Languages of Mozambique | |
---|---|
Official | Portuguese |
Recognised | Makhuwa, Sena, Tsonga, Lomwe, Shona |
Indigenous | Barwe, Chewa, Chichopi, Chitonga, Chuwabu, Dema, Gitonga, Kimwani, Koti, Kunda, Maindo, Makonde, Makwe, Manyika, Nathembo, Ndau, Ngoni, Nsenga, Nyungwe, Phimbi, Ronga, Sena, Swahili, Swati, Tawara, Tewe, Tswa, Yao |
Vernacular | Mozambican Portuguese |
Immigrant | English, Punjabi, Hindi |
Foreign | English |
Signed | Mozambican Sign Language |
Keyboard layout |
Mozambique is a multilingual country. A number of Bantu languages are indigenous to Mozambique. Portuguese, inherited from the colonial period (see: Portuguese Mozambique ), is the official language, and Mozambique is a full member of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries. [1] Ethnologue lists 43 languages spoken in the country.
According to INE, the National Institute of Statistics of Mozambique, Portuguese is the most widely spoken language in Mozambique: according to the 2007 national population and housing census, 50.4% of the national population aged 5 and older (80.8% of people living in urban areas and 36.3% in rural areas) are fluent in the language. The 2017 national population and housing census found out that Portuguese is spoken by 47.3% of all Mozambicans aged 5 and older, with native speakers making up 16.6% [2] of the population (38.3% in the cities and 5.1% in rural areas, respectively) Mozambique has 22 Bantu origin languages which are: Swahili, Makhuwa, Sena, Ndau, Tswa-Ronga (Tsonga), Lomwe, Ekoti, Nahara, Makonde, Chopi, Chuwabu, Ronga, Kimwani, Nhungwe, Chimanika, Shona, Chiyao, Chichewa, Bitonga, Ngoni, Tswa and Chitewe. [3] The language of the deaf community is Mozambican Sign Language. [3]
Small communities of Arabs, Chinese, and Indians (primarily the Gujarati language) speak their own languages (Indians from Portuguese India speak any of the Portuguese Creoles of their origin) aside from Portuguese as their second language. [3]
Article 9 of Mozambique's constitution provides for the recognition of national languages and that such languages be considered of "cultural and educational heritage" and that the state "shall promote their development and increasing use as languages that convey our identity". Portuguese is deemed the country's official language by article 10.
Most Mozambicans speak more than one language. According to the Mozambican MINEDH, primary education will become fully bilingual, starting in 2017, and include 16 Mozambican languages, followed by Portuguese as a foreign language [4] [5] [ citation needed ]. According to the 2007 census, about 50.4% of all people aged 5 and older speak Portuguese, and 10.7%, including people of Portuguese ancestry and mestiços, speak it as their first language. Use of the Portuguese language remains strongly concentrated to the urban population of Mozambique along the coast. [1]
The map shows the dominant language by region.
Many indigenous languages of Mozambique have loan words of Portuguese origin.
Language | Number of speakers (L1) | Percentage of population |
---|---|---|
Emakhuwa | 4,007,010 | 24.8 |
Cisena | 1,807,319 | 11.2 |
Xitsonga | 1,799,614 | 11.2 |
Elomwe | 1,269,527 | 7.9 |
Cishona | 1,070,471 | 6.6 |
Xitswa | 763,029 | 4.7 |
Xironga | 626,174 | 3.9 |
Chichewa | 607,671 | 3.8 |
Portuguese | 489,915 | 3.0 |
Cinyungwe | 446,567 | 2.8 |
Cicopi | 406,521 | 2.5 |
Ciyao | 374,426 | 2.3 |
Shimakonde | 371,111 | 2.3 |
Ekoti | 102,393 | 0.6 |
Kimwani | 29,980 | 0.2 |
Swahili | 21,070 | 0.1 |
Swazi | 7,742 | 0.05 |
Zulu | 3,529 | 0.02 |
Total | 16,135,403 | 100 |
Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique, is a country located in southeast Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west, and Eswatini and South Africa to the southwest. The sovereign state is separated from the Comoros, Mayotte and Madagascar by the Mozambique Channel to the east. The capital and largest city is Maputo.
The demographics of Mozambique describes the condition and overview of Mozambique's peoples. Demographic topics include basic education, health, and population statistics as well as identified racial and religious affiliations.
Tsonga or, natively, Xitsonga, as an endonym, is a Bantu language spoken by the Tsonga people of South Africa. It is mutually intelligible with Tswa and Ronga and the name "Tsonga" is often used as a cover term for all three, also sometimes referred to as Tswa-Ronga. The Xitsonga language has been standardised for both academic and home use. Tsonga is an official language of South Africa, and under the name "Shangani" it is recognised as an official language in the Constitution of Zimbabwe. All Tswa-Ronga languages are recognised in Mozambique. It is not official in Eswatini.
The Instituto Nacional de Estatística or INE is the government office for national statistics of Portugal. In the English language it is also branded as Statistics Portugal.
Latin Americans are the citizens of Latin American countries.
