Bantu is a Most languages are known to belong to language families (families hereforth). An accurately identified family is a phylogenetic unit, i.e., all its members derive from a common ancestor. The ancestor is very seldom known to us directly, since most languages have a very short recorded history. However, it is... language family that belongs to the Map showing the distribution of Niger-Congo languages The Niger-Congo languages are probably the largest group of the world in terms of different languages. Some of the African languages with the largest number of speakers belong to it. A common property of many Niger-Congo languages is the use... Niger-Congo group.

Bantu As with any complex, emergent concept, language is somewhat resistant to definition; however, most would agree that language is a system of communication or reasoning using representation along with metaphor and some manner of logical grammar all of which presuppose a historical and at least temporarily transcendent standard or truth... languages are spoken in South The Republic of Cameroon is a unitary republic of central Africa. It borders Nigeria, Chad, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and the Gulf of Guinea. The former French Cameroon and part of British Cameroons merged in 1961 to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon which in... Cameroon, and in the south-eastern region of The Federal Republic of Nigeria is a country in West Africa. It borders on Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, Niger in the north and the Gulf of Guinea in the south. Major cities include the capital Abuja, the former capital Lagos, Abeokuta, Ibadan, Port Harcourt... Nigeria close the Cameroonian Border, in The Gabonese Republic, or Gabon, is a nation of west central Africa. It borders on Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Republic of the Congo and the Gulf of Guinea. Ruled by autocratic presidents since independence from France on August 17, 1960, Gabon introduced a multiparty system and a new constitution in the... Gabon, The Republic of the Congo, also known as Middle Congo, Congo-Brazzaville, and Congo (but not to be confused with the Democratic Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire, which was also at one time known as the Republic of the Congo), is a former French colony of west-central Africa... Republic of the Congo, The Democratic Republic of the Congo, called Zaïre between 1971 and 1997, is a nation in central Africa. It is sometimes called Congo-Kinshasa, after its capital, to distinguish it from the Republic of Congo, or Congo-Brazzaville. It borders on Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, Sudan... Democratic Republic of the Congo, The Republic of Uganda is a country in east central Africa. It is bordered in the east by Kenya, in the north by Sudan, by the Democratic Republic of Congo in the west, Rwanda in the southwest and Tanzania in the south. The southern part of the country includes a... Uganda, Kenya (pronounced either as KEN-ya or as KEEN-ya, the former being more common and thought to be correct) is a country of eastern Africa, bordering Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and the Indian Ocean. Nairobi is its capital and largest city. Republic of Kenya (Flag) (Coat of Arms... Kenya, The United Republic of Tanzania (Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania in Swahili) is a country on the east coast of central Africa. It is bordered by Kenya and Uganda on the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique on... Tanzania, This article is about the nation, for the prison see Angola Prison Angola is a maritime country in southwestern Africa bordering Namibia, Congo-Brazzaville and Zambia and with a west coast along the Portuguese colony, it has considerable natural resources, among which oil and diamonds are the most relevant. The... Angola, Zambia is a republic in south central Africa. It borders the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, and Angola. Zambias capital and largest city is Lusaka. Republic of Zambia (Flag) (Coat of Arms) National motto: One Zambia, One Nation Official languages English Capital... Zambia, The title given to this article is incorrect due to technical limitations. The correct title is Malaŵi. Malaŵi is a nation in east Africa. It is bordered by Tanzania, Zambia, and Mozambique. Republic of Malaŵi (Flag) (Coat of Arms) National motto: Unity and Freedom... Malawi, Mozambique is a country in Southern Africa, bordering South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. It is a member of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries and the Commonwealth of Nations. Its capital and largest city is Maputo, located in the southern edge of the country. República de... Mozambique, The Republic of Zimbabwe is a country located in the southern part of the continent of Africa, between the Victoria Falls, Zambezi river, Kariba Dam and Limpopo river. It is bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the west, Zambia to the north and Mozambique to the east... Zimbabwe, The Republic of Namibia is a country in southwest Africa, on the Atlantic coast. It is bordered by Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east, and South Africa to the south. It gained independence in 1990, and as such it is one of the youngest nations in... Namibia, The Republic of Botswana (Lefatshe la Botswana) is a landlocked nation of southern Africa. Formerly the British protectorate of Bechuanaland, Botswana adopted its new name after becoming independent on September 30, 1966. It is bordered by South Africa to the south, Namibia to the west, Zambia to the north, and... Botswana, and The Republic of South Africa (listen) is a republic at the southern tip of the African continent. It is bordered to the north by Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe and to the north-east by Mozambique and Swaziland. Lesotho is contained entirely inside the borders of South Africa. South Africa is... South Africa. This wide expansion makes the Bantu family the most widespread language family in ... World map showing location of Africa Download high resolution version (741x800, 113 KB) This image page contains items that originally came from a NASA website or publication. All works created by NASA are in the public domain, with the exception of the usage-restricted NASA logo, because works created by... Africa, with about 310 million speakers.

