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Xhosa | ||||
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isiXhosa | ||||
Native to | South Africa, Zimbabwe, Lesotho | |||
Region | Eastern Cape, Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, Northern Cape, Free State | |||
Ethnicity | Xhosa people | |||
Native speakers | 8.2 million (2011 census)[1] 11 million L2 speakers (2002)[2] | |||
Latin (Xhosa alphabet) Xhosa Braille | ||||
Signed Xhosa[3] | ||||
Official status | ||||
Official language in | South Africa Zimbabwe | |||
Language codes | ||||
ISO 639-1 | xh | |||
ISO 639-2 | xho | |||
ISO 639-3 | xho | |||
Glottolog | xhos1239 | |||
S.41 [4] | ||||
Linguasphere | 99-AUT-fa incl. | |||
Proportion of the South African population that speaks Xhosa at home
| ||||
Xhosa is one of the official languages of South Africa. Xhosa is spoken by 7.6 million people, or about 18% of the South African population. Xhosa is written using a Latin alphabet. Henry Hare Dugmore helped translate the entire Bible in Xhosa language. Xhosa has ten vowels.
Xhosa is well known for its set of three major clicks.
References
- ↑ Xhosa at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- ↑ Webb, Vic. 2002. "Language in South Africa: the role of language in national transformation, reconstruction and development." Impact: Studies in language and society, 14:78
- ↑ Aarons & Reynolds, 2003, "South African Sign Language", in Monaghan, ed., Many Ways to be Deaf: International Variation in Deaf Communities
- ↑ Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online