Kwangali language

Last updated
Kwangali
Rukwangali
Native to Namibia, Angola
Region Kavango West
Native speakers
152,000 (2018) [1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 kwn
Glottolog kwan1273
K.33 [2]

Kwangali, or RuKwangali, is a Bantu language spoken by 85,000 people along the Kavango River in Namibia, where it is a national language, and in Angola. It is one of several Bantu languages of the Kavango which have click consonants; these are the dental clicks c and gc, along with prenasalization and aspiration.

Contents

Maho (2009) includes Mbunza as a dialect, but excludes Sambyu, which he includes in Manyo.

Phonology

Consonants

Bilabial Labio-
dental
Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Nasal m n ɲ
Plosive voiceless p t k
aspirated
voiced b d ɡ
prenasal vl. ᵐpʰ ⁿtʰ ᵑkʰ
prenasal vd. ᵐb ⁿd ⁿdʒ ᵑɡ
Fricative voiceless f s ʃ h
voiced β v z
prenasal vl. ᶬf ⁿs
prenasal vd. ᶬv ⁿz
Approximant l j w
Trill r

A dental click type [ǀ] may also be heard,[ how many consonants is this? ] being adopted from the neighboring Khoisan languages. The clicks may also tend to be heard as alveolar [!]. [3]

Vowels

Front Central Back
High i u
Mid e o
Low a

Short vowels of /i e o u/ may also be pronounced as [ɪ ɛ ɔ ʊ]. [4]

Related Research Articles

Central Kilimanjaro, or Central Chaga, is a Bantu language of Tanzania spoken by the Chaga people.

Yeyi is a Bantu language spoken by many of the approximately 50,000 Yeyi people along the Okavango River in Namibia and Botswana. Yeyi, influenced by Juu languages, is one of several Bantu languages along the Okavango with clicks. Indeed, it has the largest known inventory of clicks of any Bantu language, with dental, alveolar, palatal, and lateral articulations. Though most of its older speakers prefer Yeyi in normal conversation, it is being gradually phased out in Botswana by a popular move towards Tswana, with Yeyi only being learned by children in a few villages. Yeyi speakers in the Caprivi Strip of north-eastern Namibia, however, retain Yeyi in villages, but may also speak the regional lingua franca, Lozi.

Mbukushu or Thimbukushu is a Bantu language spoken by 45,000 people along the Kavango East Region in Namibia, where it is a national language, and in Botswana, Angola and Zambia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dciriku language</span> Bantu language spoken in southern Africa

Gciriku, or Dciriku, is a Bantu language spoken by 305,000 people along the Kavango River in Namibia, Botswana and Angola. 24,000 people speak Gciriku in Angola, according to Ethnologue. It was first known in the west via the Vagciriku, who had migrated from the main Vamanyo area and spoke Rugciriku, a dialect of Rumanyo. The name Gciriku remains common in the literature, but within Namibia the name Rumanyo has been revived. The Mbogedu dialect is extinct; Maho (2009) lists it as a distinct language, and notes that the names 'Manyo' and 'Rumanyo' are inappropriate for it.

Chokwe is a Bantu language spoken by the Chokwe people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola and Zambia. It is recognised as a national language of Angola, where half a million people were estimated to have spoken it in 1991; another half a million speakers lived in the Congo in 1990, and some 20,000 in Zambia in 2010. It is used as a lingua franca in eastern Angola.

The Kavango – Southwest Bantu languages are a group of Bantu languages established by Anita Pfouts (2003). The Southwest Bantu languages constitute most of Guthrie's Zone R. The languages, or clusters, along with their Guthrie identifications, are:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lega language</span> Bantu language spoken in DR Congo

Lega is a Bantu language, or dialect cluster, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. There are two major varieties, Shabunda Lega and Mwenga Lega; Mwenga Lega, with about 10% of speakers, finds Shabunda difficult to understand. Kanu has been assigned a separate ISO code but is a dialect of Shabunda, and no more divergent than other dialects.

The Tsogo languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone B.30 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), the languages form a valid node. They are:

The Kele or Sheke languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone B.20 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), apart possibly from Seki (Sheke) (B.21) itself, the languages form a valid node. They are:

The Sira languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone B.40 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), together with a couple languages from H10, they form a valid node. They are:

The Mboshi languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone C.20 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), apart from Kyba (Kuba), the languages form a valid node. They are:

The Soko or Soko–Kele languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone C.50–60 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), apart from Mongo (Nkundo), the languages form a valid node. They are:

The Tetela languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone C.70 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), together with C.81 Dengese and C.89, the Shuwa "dialect" of Bushoong, the languages form a valid node. They are:

Tongwe (Sitongwe) and Bende (Sibende) constitute a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone F.10 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), they form a valid node. Indeed, at 90% lexical similarity they may be dialects of a single language.

The Pende or Holu languages are a clade of Bantu languages coded Zone L.10 in Guthrie's classification. According to Nurse & Philippson (2003), they form a valid node together with a couple languages from Zone H:

Kuba is a Bantu language of Kasai, Democratic Republic of Congo.

Holoholo is a Bantu language of DR Congo and formerly in Tanzania spoken by the Holoholo people on either side of Lake Tanganyika. Classification is uncertain, but it may belong with the Takama group.

Bango, is a Bantu language spoken in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Ethnologue suggests it may be a dialect of Budza, but Nurse & Philippson (2003) list it as one of the Bwa languages.

Suku is a Bantu language of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Proto-Bantu is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Bantu languages, a subgroup of the Southern Bantoid languages. It is thought to have originally been spoken in West/Central Africa in the area of what is now Cameroon. About 6,000 years ago, it split off from Proto-Southern Bantoid when the Bantu expansion began to the south and east. Two theories have been put forward about the way the languages expanded: one is that the Bantu-speaking people moved first to the Congo region and then a branch split off and moved to East Africa; the other is that the two groups split from the beginning, one moving to the Congo region, and the other to East Africa.

References

  1. "Kwangali". Ethnologue. Retrieved 15 August 2018.
  2. Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online
  3. Dammann (1957)
  4. Sommer, Gabi (2003). Western Savanna. Nurse, Derek and Philippson, Gérard (eds.), The Bantu languages: London & New York: Routledge. pp. 566–580.

Books