Languages of South Africa

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Languages of South Africa
Dominant languages in South Africa:
  •   Afrikaans
  •   English
  •   Pedi
  •   Sotho
  •   Southern Ndebele
  •   Swazi
  •   Tsonga
  •   Tswana
  •   Tshivenda
  •   Xhosa
  •   Zulu
  •   None dominant
  •   Areas of little or no population
Official
Recognised
Main
English
SignedSouth African Sign Language
Keyboard layout
Part of a series on the
Culture of South Africa
Flag of South Africa
History
People
Languages
Cuisine
Festivals
Religion
Art
Literature
Music and Performing arts
Media
Sport
Monuments
Symbols
Trilingual government building sign in Afrikaans, English, and Xhosa
A man speaking Afrikaans
Languages in South Africa (2017)[1]
Languages percent
Zulu
 
 24.7%
Xhosa
 
 15.6%
Afrikaans
 
 12.1%
Sepedi
 
 9.8%
Tswana
 
 8.9%
English
 
 8.4%
Sotho
 
 8%
Tsonga
 
 4%
Swati
 
 2.6%
Venda
 
 2.5%
Ndebele
 
 1.6%
SA Sign Language
 
 0.5%

At least thirty-five languages are spoken in South Africa, twelve of which are official languages of South Africa: Ndebele, Pedi, Sotho, South African Sign Language, Swazi, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu and English, which is the primary language used in parliamentary and state discourse, though all official languages are equal in legal status. In addition, South African Sign Language was recognised as the twelfth official language of South Africa by the National Assembly on 3 May 2023.[2] Unofficial languages are protected under the Constitution of South Africa, though few are mentioned by any name.

Unofficial and marginalised languages include what are considered some of Southern Africa's oldest[

KheLobedu, SePulana, HiPai, SeKutswe, SeṰokwa, SeHananwa, SiThonga, SiLaNgomane, SheKgalagari, XiRhonga, SeKopa (Sekgaga), and others. Most South Africans can speak more than one language,[3] and there is very often a diglossia
between the official and unofficial language forms for speakers of the latter.

Language demographics

Nguni language
as a first language.
  0–20%
  20–40%
  40–60%
  60–80%
  80–100%
Density of first-language speakers of Nguni languages.
  <1 /km2
  1–3 /km2
  3–10 /km2
  10–30 /km2
  30–100 /km2
  100–300 /km2
  300–1000 /km2
  1000–3000 /km2
  >3000 /km2
Proportion of the population that speaks a Sotho–Tswana language as a first language.
  0–20%
  20–40%
  40–60%
  60–80%
  80–100%
Density of first-language speakers of Sotho–Tswana languages.
  <1 /km2
  1–3 /km2
  3–10 /km2
  10–30 /km2
  30–100 /km2
  100–300 /km2
  300–1000 /km2
  1000–3000 /km2
  >3000 /km2
Proportion of the population that speaks a West Germanic language as a first language.
  0–20%
  20–40%
  40–60%
  60–80%
  80–100%
Density of first-language speakers of West Germanic languages.
  <1 /km2
  1–3 /km2
  3–10 /km2
  10–30 /km2
  30–100 /km2
  100–300 /km2
  300–1000 /km2
  1000–3000 /km2
  >3000 /km2

The most common language spoken as a first language by South Africans is Zulu (23 percent), followed by Xhosa (16 percent), and Afrikaans (14 percent). English is the fourth most common first language in the country (9.6%), but is understood in most urban areas and is the dominant language in government and the media.[4]

Trilingual sign in Roodepoort, in English, Afrikaans and Tswana

The majority of South Africans speak a language from one of the two principal branches of the native Bantu languages that are represented in South Africa: the Sotho–Tswana branch (which includes Southern Sotho, Northern Sotho and Tswana languages officially), or the Nguni branch (which includes Zulu, Xhosa, Swati and Ndebele languages officially). For each of the two groups, the languages within that group are for the most part intelligible to a native speaker of any other language within that group.[5]

The indigenous African languages of South Africa which are official, and therefore dominant, can be divided into two geographical zones, with Nguni languages being predominant in the south-eastern third of the country (Indian Ocean coast) and Sotho-Tswana languages being predominant in the northern third of the country located further inland, as also in

Tsotsitaal
or S'Camtho/Ringas, in large urban townships in the province, which has spread nationwide.

Tsotsitaal in its original form as "Flaaitaal" was based on Afrikaans, a colonial language derived from

mixed race", as it represents to some degree a creole population many of whom are descendants of slave populations imported by the Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) from slaving posts in West and East Africa, and from its colonies of the Indian Ocean
trade route.

