Zulu language

Zulu, also known by its name isiZulu, is a language spoken by about 13.56 million people in Southern Africa. Most of these speakers live in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, a place whose name means "Home of the Zulu Nation is Natal." Zulu is very important in South Africa because it is the most widely spoken home language there, used by 24% of the population. Even more people, over 50%, can understand it.

In 1994, Zulu became one of South Africa's 12 official languages. It is the second-most widely spoken language in a group called the Bantu languages, after Swahili. Like many of these languages, Zulu is written using the Latin alphabet, which is the same alphabet used in English and many other languages.

When people in South Africa talk about the language in English, they often use its native name, isiZulu. Zulu belongs to a language family called the Nguni branch, which is part of the larger Southern Bantu languages. This makes Zulu a rich and important part of the country's culture and history.

Geographical distribution

The Zulu language is spoken by many people who have moved to nearby areas, especially Zimbabwe, where the Northern Ndebele language (isiNdebele) is very similar to Zulu.

Another language, Xhosa, which is mainly spoken in the Eastern Cape, can often be understood by Zulu speakers, just like the Northern Ndebele language.

History

The Zulu people have lived in South Africa for many years, along with other groups like the Xhosa and Nguni. Their language, Zulu, has special sounds called clicks that are common in Southern Africa but not found elsewhere.

For a long time, Zulu was not a written language. This changed when European missionaries arrived and began writing it down using the Latin alphabet. The first grammar book for Zulu was published in Norway in 1850. The first Bible in Zulu appeared in 1883. Later, Zulu writers began creating books in their own language, with the first novel appearing in 1930. Today, Zulu is one of the official languages of South Africa, promoted by a special board that supports all the country's languages.

Contemporary usage

Before 1994, South African governments mainly used English and Afrikaans, with earlier use of Dutch. However, in the Kwazulu area, many people used the Zulu language. All high school lessons were in English or Afrikaans. After apartheid ended in 1994, the Zulu language started to become more popular again. Television stations began showing news and shows in Zulu, and many people enjoy listening to Zulu radio. You can find Zulu newspapers like isoLezwe, Ilanga, and UmAfika in Kwazulu-Natal and Johannesburg. In 2005, the first full-length movie made entirely in Zulu, called Yesterday, was nominated for an Oscar.

The famous movie The Lion King used some Zulu words in the song "Circle of Life." The song includes phrases like Ingonyama nengw' enamabala (meaning "A lion and a leopard spots"), Nans' ingonyama bakithi Baba (meaning "Here is the king, my people"), and Siyonqoba (meaning "We will conquer"). Other songs, like "This Land," also used Zulu words such as Busa lezi zwe bo ("Rule this land") and Busa ngothando bo ("Rule with love"). The hymn Siyahamba was originally written in Zulu and became popular in churches in North America in the 1990s. The 2019 song Jerusalema also includes Zulu lyrics.

Standard vs Urban Zulu

The Zulu language taught in schools, called "deep Zulu" (isiZulu esijulile), is different from the Zulu spoken in cities, known as Urban Zulu (isiZulu sasedolobheni). School Zulu is very careful to use only Zulu words, even for new ideas. But people in cities often mix in many words from English. This difference can make it hard for young students to understand the Zulu they learn in school.

Phonology

Vowels

The vowel system of Zulu consists of five vowels.

/ɛ/ and /ɔ/ are pronounced [e] and [o], respectively, if the following syllable contains the [+ATR] vowels /i/ or /u/. They are [ɛ] and [ɔ] otherwise:

• umgibeli "passenger", phonetically [úm̩̀ɡìɓé(ː)lì]
• ukupheka "to cook", phonetically [ùɠúpʰɛ̀(ː)ɠà]

There is limited vowel length in Zulu, as a result of the contraction of certain syllables. For example, the word ithambo /íːtʰámbó/ "bone", is a contraction of an earlier ilithambo /ílítʰámbó/, which may still be used by some speakers. Likewise, uphahla /úːpʰaɬa/ "roof" is a contraction of the earlier uluphahla /ulúpʰaɬa/. In addition, the vowel of the penultimate syllable is allophonically lengthened phrase- or sentence-finally.

