egyptian are members.

Nilo-Saharan languages[link]

Nilo-Saharan is extremely diverse and thus a somewhat controversial grouping uniting over a hundred languages from southern Egypt to northern Tanzania and into Nigeria and DR Congo, with the Songhay languages along the middle reaches of the Niger River as a geographic outlier. The languages share some unusual morphology, but if they are related, most of the branches must have undergone major restructuring since diverging from their common ancestor. The inclusion of the Songhay languages is questionable, and doubts have been raised over the Koman, Gumuz, and Kadu branches.

Some of the better known Nilo-Saharan languages are Kanuri, Songhay, Nubian, and the widespread Nilotic family, which includes Luo, Dinka, and Maasai. The Nilo-Saharan languages are tonal.

Niger–Congo languages[link]

The Niger–Congo language family is the largest group of Africa (and probably of the world) in terms of the number of languages. One of its salient features is an elaborate noun class system with grammatical concord. The vast majority of languages of this family are tonal such as Yoruba and Igbo, Ashanti,. A major branch of Niger–Congo languages is the Bantu family, which covers a greater geographic area than the rest of the family put together (see Niger–Congo B (Bantu) in the map above).

The Niger–Kordofanian language family, joining Niger–Congo with the Kordofanian languages of south-central Sudan, was proposed in 1950s by Joseph Greenberg. Today, linguists often use "Niger–Congo" to refer to this entire family, including Kordofanian as a subfamily. One reason for this is that it is not clear whether Kordofanian was the first branch to diverge from rest of Niger–Congo. Mande has been claimed to be equally or more divergent. Niger–Congo is generally accepted by linguists, though a few question the inclusion of Mande and Dogon, and there is no real evidence for the inclusion of Ubangian.

Other language families[link]

Austronesian[link]

Several languages spoken in Africa belong to language families concentrated or originating outside of the African continent: for example, Malagasy, the language of Madagascar, is an Austronesian language.

Indo-European[link]

Afrikaans is Indo-European, as are the lexifiers of most African creoles. Afrikaans is the only Indo-European language known to have developed in Africa.

Since the colonial era, Indo-European languages such as Afrikaans, English, French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish have held official status in many countries, and are widely spoken, generally as lingua francas. (See African French and African Portuguese.) Indian languages such as Gujarati are spoken by South Asian expatriates exclusively. In earlier historical times, other Indo-European languages could be found in various parts of the continent, such as Old Persian and Greek in Egypt, Latin and Vandalic in North Africa, and Modern Persian in the Horn of Africa.

Small families[link]

The three small Khoisan families of southern Africa have not been shown to be related to the major families of Africa. In addition, there are various other families which have not been demonstrated to belong to one of these families. (The questionable branches of Nilo-Saharan were covered above, and are not repeated here.)

• Mande, some 70 languages, including the major languages of Mali and Guinea. These are generally thought to be divergent Niger–Congo, but debate persists.
• Ubangian, some 70 languages, including the languages of the Central African Republic
• Khoe, about 10 languages, the primary family of Khoisan languages of Namibia and Botswana
• Sandawe, an isolate of Tanzania, possibly related to Khoe
• Kx'a of southern Africa
• Tuu, or Taa-Ui, two surviving languages
• Hadza, and isolate of Tanzania
• Bangi-me, a likely isolate of Mali

Khoisan is a term of convenience covering some 30 languages spoken by about 300 000–400 000 people. There are five Khoisan families which have not been shown to be related to each other, Khoe, Tuu, and Kx'a (these are found mainly in Namibia and Botswana) and Sandawe and Hadza of Tanzania, which are language isolates. A striking feature of Khoisan languages, and the reason they are often counted together, is their use of click consonants. Some neighbouring Bantu languages (notably Xhosa and Zulu) have clicks as well, but these were adopted from Khoisan languages. The Khoisan languages are also tonal.

Creole languages[link]

Due partly to its multilingualism and its colonial past, a substantial proportion of the world's creole languages are to be found in Africa. Some are based on Indo-European languages (e.g. Krio from English in Sierra Leone and the very similar Pidgin in Nigeria and parts of Cameroon, Cape Verdean Creole in Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau Creole in Guinea-Bissau and Senegal both from Portuguese, Seychellois Creole from French in the Seychelles, or Mauritian Creole in Mauritius); some are based on Arabic (e.g., Juba Arabic in the southern Sudan, or Nubi in parts of Uganda and Kenya); some are based on local languages (e.g., Sango, the main language of the Central African Republic.) While in Cameroon a creole based on French,English and local African languages known as Camfranglais has started to become popular.

