Nguni languages are mostly spoken by Nguni people, which are group of clans and nations living in south-east Africa.

The languages are a group of Bantu languages spoken in southern Africa including Zulu, Xhosa, Swati, Phuthi and Ndebele (both Southern Transvaal Ndebele and Northern Ndebele).

The appellation "Nguni" derives from the Nguni cattle type. Ngoni (see below) is an older, or a shifted, variant.

It is sometimes argued that use of Nguni as a generic label suggests a historical monolithic unity of the peoples in question where in fact the situation may have been more complex (Wright 1987). The linguistic use of the label (referring to a subgrouping of the Bantu languages) is relatively stable.

Language classification

Within a subset of southeastern Bantu, the label "Nguni" is used both genetically (in the linguistic sense) and typologically (quite apart from any historical significance that it may accurately or inaccurately imply).

The Nguni languages are closely related, and in many instances mutually intelligible. The linguistic classificatory category "Nguni" is typically considered to subsume two subgroups: "Zunda Nguni" and "Tekela Nguni" (cf. Doke 1954, Ownby 1985). This division is based principally on the salient phonological distinction between corresponding coronal consonants: Zunda /z/ and Tekela /t/, but there is a host of additional linguistic variables that enables a relatively straightforward division into these two substreams of Nguni.

Zunda languages include Zulu, Xhosa, and Northern Ndebele (or 'Zimbabwean Ndebele'). Tekela languages include Swati, Phuthi, and the little-studied varieties Bhaca, Hlubi, Cele and Lala.

Comparative data

Compare the following sentences:

• I like your new sticks

Ndi-ya-zi-thanda ii-ntonga z-akho ezin-tsha (Xhosa)

Ngi-ya-zi-thanda izi-ntonga z-akho ezin-sha (Zulu)

Gi-ya-ti-tshadza ti-tfoga t-akho leti-tjha (Phuthi)

Ngi-ya-zi-thanda izi-ntonga z-akho -ezintsha (Ndebele)

Note: Xhosa = Phuthi = IPA [tʃʰ]; Zulu = IPA [ʃ], but in the environment cited here [ʃ] is "nasally permutated" to become [tʃ]. Phuthi = breathy voiced [dʒ] = Xhosa, Zulu (in the environment here following the nasal [n]).

• I only understand a little English

Ndi-qonda isi-Ngesi ka-ncinci nje (Xhosa)

Ngi-qonda ka-ncane nje isi-Ngisi (Zulu)

Gi-visisa si-Kguwa ka-nci të-jhë (Phuthi)

Ngi-qonda ka-ncane nje isi-Ngisi (Ndebele)

Note: Phuthi = IPA [x].

See also

• Ngoni is the ethnonym and language name of a group living in Malawi, who are a geographically distant descendant of South African Nguni. Ngoni separated from all other Nguni languages subsequent to the massive political and social upheaval within southern Africa, the mfecane, lasting until the 1830s.

References

• Doke, Clement Martyn. (1954) The Southern Bantu Languages. Handbook of African Languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Ownby, Caroline P. (1985) 'Early Nguni History: The Linguistic Evidence and Its Correlation with Archeology and Oral Tradition'. Doctoral dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles.
• Wright, J. (1987) 'Politics, ideology, and the invention of the "nguni"', in Tom Lodge (ed.), Resistance and ideology in settler societies, 96-118.
• Shaw, E. M. and Davison, P. (1973) The Southern Nguni (series: Man in Southern Africa) South African Museum, Cape Town;

External links

• http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=92325