Maputo, officially named Lourenço Marques until 1976, is the capital and most populous city of Mozambique. The city is named after chief Maputsu I of the Tembe clan, a subgroup of the Tsonga people. Located near the southern end of the country, it is positioned within 120 km of the Eswatini and South Africa borders. The city has a population of 1,088,449 distributed over a land area of 347.69 km2. The Maputo metropolitan area includes the neighbouring city of Matola, and has a total population of 2,717,437. Maputo is a port city, with an economy centered on commerce. It is also noted for its vibrant cultural scene and distinctive, eclectic architecture.
Samora Moisés Machel was a Mozambican military commander and political leader. A socialist in the tradition of Marxism–Leninism, he served as the first President of Mozambique from the country's independence in 1975. Machel died in office in 1986 when his presidential aircraft crashed near the Mozambican-South African border.
António Emílio Leite Couto, better known as Mia Couto, is a Mozambican writer. He won the Camões Prize in 2013, the most important literary award in the Portuguese language, and the Neustadt International Prize for Literature in 2014.
The Eduardo Mondlane University is the oldest and largest university in Mozambique. The UEM is located in Maputo and has about 40,000 students enrolled.
"Pátria Amada" is the national anthem of Mozambique, approved by law in 2002 under Article 295 of the Constitution of Mozambique.
Portuguese is spoken in a number of African countries and is the official language in six African countries: Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe and Equatorial Guinea. There are Portuguese-speaking communities in most countries of Southern Africa, a mixture of Portuguese settlers and Angolans and Mozambicans who left their countries during the civil wars. A rough estimate has it that there are about 14 million people who use Portuguese as their sole mother tongue across Africa, but depending on the criteria applied, the number might be considerably higher, since many Africans speak Portuguese as a second language, in countries like Angola and Mozambique, where Portuguese is an official language, but also in countries like South Africa and Senegal, thanks to migrants coming from Portuguese speaking countries. Some statistics claim that there are over 41,5 million Portuguese speakers in the continent. Africa is, therefore, the second continent with the most Portuguese speakers in the world, only behind the Americas. Like French and English, Portuguese has become a post-colonial language in Africa and one of the working languages of the African Union (AU) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Portuguese co-exists in Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, and São Tomé and Principe with Portuguese-based creoles, and in Angola, Mozambique, and Guinea-Bissau with autochthonous African languages.
Luís Bernardo Honwana is a Mozambican author and statesman.
José Eduardo Agualusa Alves da Cunha is a Portuguese journalist and writer of Portuguese and Brazilian descent. He studied agronomy and silviculture in Lisbon, Portugal. Currently he resides in the Island of Mozambique, working as a writer and journalist. He also has been working to establish a public library on the island.
Portuguese Mozambicans are Mozambican-born descendants of Portuguese settlers.
Sleepwalking Land is a novel written by Mia Couto, a Mozambican writer, first published in Portuguese in 1992 and translated into English by David Brookshaw in 2006. In 1995, the novel received the National Fiction Award from the Association of Mozambican Writers (AEMO) and was chosen as one of the twelve best African books of the 20th century by the panel of the Zimbabwe International Book Fair. The book was also the representative text read by the Neustadt Prize jury when Couto was nominated for the 2014 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, which he won.
Mozambique competed at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 5 to 21 August 2016. This was the nation's tenth consecutive appearance at the Summer Olympics.
Fundação Fernando Leite Couto, Portuguese for "Foundation Fernando Leite Couto", is a foundation and cultural centre in Mozambique's capital Maputo. It was founded in 2015 and is named after the Portuguese-Mozambican writer Fernando Leite Counto. The foundation has its seat in a building developed by Pancho Guedes at Avenida Kim Il Sung 961 in the Sommerschield neighbourhood.
Stella Mendonça is a Mozambican operatic soprano specializing in the bel canto repertoire. In 2002 Mendonça collaborated in adapting Georges Bizet's opera Carmen for African audiences and then performed it in Mozambique.
Magnet Theatre is an independent physical theatre company based in Cape Town, South Africa. It was formed in 1987 by Mark Fleishman and Jennie Reznek who have since been the company's artistic directors. Besides creating original theatre productions, Magnet Theatre is actively engaged in youth development work in the Cape Town area as well as in the Cederberg Municipality.
Confession of the Lioness is a novel written by award-winning Mozambican author Mia Couto. Originally published in 2012, it was translated from Portuguese to English in 2015 by David Brookshaw, and it was also a finalist for the Man Booker International Prize in 2015. The story is set in the 21st Century and inspired by real events that Couto experienced and real people with whom he interacted during his work as an environmental field officer in Cabo Delgado, Mozambique in 2008. His novel portrays the enigmatic crisis of Kulumani, a small village in Mozambique, where the women have become the prey of lions. Couto establishes the story through the perspective of Mariamar, the sister of the most recent victim, and Archangel Bullseye, a hunter hired by the government.
Hirondina Juliana Francisco Joshua, best known as Hirondina Joshua, is a Mozambican poet, writer, member of Associação dos Escritores Moçambicanos. She is part of the new generation of Mozambican authors.
Mabata Bata, is a 2017 Mozambique documentary drama film directed by Sol de Carvalho and co-produced by director himself with Rodrigo Areias and Ricardo Freitas for Bando à parte Promarte Films. The film is adapted from the short story “The Day Mabata Bata Exploded” written by Mozambican writer Mia Couto. The film describes the life of Azarias, a young orphaned shepherd who take care of the oxen herd. Even though he dreams of going to school, he is later accompany with Mabata Bata, the herd’s biggest ox to continue his life.
Fátima Langa was a Mozambican writer, primarily of stories for young readers, which drew on her childhood in southeastern Mozambique. She was the founder of the publishing house Editora Mulheres e Jovens Moçambicanos.