Unclassified languages[link]

A fair number of unclassified languages are reported in Africa; many remain unclassified simply for lack of data, but among the better-investigated ones may be listed:

• possibly Afroasiatic: Ongota, Gomba
• possibly Nilo-Saharan: Shabo
• possibly Niger–Congo: Jalaa, Mbre, Bayot
• possibly Khoe: Kwadi
• unknown: Laal, Mpre

Less-well investigated ones include Irimba, Luo, Mawa, Rer Bare (possibly Bantu), Bete (evidently Jukunoid), Bung (unclear), Kujarge (evidently Chadic), Lufu (Jukunoid), Oropom (possibly spurious), and Weyto (evidently Cushitic). Several of these are extinct, and adequate comparative data is thus unlikely to be forthcoming year.

Sign languages[link]

Many African countries have national sign languages, such as Algerian Sign Language, Tunisian Sign Language, Ethiopian Sign Language, while other sign languages are restricted to small areas or single villages, such as Adamorobe Sign Language in Ghana. Tanzania has seven, one for each of its schools for the Deaf, all of which are discouraged. Not much is known, since little has been published on these languages.

Language in Africa[link]

Throughout the long multilingual history of the African continent, African languages have been subject to phenomena like language contact, language expansion, language shift, and language death. A case in point is the Bantu expansion, in which Bantu-speaking peoples expanded over most of Sub-Saharan Africa, displacing Khoi-San speaking peoples from much of East Africa and Southern Africa. Another example is the Arab expansion in the 7th century, which led to the extension of Arabic from its homeland in Asia, into much of North Africa.

Trade languages are another age-old phenomenon in the African linguistic landscape. Cultural and linguistic innovations spread along trade routes and languages of peoples dominant in trade developed into languages of wider communication (linguae francae). Of particular importance in this respect are Berber (North and West Africa), Jula (western West Africa), Fulfulde (West Africa), Hausa (West Africa), Lingala (Congo), Somali (Horn of Africa), Swahili (East Africa) and Arabic (North Africa, West Africa, and East Africa).

After gaining independence, many African countries, in the search for national unity, selected one language, generally the former colonial language, to be used in government and education. However, in recent years, African countries have become increasingly supportive of maintaining linguistic diversity. Language policies that are being developed nowadays are mostly aimed at multilingualism.

Official languages[link]

Official languages in Africa

Afrikaans	Portuguese
Arabic	Spanish
English	Swahili
French	other languages

Besides the former colonial languages of English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish, the following languages are official at the national level in Africa:

• Arabic in Algeria, Comoros, Chad, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Libya, Mauritania,^[6] Morocco, Somalia,^[7] Sudan, and Tunisia
• Berber in Morocco and Algeria
• Swahili in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda
• Chichewa in Malawi
• Amharic in Ethiopia ( Work Language not Official language )
• Somali in Greater Somalia
• Kinyarwanda in Rwanda and the closely related Kirundi in Burundi
• Sango in the CAR
• Swazi in Swaziland and South Africa
• Malagasy in Madagascar
• Seychellois Creole in the Seychelles
• Shona, Ndebele in Zimbabwe
• Afrikaans, Ndebele, Xhosa, Zulu, Pedi, Sotho, Tswana, Swazi, Venda, and Tsonga in South Africa^[8]

Cross-border languages[link]

The colonial borders established by European powers following the Berlin Conference in 1884-1885 divided a great many ethnic groups and African language speaking communities. In a sense, "cross-border languages" is a misnomer — the speakers did not divide themselves. Nevertheless it describes the reality of many African languages, which has implications for divergence of language on either side of a border (especially when the official languages are different), standards for writing the language, etc. Some notable cross-border languages include Berber (which stretches across much of North Africa and some parts of West Africa), Swahili and Fula.

Some prominent Africans such as former Malian president and current Chairman of the African Commission, Alpha Oumar Konaré, have referred to cross-border languages as a factor that can promote African unity.^[9]

Language change and planning[link]

Language is not static in Africa any more than in other world regions. In addition to the (probably modest) impact of borders, there are also cases of dialect levelling (such as in Igbo and probably many others), koinés (such as N'Ko and possibly Runyakitara), and emergence of new dialects (such as Sheng). In some countries there are official efforts to develop standardized language versions.

There are also many less widely spoken languages that may be considered endangered languages.

Demographics[link]

Of the 890 million Africans (as of 2005), about 17 percent speak an Arabic dialect. About 10 percent speak Swahili, the lingua franca of East Africa; about 5 percent speak a Berber dialect; and about 5 percent speak Hausa, the lingua franca of West Africa. Other important West African languages are Yoruba, Igbo and Fula. Major Horn of Africa languages are Amharic and Oromo. Important South African languages are Zulu and Afrikaans.