The word Bantu was first used by Wilhelm Heinrich Immanuel Bleek (March 8, 1827 - August 17, 1875) was a German linguist. His great work was A Comparative Grammar of South African Languages. Wilhelm Bleek was born in Berlin (Kingdom of Prussia). From 1845 to 48 he studied theology in Bonn and then went to Berlin to study... Wilhelm Heinrich Immanuel Bleek ( Years: 1824 1825 1826 - 1827 - 1828 1829 1830 Decades: 1790s 1800s 1810s - 1820s - 1830s 1840s 1850s Centuries: 18th century - 19th century - 20th century 1827 in art 1827 in literature 1827 in rail transport 1827 in science 1827 in music 1827 in sports List of state leaders in 1827 List of... 1827- Years: 1872 1873 1874 - 1875 - 1876 1877 1878 Decades: 1840s 1850s 1860s - 1870s - 1880s 1890s 1900s Centuries: 18th century - 19th century - 20th century 1875 in topic: Arts Architecture - Art - Literature - Music Other topics Canada - Rail transport - Science - Sport Lists of leaders: Colonial governors - State leaders Contents // 1 Events 1.1... 1875) with the meaning people as this is reflected in many of the languages of this group. A characteristic of Bantu languages is that they use -ntu to refer to a man. ba is a plural in some dialects, becoming ba-ntu. He and later Carl Friedrich Michael Meinhof (July 23, 1857_February 11, 1944) was a German linguist. He did comparative grammar studies of the Bantu languages. In 1905 he became professor at the School of Oriental Studies in Berlin. Reference: Meinhof, C 1948 (1st edn 1906) Grundzüge einer vergleichenden Grammatik der Bantusprachen. Reimer... Carl Meinhof did comparative studies of the Bantu language grammars.

The language family has hundreds of members. They have been classified by Malcolm Guthrie (1903-1972), professor of Bantu languages, is known primarily for his classification of Bantu languages (Guthrie 1971). The classification, although certainly not undisputed, is still the most widely used. The magnum opus of Guthrie is Comparative Bantu which appeared in 4 volumes published in 1967 (volume 1), 1970... Malcolm Guthrie in 1971 is a common year starting on Friday (click for link to calendar). Years: 1968 1969 1970 - 1971 - 1972 1973 1974 Decades: 1940s 1950s 1960s - 1970s - 1980s 1990s 2000s Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century 1971 in topic: Arts Architecture - Art - Film - Literature - Music Science and technology Aviation - Rail... 1971 into groups according to geographical zones - A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, K, L, M, N, P, R and S and then numbered within the group. Guthrie also reconstructed Proto-Bantu as the Proto-language may either refer to a language that preceded a certain set of given languages, or to system of communication during a stage in glottogony that may not yet be properly called a language. A relative proto-language is a language that reflects an earlier state in a language... Proto-language of this language family.

The most prominent This article is about grammar from a linguistic perspective. For English grammar rules see English writing style. According to the structuralist point of view, grammar is the study of the rules governing the use of a language. That set of rules is also called the grammar of the language, and... grammatical characteristic of Bantu languages is the extensive use of Prefix has meanings in linguistics, mathematics and computer science, and telecommunications. Contents // 1 Linguistics 1.1 Associative prefix 1.2 See also 2 Mathematics and computer science 3 Telephone Prefixes 4 See also Linguistics In linguistics, a prefix is a type of affix that precedes the morphemes to which it... prefixes (see ... Sesotho language). Each noun belongs to a class, and each language may have about ten classes all together, somewhat like genders in European languages. The class is indicated by a prefix on the noun, as well as on adjectives and verbs agreeing with it. Plural is indicated by a change of prefix.