Consonants

1. The plain voiceless plosives, affricates and clicks are realised phonetically as ejectives [pʼ], [tʼ], [kʼ], [tsʼ], [tʃʼ] [kxʼ].
2. When not preceded by a nasal, /ɠ/ is almost in complementary distribution with /k/ and /kʰ/. The latter two phonemes occur almost exclusively root-initially, while /ɠ/ appears exclusively medially. Recent loanwords contain /k/ and /kʰ/ in other positions, e.g. isekhondi /iːsekʰoːndi/ "second", ibhayisikili /iːbajisikiːli/ "bicycle".
3. The slack-voiced consonants are depressor consonants. These have a lowering effect on the tone of their syllable.
4. The consonant /ŋ/ occurs in some dialects as a reduction of the cluster /nɡ/ when it is not in stem-initial position, and is therefore always slack-voiced.
5. The trill /r/ is not native to Zulu and occurs only in expressive words and in recent borrowings from European languages.

The use of click consonants is one of the most distinctive features of Zulu. This feature is shared with several other languages of Southern Africa, but it is very rare in other regions. There are three basic articulations of clicks in Zulu:

• Denti-alveolar /ǀ/, comparable to a sucking of teeth, as the sound one makes for 'tsk tsk'.
• Postalveolar /!/, comparable to a bottle top 'pop'.
• Lateral /ǁ/, comparable to a click that one may do for a walking horse.

Each articulation covers five click consonants, with differences such as being slack-voiced, aspirated or nasalised, for a total of 15.

Phonotactics

Zulu syllables are canonically (N)C(w)V^{[clarification needed]}, and words must always end in a vowel. Consonant clusters consist of any consonant, optionally preceded by a homorganic nasal consonant (so-called "prenasalisation", described in more detail below) and optionally followed by the consonant /w/.

In addition, syllabic /m̩/ occurs as a reduction of former /mu/, and acts like a true syllable: it can be syllabic even when not word-initial, and can also carry distinctive tones like a full syllable. It does not necessarily have to be homorganic with the following consonant, although the difference between homorganic nonsyllabic /mC/ and syllabic /m̩C/ is distinctive, e.g. umpetshisi /um̩pétʃiːsi/ "peach tree" (5 syllables) versus impoko /ímpoːɠo/ "grass flower" (3 syllables). Moreover, sequences of syllabic m and homorganic m can occur, e.g. ummbila /úm̩mbíːla/ "maize" (4 syllables).

Recent loanwords from languages such as English may violate these constraints, by including additional consonant clusters that are not native to Zulu, such as in igremu /iːgreːmu/ "gram". There may be some variation between speakers as to whether clusters are broken up by an epenthetic vowel or not, e.g. ikhompiyutha /iːkʰompijuːtʰa/ or ikhompyutha /iːkʰompjuːtʰa/ "computer".

Prosody

Stress

Stress in Zulu words is mostly predictable and normally falls on the penultimate syllable of a word. It is accompanied by an allophonic lengthening of the vowel. When the final vowel of a word is long due to contraction, it receives the stress instead of the preceding syllable.

Lengthening does not occur on all words in a sentence, however, but only those that are sentence- or phrase-final. Thus, for any word of at least two syllables, there are two different forms, one with penultimate length and one without it, occurring in complementary distribution. In some cases, there are morphemic alternations that occur as a result of word position as well. The remote demonstrative pronouns may appear with the suffix -ana when sentence-final, but only as -ā otherwise. Likewise, the recent past tense of verbs ends in -ile sentence-finally, but is reduced to -ē medially. Moreover, a falling tone can only occur on a long vowel, so the shortening has effects on tone as well.

Some words, such as ideophones or interjections, can have stress that deviates from the regular pattern.