English, French, Portuguese and Spanish are important languages in Africa: 130, 115, 20, 10 million Africans speak them as either native or secondary languages. Through (among other factors) sheer demographic weight, Africans are increasingly taking ownership of these four world languages and having an ever greater influence on their development and growth.

Linguistic features[link]

Some linguistic features are particularly common among languages spoken in Africa, whereas others are less common. Such shared traits probably are not due to a common origin of all African languages. Instead, some may be due to language contact (resulting in borrowing) and specific idioms and phrases may be due to a similar cultural background.

Phonological[link]

Some widespread phonetic features include:

• certain types of consonants, such as implosives (/ɓa/), ejectives (/kʼa/), the labiodental flap, and in southern Africa, clicks (/ǂa/, /ᵑǃa/). True implosives are rare outside Africa, and clicks and the flap almost unheard of.
• doubly articulated labial-velar stops like /k͡pa/ and /ɡ͡ba/ are found it a wide belt south of the Sahara.
• prenasalized consonants, like /mpa/ and /ŋɡa/, are widespread in Africa but not common outside it.
• sequences of stops and fricatives at the beginnings of words, such as /fsa/, /pta/, and /dt͡sk͡xʼa/, are notable throughout the continent.
• nasal stops which only occur with nasal vowels, such as [ba] vs. [mã] (but both [pa] and [pã]), especially in West Africa.
• vowels contrasting a advanced or retracted tongue, commonly called "tense" and "lax".
• simple tone systems which are used for grammatical purposes.

Sounds that are relatively uncommon in African languages include uvular consonants, diphthongs, and front rounded vowels.

Tonal languages are found throughout the world but are especially numerous in Africa. Both the Nilo-Saharan and the Khoi-San phyla are fully tonal. The large majority of the Niger–Congo languages is also tonal. Tonal languages are also found in the Omotic, Chadic, and South & East Cushitic branches of Afroasiatic. The most common type of tonal system opposes two tone levels, High (H) and Low (L). Contour tones do occur, and can often be analysed as two or more tones in succession on a single syllable. Tone melodies play an important role, meaning that it is often possible to state significant generalizations by separating tone sequences ("melodies") from the segments that bear them. Tonal sandhi processes like tone spread, tone shift, and downstep and downdrift are common in African languages.

Syntactic[link]

Widespread syntactical structures include the common use of adjectival verbs and the expression of comparison by means of a verb 'to surpass'. The Niger–Congo languages are famous for having very large numbers of genders (noun classes) which cause agreement in verbs and other words. Case, tense, and other categories may be distinguished only by tone.

Semantic[link]

Quite often, only one term is used for both animal and meat; the word nama or nyama for animal/meat is particularly widespread in otherwise widely divergent African languages.

See also[link]

General[link]

Africa portal

• Languages of the African Union
• Writing systems of Africa
• Journal of West African Languages

Works[link]

• Polyglotta Africana
• The Languages of Africa

Classifiers[link]

• Karl Lepsius
• Wilhelm Bleek
• Carl Meinhof
• Diedrich Westermann
• Joseph Greenberg

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Childs, G. Tucker (2003). An Introduction to African Languages. Amsterdam: John Benjamin.
• Chimhundu, Herbert (2002). Language Policies in Africa. (Final report of the Intergovernmental Conference on Language Policies in Africa.) Revised version. UNESCO.
• Cust, Robert Needham (1883). Modern Languages of Africa.
• Ellis, Stephen (ed.) (1996). Africa Now: People - Policies - Institutions. The Hague: Ministry of Foreign Affairs (DGIS).
• Elugbe, Ben (1998) "Cross-border and major languages of Africa." In K. Legère (editor), Cross-border Languages: Reports and Studies, Regional Workshop on Cross-Border Languages, National Institute for Educational Development (NIED), Okahandja, 23–27 September 1996. Windhoek: Gamsberg Macmillan.
• Ethnologue.com's Africa: A listing of African languages and language families.
• Greenberg, Joseph H. (1983). 'Some areal characteristics of African languages.' In Ivan R. Dihoff (editor), Current Approaches to African Linguistics, Vol. 1 (Publications in African Languages and Linguistics, Vol. 1), Dordrecht: Foris, 3-21.
• Greenberg, Joseph H. (1966). The Languages of Africa (2nd edition with additions and corrections). Bloomington: Indiana University.
• Heine, Bernd and Derek Nurse (editors) (2000). African Languages: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Webb, Vic and Kembo-Sure (editors) (1998). African Voices: An Introduction to the Languages and Linguistics of Africa. Cape Town: Oxford University Press Southern Africa.
• Wedekind, Klaus ( Oxford University Press.