The verb has a number of prefixes. In Swahili (also called Kiswahili; see Kiswahili for a discussion of the nomenclature) is an agglutinative Bantu language widely spoken in East Africa. Swahili is the mother tongue of the Swahili people (much dispute exists over the identity of the Swahili people since they do not constitute an ethnically homogenous group... Swahili for example Mtoto mdogo amekisoma means 'The small child has read it [a book]'. Mtoto 'child' governs the adjective prefix m- and the verb subject prefix a-. Then comes perfect tense -me- and an object marker -ki- agreeing with implicit kitabu 'book'. Pluralizing to children makes it Watoto wadogo wamekisoma, and pluralizing to books (vitabu) makes it Watoto wadogo wamevisoma.

The Bantu language with the largest number of speakers is Swahili (G 40). Judging from the history of Swahili, some linguists believe that Bantu languages are on a continuum from purely ... tonal languages to languages with no tone at all.

Other important Bantu languages include:

• in Central and Eastern Africa
  • Swahili (also called Kiswahili; see Kiswahili for a discussion of the nomenclature) is an agglutinative Bantu language widely spoken in East Africa. Swahili is the mother tongue of the Swahili people (much dispute exists over the identity of the Swahili people since they do not constitute an ethnically homogenous group... Swahili
  • Lingala is one of the Bantu languages spoken throughout the northwestern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo-Kinshasa) and a large part of the Republic of the Congo (Congo-Brazzaville), as well as to some degree in Angola and the Central African Republic. It has over 10... Lingala
  • ... Luganda
  • Gĩkũyũ is a language in the Bantu branch of the Niger-Congo family spoken primarily by the Kĩkũyũ people of Kenya. External links Categories: Language stubs | Substubs ... Gĩkũyũ
  • Bukusu is one of the seventeen sub-tribes of the Luhya Bantu language and cultural group of East Africa. The Bukusu are the largest single ethnic unit of the Luhya nation, making up about 17% of the whole Luhya population. The others in Kenya are Batiriki, Maragoli, Banyore, Bakhayo, Bamateki... Bukusu
  • Lusoga is a Bantu language spoken in the Busoga region of Uganda by approximately 1 500 000 people. References Fallers, Margaret Chave (1960) The eastern lacustrine Bantu (Ganda and Soga). Ethnographic survey of Africa: East central Africa, Vol 11. London: International African Institute. External link Ethnologue: Soga (http://www... Lusoga
  • The Kongo Empire was an African kingdom located in southwest Africa in what are now northern Angola, Cabinda, Republic of the Congo, and the western portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. At its greatest extent, it reached from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Kwango River... Kikongo
  • Chichewa is the official national language of the Republic of Malawi. Chichewa, also known as Chinyanja, is a language of the Bantu language family widely spoken in south-central Africa. It is also spoken in Mozambique, especially in the provinces of Tete and Niassa, in Zambia (especially in the Eastern... Chichewa
• in Southern Africa
  • Shona (or ChiShona) is a native language of Zimbabwe; the term is also used to identify those Bantu tribes in Southern Africa who speak one of the Shona languages. Shona proper is an official language of Zimbabwe, along with Ndebele and English. Numbering about 6 225 000 (SIL 1989), Shona... Shona
  • There are two versions of Ndebele in South Africa, they both belong to the Nguni group of Bantu Languages. The Northern Ndebele or Nrebele and the Southern Ndebele otherwise known as Amandebele. There is also a separate language called Ndebele (spoken primarily in Zimbabwe, but also in Botswana - see Matabele... Ndebele (Sindebele)
  • Tswana, also known as Setswana, is a Bantu language. Tswana is the national and majority language of Botswana, whose people are the Batswana (singular Motswana). The majority of Tswana speakers are in South Africa (where it is an official language), but there are also speakers in Zimbabwe and Namibia. Internationally... Tswana (Setswana)
  • Sesotho () Spoken in: Lesotho and South Africa Region: Total speakers: about 5 million Ranking: Not in top 100 Genetic classification: Niger-Congo  Atlantic-Congo   Volta-Congo    Benue-Congo     Bantoid      Narrow Bantu     ... Sesotho
  • Zulu (isiZulu) Spoken in: South Africa, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland Region: Zululand Total speakers: ~9 million Ranking: 87 Genetic classification: Niger-Congo language family  Atlantic-Congo   Volta-Congo    Benue-Congo languages     Bantoid      Southern    ... Zulu (isiZulu)
  • Xhosa (isiXhosa) Spoken in: South Africa Region: Eastern Cape Province Total speakers: 7.9 million Ranking: Not in top 100 Genetic classification: Niger-Congo  Atlantic-Congo   Volta-Congo    Benue-Congo     Bantoid      Southern    ... Xhosa
  • This article needs cleanup. Please edit this article to conform to a higher standard of article quality. Sepedi is one of the main dialects on which the Bantu Northern Sotho language is based. For this reason, the name Sepedi came to be incorrectly used to refer to Northern Sotho. I... Sepedi
  • Swati (also known as siSwati and Swazi) is a Bantu language spoken in Swaziland and South Africa. It has 1.5 million speakers and is taught in schools. It is an official language of Swaziland (along with English) and one of the 11 official languages of South Africa. The Language... Swazi ;
• in West Africa
  • Abanyom is a language of the Bantu language family. It is spoken by approximately 12,500 people in the Cross River State region of Nigeria. External links Ethnologue (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=ABM) Categories: Bantu languages | Languages of Nigeria | Language stubs ... Abanyom
  • ... Ibibio