Political exiles from the VOC colony of

Cape Muslim pioneering of the first Afrikaans literature, written in Arabic Afrikaans, which was an adaptation of the Jawi script, using Arabic letters to represent Afrikaans for both religious and quotidian purposes. It also became the de facto national language of the Griqua
(Xiri or Griekwa) nation, which was a mixed race group.

Afrikaans is also spoken widely across the centre and north of the country, as a second (or third or even fourth) language by Black or Indigenous South Africans (which, in South Africa, popularly means SiNtu-speaking populations) living in farming areas.

The

2011 census recorded the following distribution of first language speakers:[6]

Demographics

Language L1 speakers L2 speakers[7] Total speakers[7]
Count Of population Count Of population Count Of population
Zulu 11,587,374 22.7% 15,700,000 27,300,000 46%
Xhosa 8,154,258 16.0% 11,000,000 19,150,000 33%
Afrikaans 6,855,082 13.5% 10,300,000 17,160,000 29%
English 4,892,623 9.6% 14,000,000 19,640,000 33%
Pedi
 4,618,576 9.1% 9,100,000 13,720,000 23%
Tswana 4,067,248 8.0% 7,700,000 11,770,000 20%
Sotho 3,849,563 7.6% 7,900,000 11,750,000 20%
Tsonga 2,277,148 4.5% 3,400,000 5,680,000 10%
Swati
 1,297,046 2.5% 2,400,000 3,700,000 6%
Venda 1,209,388 2.4% 1,700,000 2,910,000 5%
Ndebele 1,090,223 2.1% 1,400,000 2,490,000 4%
SA Sign Language 234,655 0.5% 500,000
Other languages 828,258 1.6%
Total 50,961,443 100.0%
Language 2022 2011 2001 Change 2011–2022 (pp)
Zulu 24.4% 22.7% 23.8% 1.3%
Xhosa 16.3% 16.0% 17.6% 0.3%
Afrikaans 10.6% 13.5% 13.4% -2.9%
Sepedi
 10.0% 9.0% 9.4% 1.0%
English 8.7% 9.7% 8.3% -1.0%
Tswana 8.3% 8.0% 8.2% 0.3%
Sesotho
 7.8% 7.6% 7.9% 0.2%
Tsonga 4.7% 4.5% 4.4% 0.2%
Swati
 2.8% 2.5% 2.7% 0.3%
Venda 2.5% 2.4% 2.3% 0.1%
Ndebele 1.7% 2.1% 1.6% -0.4%
SA Sign Language 0.02% 0.5% -0.4%
Other languages 2.1 1.6% 0.5% 0.5%
Total 100.0% 100.0% 100.0%

Other significant languages in South Africa

Other languages spoken in South Africa not mentioned in the Constitution, include many of those already mentioned above, such as

argot
that has found wider usage as an informal register.

Many unofficial languages have been variously claimed to be dialects of official languages, which largely follows the

ethnos
of the Bantustan or "Homeland".

Significant numbers of immigrants from

Italian and smaller numbers of Dutch, French and German speakers. Older Chinese tend to speak Cantonese or Hokkien, but recent immigrants mainly speak Mandarin Chinese
.

These non-official languages may be used in limited semi-official use where it has been determined that these languages are prevalent. More importantly, these languages have significant local functions in specific communities whose identity is tightly bound around the linguistic and cultural identity that these non-official SA languages signal.

The fastest growing non-official language is Portuguese

Francophone Central Africa
.

More recently, speakers of North, Central and West Africa languages have arrived in South Africa, mostly in the major cities, especially in Johannesburg and Pretoria, but also Cape Town and Durban.[10]

Angloromani is spoken by the South African Roma minority.[11]

Constitutional provisions

Chapter 1 (Founding Provisions), Section 6 (Languages) of the Constitution of South Africa is the basis for government language policy.

The English text of the constitution signed by president

Northern Sotho language.[12]

The constitution mentions "sign language" in the generic sense rather than South African Sign Language specifically.

  1. The official languages of the Republic are
.
  • Recognising the historically diminished use and status of the indigenous languages of our people, the state must take practical and positive measures to elevate the status and advance the use of these languages.
  •  
    1. The national government and provincial governments may use any particular official languages for the purposes of government, taking into account usage, practicality, expense, regional circumstances and the balance of the needs and preferences of the population as a whole or in the province concerned; but the national government and each provincial government must use at least two official languages.
    2. Municipalities must take into account the language usage and preferences of their residents.
  • The national government and provincial governments, by legislative and other measures, must regulate and monitor their use of official languages. Without detracting from the provisions of subsection (2), all official languages must enjoy parity of esteem and must be treated equitably.
  • A
    Sanskrit and other languages used for religious purposes in South Africa.
    • — Constitution of the Republic of South Africa[13]