The word "Xhosa" is derived from the Khoisan language and means "angry men". The murmured clicks, plosives and affricates are only partially voiced, with the following vowel murmured for some speakers. The phonology of Xhosa is characterized by a simple vowel inventory and a complex system of consonants. Bonny Sands (1998) concluded that the family is not demonstrable with current evidence. Voiceless palatal plosive becomes voiced. The Khoe family is both the most numerous and diverse family of Khoisan languages, with seven living languages and over a quarter million speakers. Tuu: A New Name for the Southern Khoisan Family, in Tom Gldemann (ed.). Agreements usually reflect part of the original class with which the word agrees. F https://t.co/s7IkqA9Utl, It feels good to have @KevinHart4real also known as Mpho here in Johannesburg, South Africa. We use the verb "have" to denote possession, ownership, and other related meanings. The official name of the language is isiXhosa, with the key word Xhosa being derived from the Khoisan Language. Occasionally other languages are said by laypeople to have "click" sounds. Xhosa (formerly spelled Xosa) is an official language of South Africa, natively spoken by around 7.9 million people which is about around 16% of the population of South Africa. The verb is modified by affixes to mark subject, object, tense, aspect and mood. Fricatives become affricated and, if voiceless, they become ejectives as well: mf is pronounced [pf], ndl is pronounced [nd], n+hl becomes ntl [nt], n+z becomes ndz [ndz], n+q becomes [n] etc. Don't let the learning stop here. The pocket of air produced by the resulting enclosure is rarefied by the sucking action of the tongue. Some support the use of English and see its use in education as de facto segregation. The language is an important part of Khois. North Khoisan is spoken by hunter-gatherers mainly in Namibia. By distribution over land, Xhosa is the most widely spoken African language (while Zulu is most widely spoken in terms of population). Is Xhosa a Khoisan language? is awesome for learning key words and phrases in Xhosa, especially if you want to use it for travel purposes. Bulu, Xhosa is a member of the Southeastern, or Nguni, subgroup of the Bantu group of the Benue-Congo branch of the Niger-Congo language family. With about 800 speakers in Tanzania, Hadza is no longer seen as a Khoisan language and appears to be unrelated to any other language. Its great for beginners getting started in a language and invaluable for intermediates looking to fill in gaps in their vocabulary and pronunciation. The Xhosa noun consists of two essential parts, the prefix and the stem. As a balance to consonant complexity, strict rules restrict clicks and most of the non-clicks to the beginning of a word being followed always by a vowel. http://www.freelang.net/dictionary/xhosa.php Learn more about the Nilo-Saharan language family on Ethnologue. The language is marked by the large number of click consonant sounds used. Otherwise, they tend to be tenuis (plain) stops. [12], Xhosa is the most widely distributed African language in South Africa, though the most widely spoken African language is Zulu. Because I believe in uTalk so much, I reached out to them and weve teamed up to offer you an exclusive 30% OFF reader discount across all of uTalks 140 languages! They are called upon for guidance, support. Besides clicks, Khoisan languages have non-click consonants, giving rise to very complex consonantal systems which are amongst the largest in the world. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. [1][2] Khoisan is defined as those languages that have click consonants and do not belong to other African language families. Lingala, Forming part of Durban's vibrant Golden Mile, the Bay of Plenty lies at the heart of the beachfront, with high-rise hotels and apartment buildings making the most of the stunning sea view. . Herero, All languages use sound symbolism to some extent, and, while there are indeed examples of clicks functioning in this way (for example, !, the word for the clicking noise made by the knee joints of a walking eland [Taurotragus oryx], contains an appropriate click in one Khoisan language), their normal linguistic function is as unremarkable as the function of more familiar consonants such as b or s in any language. Chokwe, Subscribe using the form below to have all of my posts delivered directly to your email. A certain headdress will be a worn by a newly married girl, while a woman who has just given birth to her first child will wear a differently styled headdress. Unfortunately, many of these languages have left behind no written records, so their loss is permanent. According to the 2011 census there Gwere, Copyright 19982023 Simon Ager | Email: | Hosted by Kualo, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xhosa_language, https://www.memrise.com/course/1572/xhosa-an-intro/, http://xhosaculture.co.za/about-us/learn-xhosa/, https://www.twinkl.co.za/resources/south-africa-resources/isixhosa-foundation-phase-english-south-africa-suid-afrika/2, http://www.freelang.net/dictionary/xhosa.php, http://www.salanguages.com/isixhosa/xhowrd.htm, http://www.southafricalogue.com/travel-tips/south-african-phrases-xhosa.html. Xhosa