Some are usually known in English without the class prefix (Swahili instead of Kiswahili, etc.), and some others vary (Setswana or Tswana, Sindebele or Ndebele, etc.). The bare form typically does not occur in the language: in the country of Botswana the people are the Batswana, one person is a Motswana, and the language is Setswana.

Today most linguist see the center of the The Bantu refer to over 400 different ethnic groups in Africa, from Cameroon to South Africa, united by a common language family, the Bantu languages, and in many cases common customs. Black South Africans were at times officially called Bantus by the apartheid regime. Contents // 1 History 2 Bantu in... Bantu expansion, that started about 2000 years before present in eastern The Federal Republic of Nigeria is a country in West Africa. It borders on Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, Niger in the north and the Gulf of Guinea in the south. Major cities include the capital Abuja, the former capital Lagos, Abeokuta, Ibadan, Port Harcourt... Nigeria and The Republic of Cameroon is a unitary republic of central Africa. It borders Nigeria, Chad, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and the Gulf of Guinea. The former French Cameroon and part of British Cameroons merged in 1961 to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon which in... Cameroon.

Black-African South Africans were at times officially called "Bantus" by the Apartheid ( This article is about the alphabet officially used in linguistics. The NATO phonetic alphabet (alpha bravo) had informally been called the International Phonetic Alphabet. The International Phonetic Alphabet is a phonetic alphabet used by linguists to accurately and uniquely represent each of the wide variety of sounds (phones or... apartheid regime.

See also

• ... Meeussen's rule
• In linguistics, grammatical genders, also called noun classes, are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words; every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be very few which belong to several classes at once. (Source of definition: Hockett, 1958, p. 231. See References... Noun class

Bibliography

• Guthrie, Malcolm (1948) The classification of the Bantu languages. London: Oxford University Press for the International African Institute.
• Guthrie, Malcolm (1971) Comparative Bantu vol 2. London: Gregg Press.
• Heine, Bernd (1973) 'Zur genetische Gliederung der Bantu-Sprachen'. Afrika und Übersee, 56, 164–185.
• Maho, Jouni F. (2001) 'The Bantu area: (towards clearing up) a mess'. Africa & Asia, 1, 40–49.
• Piron, Pascale (1995) 'Identification lexicostatistique des groupes Bantoïdes stables.' Journal of West African Languages, 25, 2, 3–39.

External links

• Comparative Bantu Online Dictionary (http://www.cbold.ddl.ish-lyon.cnrs.fr/) - includes a comprehensive bibliography.
• Bantu online resources by Jacky Maniacky (http://www.bantu-languages.com/en/)
• List of Bantu language names with synonyms ordered by Guthrie number (http://www.linguistics.berkeley.edu/CBOLD/Lgs/LgsbyGN.html)).