Herero language
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Herero | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spoken in |  Namibia Botswana |
|
| Region | Kunene, Omaheke and Otjozondjupa in Namibia; Ghanzi in Botswana | |
| Total speakers | 133,000 | |
| Language family | Niger-Congo | |
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1 | hz | |
| ISO 639-2 | her | |
| ISO 639-3 | her | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
The Herero language (Otjiherero) is a language of the Bantu family (Niger-Congo group). It is spoken by Herero people in Namibia (113,000) and Botswana. Total population in both countries is approximately 133,000.
Its linguistic distribution covers a zone called Hereroland: this zone is constituted of the region of Omaheke, along with the regions of Otjozondjupa and Kunene. The Himba, who are related to the Herero people, speak a dialect very close to the Herero language. In Windhoek, the capital of Namibia, there exists a considerable minority of hererophones.
Thanks to the translation of the Bible into Otjiherero by missionary Gottlieb Viehe (1839–1901) at the end of the 19th century, the spoken language was transcribed to a script based on the Latin alphabet. Father Peter Heinrich Brincker (1836–1904) translated several theological works and songs.
Otjiherero is taught in Namibian schools both as a native tongue and as a secondary language, and is to be included as a principal material at the University of Namibia. Otjiherero is also one of the six minority languages that are used by the Namibian State Radio (NBC). Gamsberg Macmillan, as of 2008[update], has published the only Dictionary in Otjiherero.
[edit] Bibliography
- Brincker, Peter Heinrich (1886, 1964). Wörterbuch und kurzgefasste Grammatik des Otji-Herero. Leipzig (reprint 1964 Ridgwood, NJ: The Gregg Press).
- Hahn, C. Hugo (1857). Grundzüge einer Grammatik des Hereró. Berlin: Verlag von Wilhelm Hertz.
- Lutz, Marten (2006). "Locative inversion in Otjiherero: more on morpho-syntactic variation in Bantu." In: Laura Downing, Lutz Marten & Sabine Zerbian (eds.), Papers in Bantu Grammar, ZAS Papers in Linguistics 43, 97—122.
- Marten, Lutz & Nancy C. Kula (2007). "Morphosyntactic co-variation in Bantu: two case studies." SOAS Working Papers in Linguistics 15.227-238.
- Möhlig, Wilhelm, Lutz Marten & Jekura U. Kavari (2002). A Grammatical Sketch of Herero (Otjiherero). Köln: Köppe (Grammatische Analysen afrikanischer Sprachen; v.19).
[edit] External links
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