is part of the branch of Nguni languages, which also include Zulu, Southern Ndebele and Northern Ndebele, called the Zunda languages. How difficult is it to learn Xhosa? These are divided into North, Central and South Khoisan groups belonging to southern Africa, plus two Tanzanian isolates, Sandawe and Hadza (Hatsa), which possess a few words, affixes, and particles that justify the assumption of a distant relationship with Khoisan. These famous click sounds are found in Khoisan languages (alternative names include Khoesaan or Khoesan). Xhosa and Khoisan peoples. The prenasalized versions have a very short voicing at the onset which then releases in an ejective, like the prenasalized affricates, while the phonemically nasal clicks have a very long voicing through the consonant. Forms of "Nga" ##. It is spoken by the Xhosa people in South Africa, and has around 8 million speakers. As a Bantu language, Xhosa and Zulu people are often able to understand one another. Their use in education has been governed by legislation, beginning with the Bantu Education Act, 1953.[12]. Elsewhere many bilingual Khoisan speakers have tended to shift rapidly to the dominant language, thus ceasing transmission of the mother tongue to children and leaving it to contract and die, sometimes quite abruptly. However, tones are usually not indicated in writing. Khoisan languages, characterised by implosive consonants or 'clicks', belonged to a totally different language family from those of the Bantu speakers. It is believed that the Xhosa language "click" sounds originated from the Khoisan language and that they were assimilated into the Xhosa Language over a long period of amalgamation between Xhosa and Khoisan peoples. The normal word order in Xhosa is Verb-Object (the subject is part of the verb compound). C'est la deuxime langue la plus parle du pays. If a woman has children, whom she has raised to be adults, then it is usual to find her seated among her peers smoking a long-handled pipe. Although vowel length distinguishes word meaning, the length is not represented in writing, except for and . Xhosa has a complex system of consonants, including some uncommon ones. Xhosa is a tonal language with two inherent phonemic tones: low and high. Below is a table of Xhosa consonants. Includes English and Italian translations with pronuncation guide. So by clicking on these links you can help to support this site. https://www.twinkl.co.za/resources/south-africa-resources/isixhosa-foundation-phase-english-south-africa-suid-afrika/2, Online Xhosa dictionaries Songe, second language speakers. Xhosa | South African History Online Archaeological evidence suggests that the Khoisan people appeared in southern Africa some 60,000 years ago. South Africa is the native land of Xhosa, which is spoken chiefly in the Eastern Cape Province. De Aar is the commercial center for the wool production and livestock farming industry in this semi-arid region of South Africa. 1. Family words | South African Culture and Tradition Explored. Xhosa (/ks, kos/,[5][6][7] Xhosa pronunciation:[ksa]), formerly spelled Xosa and also known by its local name isiXhosa, is a Nguni language and one of the official languages of South Africa and Zimbabwe. Xhosa Language - Dialects & Structure - MustGo It is closely related to Zulu, Swati, and Ndebele. Besides pulmonic egressive sounds, which are found in all spoken languages, it has a series of ejective stops and one implosive stop. are about 8.2 million native speakers of Xhosa, and another 11 million As of 2003[update] approximately 5.3million Xhosa-speakers, the majority, live in the Eastern Cape, followed by the Western Cape (approximately 2million), Gauteng (671,045), the Free State (246,192), KwaZulu-Natal (219,826), North West (214,461), Mpumalanga (46,553), the Northern Cape (51,228), and Limpopo (14,225). There are some exceptions, for instance, the Sandawe language in Tanzania whose speakers have maintained a relatively stable linguistic community. Nama, in particular, has a long tradition of literacy. The Bantu languages adopted the use of clicks from neighboring, displaced, or absorbed Khoisan populations (or from other Bantu languages), often through intermarriage, while the Dahalo are thought to have retained clicks from an earlier language when they shifted to speaking a Cushitic language; if so, the pre-Dahalo language may have been something like Hadza or Sandawe. What Languages are Used in the Black Panther Movie? - Day Translations Blog Several radio stations and one TV station broadcast in Xhosa. Group of African language families with click consonants, "San language" redirects here. is that you can jump around their extensive library of topics and choose what you want to learn, when you want, and at your own pace. In Nguni. Xhosa is an agglutinative language that expresses grammatical functions by adding prefixes and suffixes to roots. They are marked with a raised //. In Xhosa, the verb "have" is represented by the word "nga" and its various forms. Xhosa Language in South Africa | SouthAfrica.com