100 Things 004: Polyglottal

[ctquill]

South Africa has eleven official languages. Fortunately for the sign writers, they don't have to fit all of them on at once!





In Cape Town the three main languages spoken are Afrikaans, Xhosa and English, as seen on these municipal signs. Afrikaans is pretty much a local derivation of Dutch, though also influenced by the other languages it encountered while developing. Xhosa is one of the Nguni group of languages. It's characterised by click sounds, probably picked up from the Khoisan (original inhabitants of the Cape area).

The Click Song (Qongqothwane) by the legendary Miriam Makeba:

Click to view

English is the most widely understood language in South Africa and is the second language of most South Africans, but it's the mother tongue of only about 8% of the country's population.

The eleven languages, in order from most prevalent as a mother tongue to least (in the country as a whole), are:

isiZulu
isiXhosa
Afrikaans
Sepedi
English
Setswana
Sesotho
Xitsonga
siSwati
Tshivenda
isiNdebele

So, to everyone reading this:

Ngiyabonga
Enkosi
Dankie
Ke a leboga
Ke a leboga
Ke a leboha
Inkomu
Siyabonga
Ndo livhuwa
Ngiyathokoza

And, of course, thank you!

Facts mostly from SAlanguages.com and the South African Government Information website.