Also Known As: Isizulu,Kingoni,Ngoni,Zunda,Zulu
Description:
Zulu (called isiZulu in Zulu), is the language of the Zulu people with about 10 million speakers, the vast majority (over 95%) of whom live in South Africa. Zulu is the most widely spoken home language in South Africa (24% of the population) as well as being understood by over 50% of the population (Ethnologue 2005). It became one of South Africa's eleven official languages in 1994 at the end of apartheid. Like many other Bantu languages, it is written using the Latin alphabet.
Zulu belongs to the South-Eastern group of Bantu languages (the Nguni group).
The language is widely spoken in KwaZulu-Natal (81% of the province's population are Zulu first language speakers), Mpumalanga (26%) and Gauteng (21%). It is also spoken in some other African countries, with significant Zulu-speaking populations in Lesotho and Swaziland. Ndebele, spoken in Zimbabwe, Swazi and the Nguni language formerly spoken in Malawi are all closely related to Zulu and developed from nineteenth century Zulu migrant populations. Xhosa, the predominant language in the Eastern Cape, and Zulu are also mutually intelligible.
The Zulu presence in South Africa dates from about the fourteenth century AD. Much like the..... full article at Wikipedia |