The Swahili people comprise mainly Bantu, Afro-Arab and Comorian ethnic groups inhabiting the Swahili coast, an area encompassing the Zanzibar archipelago and mainland Tanzania's seaboard, littoral Kenya, northern Mozambique, the Comoros Islands and Northwest Madagascar.
Peru has many languages in use, with its official languages being Spanish, Quechua and Aymara. Spanish has been in the country since it began being taught in the time of José Pardo instead of the country's Native languages, especially the languages in the Andes. In the beginning of the 21st century, it was estimated that in this multilingual country, about 50 very different and popular languages are spoken: which reduces to 44 languages if dialects are considered variants of the same language. The majority of these languages are Indigenous, but the most common language is Spanish, the main language that about 94.4% of the population speaks. Spanish is followed by the country's Indigenous languages, especially all types of Quechua and Aymara (1.7%), who also have co-official status according to Article 48 of the Constitution of Peru, as well as the languages of the Amazon and the Peruvian Sign Language. In urban areas of the country, especially the coastal region, most people are monolingual and only speak Spanish, while in many rural areas of the country, especially in the Amazon, multilingual populations are prevalent.
Portuguese is the only official language of Angola, but 46 other languages are spoken in the country, mostly Bantu languages.
The culture of Mozambique is in large part derived from its history of Bantu, Swahili, and Portuguese rule, and has expanded since independence in 1975. The majority of its inhabitants are black Africans. Its main language is Portuguese. Its median religion is Roman Catholicism, but only about 40% of the inhabitants are Christian. It has a rich history in the areas of arts, cuisine, and entertainment.
Mozambican Portuguese refers to the varieties of Portuguese spoken in Mozambique. Portuguese is the official language of the country.
Tswa (Xitswa) is a South-Eastern Bantu language in Southern Mozambique. Its closest relatives are Ronga and Tsonga, the three forming the Tswa–Ronga family of languages.
Ronga is a Bantu language of the Tswa–Ronga branch spoken just south of Maputo in Mozambique. It extends a little into South Africa. It has about 650,000 speakers in Mozambique and a further 90,000 in South Africa, with dialects including Konde, Putru and Kalanga.
The Tswa–Ronga languages are a group of closely related Southern Bantu languages spoken in Southern Africa chiefly in southern Mozambique, northeastern South Africa and southeastern Zimbabwe.
Mabote District is a district of Inhambane Province in south-east Mozambique. Its principal town is Mabote. The district is located at the northwest of the province and borders with Machaze District of Manica Province and Machanga District of Sofala Province in the north, Govuro District in the east, Inhassoro District in the southeast, Funhalouro District in the south, and with Chigubo and Massangena Districts of Gaza Province in the west. The area of the district is 14,577 square kilometres (5,628 sq mi). In terms of the area, this is the biggest district of Inhambane Province. It has a population of 45101 as of 2007.
Many languages are spoken, or historically have been spoken, in Zimbabwe. Since the adoption of its 2013 Constitution, Zimbabwe has 16 official languages, namely Chewa, Chibarwe, English, Kalanga, Koisan, Nambya, Ndau, Ndebele, Shangani, Shona, sign language, Sotho, Tonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa. The country's main languages are Shona, spoken by only 42% of the population, and Ndebele, spoken by roughly 39%. English is the country's lingua franca, used in government and business and as the main medium of instruction in schools. English is the first language of most white Zimbabweans, and is the second language of a majority of black Zimbabweans. Historically, a minority of white Zimbabweans spoke Afrikaans, Greek, Italian, Polish, and Portuguese, among other languages, while Gujarati and Hindi could be found amongst the country's Indian population. Deaf Zimbabweans commonly use one of several varieties of Zimbabwean Sign Language, with some using American Sign Language. Zimbabwean language data is based on estimates, as Zimbabwe has never conducted a census that enumerated people by language.
Christianity is the largest religion in Mozambique, with substantial minorities of the adherents of traditional faiths and Islam.
The official language of Guinea-Bissau is Portuguese, which was spoken by 32.1% of the population according to the 2009 census. It is the language of instruction in schools, the language of literary production, the written press, legislation and administration.
Eswatini is home to several languages. Native languages are Swazi, Zulu, Tsonga, Afrikaans, and English. Recent immigrant languages include Chichewa and Southern Sotho.
Idalaka is a Malayo-Polynesian dialect chain spoken in East Timor. The name is a portmanteau of Idaté and Lakalai.
Valdezia is a sprawling rural settlement situated at the foothills of the Soutpansberg mountain range in Louis Trichardt, Limpopo Province, South Africa. It was formerly known as Albasini before Swiss Missionaries renamed it Valdezia in 1875. The village itself was formally established in 1820 by Tsonga refugees who were fleeing despotic rule from Soshangane. It is roughly 10 km east of Elim Hospital in the Hlanganani district in the former Gazankulu homeland, South Africa. It was the site of a Swiss mission station, and it was named after the Swiss canton of Vaud. Valdezia's population, according to the official census of 2011, currently stands at between 7,600 and 8,000 people. It is considered the birthplace of the written Tsonga language in South Africa.