Zulu language - Definition and Overview

Zulu, also known as isiZulu, is a language of the Zulu people with about 9 million speakers, the vast majority (over 95%) of whom live in South Africa. Zulu is the most spoken language in South Africa and became one of South Africa's 11 official languages at the end of apartheid.

Zulu is an agglutinative language which is part of the Nguni subfamily of the Bantu family of languages. One of its most distinctive features is the use of click consonants. This feature is shared with several other languages of Southern Africa, but is almost unique to this region. There are three basic clicks in Zulu:

• c - dental
• q - alveolar
• x - lateral

These can be modified in several ways, eg. by aspiration, so that there are a total of about 15 different click sounds in Zulu. The same sounds occur in Xhosa, where they are used more frequently than in Zulu.

The written form of the language is controlled by the Zulu Language Board of KwaZulu-Natal.

The known history of the language is limited, but evidence of the language exists from the sixteenth century.

Phrases

The following is a list of phrases that can be used when visiting a region where the primary language is Zulu.

• Sawubona (Good Morning to 1 person)
• SaniBonani (Good Morning to a group of people)
• Unjani (How are you? to 1 person)
• Ninjani (How are you? to a group of people)
• Ngiyaphila (I am well)
• Ngiyabonga (Thank you to 1 person)
• Siyabonga (Thank you to a group of people)
• Ingabe isikhathi sithini? (What is the time?)
• Ingabe uhlala kuphi? (Where do you stay?)

See Also

• Zulu (the ethnic group)
• Shaka Zulu
• Nguni culture
• Bantu language

Sources

• UCLA Language Materials Project - Zulu (http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/profiles/profz01.htm)

Books

• Teach Yourself Zulu, by Arnett Wilkes. ISBN 0-07-143442-9

External links

Wikipedia articles written in this language are located at the

Zulu language Wikipedia

• Ethnologue report on Zulu (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=ZUU)
• isiZulu.net Zulu - English Online Dictionary (http://isizulu.net/)
• Zulu - English Dictionary (http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Zulu-english/)