External links[link]

• Web resources for African languages
• Linguistic maps of Africa from Muturzikin.com
• Online Dictionaries, e-books, and other online fulltexts in or on African languages

Dr Bonginkosi Emmanuel "Blade" Nzimande (born April 14, 1958) is a South African politician who has been Minister for Higher Education and Training since 2009.^[1] He has been the General Secretary of the South African Communist Party since 1998.^[2][3] He has a doctorate degree in philosophy specialising in sociology. He came out strongly against the concept of Nationalisation at the COSATU conference in June 2011.

Birth and family[link]

Nzimande was born in Edendale, Pietermaritzburg, on 14 April 1958. "Blade" Nzimande was one of the three children of Nozipho Alice and Phillip Sphambano, a Shangaan herbalist from Mozambique.

Education[link]

Nzimande attended the Roman Catholic School, Henryville, and then Plessiers Lower Primary School before going to Mthethomusha School in Edendale, the first school in the area established under the new Bantu education system. He matriculated in 1975 at Georgetown High, Edendale.

While at school participated in youth clubs which were gatherings for cultural and sporting events, and were not particularly political in nature. He first became politically aware when Harry Gwala was released from Robben Island prison in 1973 and this was widely discussed in his community.

He completed his Psychology Honours degree at the University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, in 1980. His Masters degree is in Industrial Psychology (1981) and more recently he has been awarded a PhD for a thesis in the field of personnel management from the University of Natal.

Political Demonstrations[link]

In 1976 Nzimande enrolled at the University of Zululand to study towards a BA degree, majoring in Public Administration and Psychology. He became involved in student activity, including a food boycott and demonstrations against the award of an honorary doctorate to Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi in May 1976. During that time the Black Consciousness-oriented South African Students' Organization (SASO) was prominent on campus, but Nzimande's political views later shifter towards the Congress Alliance.

Following the shooting of demonstrating students in Soweto on 16 June 1976, the administration building of the university was burnt down and the university subsequently closed down for a period. Nzimande returned to university in 1977 and completed his degree in 1979. After graduating, he returned to Edendale and joined the Azanian Students’ Organisation (Azaso) which eventually broke away from the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), aligning itself with the Congress or Charterist tendency.

For Nzimande the shift from BCM to the Chartersist position was facilitated by weekly Zulu broadcasts from Radio Freedom and Radio Moscow. In this way he and his colleaques became acquainted with the policy of the African National Congress (ANC) and they started to receive underground ANC documents. While active in Azaso Nzimande completed his Honours and Masters degrees.

Work[link]

In January 1982 Nzimande moved to Durban, and at that stage was active in the Dambuza Youth Organisation which affiliated to the United Democratic Front (UDF) after its launch in 1983.

In 1982 Nzimande undertook his internship in Industrial Psychology in the personnel department of Tongaat Hulett Sugar Ltd. There he met Jay Naidoo and began working informally with unions, addressing union seminars on job grading and other issues. He resigned his job in 1984.

Nzimande was the offered a post as a lecturer at the Umlazi branch of the University of Zululand where he founded the Department of Industrial Psychology on that campus. At the same time, he became increasingly involved with the trade unions and served on the editorial board of the South African Labour Bulletin in 1986. He also continued to assist with trade unions seminars teaching the history of trade unionism.

Lecturer[link]

In Umlazi he began to work on educational issues in mid-1986 and also held clandestine Marxist study classes with the youth. Nzimande lectured until June 1987 and then joined the University of Natal, Durban to lecture in the Psychology Department. There he became involved in the Culture and Working Life Project, and initiated the cultural actitivities of the Dumbuzo Cultural Organisation which produced a play on violence, Koze Kube Nini (Until When?), performed in the townships. He also wrote various articles on violence, and assisted in the presentation of seminars.

Mbeki[link]

Dr. Nzimande criticized the government of Thabo Mbeki and its economic policy, and he was vocal in his support for the removal of Mbeki as President of South Africa.^[4]

SACP Donation[link]

In 2007 Malawian businessman Charles Modise claimed he made a R500,000 donation to the South African Communist Party in 2002. He claimed he gave the money, packed in black plastic bags, to Willy Madisha, who in turn swore he transported the money in the boot of his car to SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande. However, Nzimande denied ever receiving the money. ^[5][6]

Kgalema Motlanthe[link]

Nzimande began to attack President Kgalema Motlanthe in early January 2009. Saying he was part of the "old Mbeki crowd", senior ANC members loyal to Jacob Zuma called for Nzimande to become second Deputy President, alongside Baleka Mbete. President Motlanthe was also attacked by Nzimande because he fired Vusi Pikoli in 2008, and refused to sign the SABC bill, which would give the ANC full control of State Television.

References[link]

• "Who is Who in South African Politics," by Shelagh Gastrow, 1995, Rovan Press, Johannesburg,