Tone

Like almost all other Bantu and other African languages, Zulu is tonal. There are three main tonemes: low, high and falling. Zulu is conventionally written without any indication of tone, but tone can be distinctive in Zulu. For example, the words "priest" and "teacher" are both spelt umfundisi, but they are pronounced with different tones: /úm̩fúndisi/ for the "priest" meaning, and /úm̩fundísi/ for the "teacher" meaning.

In principle, every syllable can be pronounced with either a high or a low tone. However, low tone does not behave the same as the other two, as high tones can "spread" into low-toned syllables while the reverse does not occur. A low tone is therefore better described as the absence of any toneme; it is a kind of default tone that is overridden by high or falling tones. The falling tone is a sequence of high-low and occurs only on long vowels. The penultimate syllable can also bear a falling tone when it is long due to the word's position in the phrase. However, when it shortens, the falling tone becomes disallowed in that position.^{[clarification needed]}

In principle, every morpheme has an inherent underlying tone pattern which does not change regardless of where it appears in a word. However, like most other Bantu languages, Zulu has word tone, meaning that the pattern of tones acts more like a template to assign tones to individual syllables, rather than a direct representation of the pronounced tones themselves. Consequently, the relationship between underlying tone patterns and the tones that are pronounced can be quite complex. Underlying high tones tend to surface rightward from the syllables where they are underlyingly present, especially in longer words.

Depressor consonants

The breathy consonant phonemes in Zulu are depressor consonants or depressors for short. Depressor consonants have a lowering effect on pitch, adding a non-phonemic low-tone onset to the normal tone of the syllable. Thus, in syllables with depressor consonants, high tones are realised as rising, and falling tones as rising-then-falling. In both cases, the pitch does not reach as high as in non-depressed syllables. The possible tones on a syllable with a voiceless consonant like hla are [ɬá ɬâ ɬà], and the possible tones of a breathy consonant syllable, like dla, are [ɮǎ̤ ɮa̤᷈ ɮà̤]. A depressor does not affect a syllable that's already low, but it blocks assimilation to a preceding high tone so that the tone of the depressor syllable and any following low-tone syllables stays low.

Phonological processes

Prenasalisation

Prenasalisation occurs whenever a consonant is preceded by a homorganic nasal, either lexically or as a consequence of prefixation. The most notable case of the latter is the class 9 noun prefix in-, which ends in a homorganic nasal. Prenasalisation triggers several changes in the following consonant, some of which are phonemic and others allophonic. The changes can be summed as follows:

Tone assimilation

Zulu has tonic assimilation: high tones tend to spread allophonically to following low-tone syllables, raising their pitch to a level just below that of adjacent high-tone syllables. A toneless syllable between a high-tone syllable and another tonic syllable assimilates to that high tone. That is, if the preceding syllable ends on a high tone and the following syllable begins with a high tone (because it is high or falling), the intermediate toneless syllable has its pitch raised as well. When the preceding syllable is high but the following is toneless, the medial toneless syllable adopts a high-tone onset from the preceding syllable, resulting in a falling tone contour.

For example, the English word spoon was borrowed into Zulu as isipunu, phonemically /ísipúnu/. The second syllable si assimilates to the surrounding high tones, raising its pitch, so that it is pronounced [ísípʼúːnù] sentence-finally. If tone pitch is indicated with numbers, with 1 highest and 9 lowest pitch, then the pitches of each syllable can be denoted as 2-4-3-9. The second syllable is thus still lower in pitch than both of the adjacent syllables.

Tone displacement

Depressor consonants have an effect called tone displacement. Tone displacement occurs whenever a depressor occurs with a high tone, and causes the tone on the syllable to shift rightward onto the next syllable. If the next syllable is long, it gets a falling tone, otherwise a regular high tone. If the penultimate syllable becomes high (not falling), the final syllable dissimilates and becomes low if it was not already. Tone displacement is blocked under the following conditions:

• When the syllable has a long vowel.
• When the following syllable also has a depressor consonant.
• When the following syllable is the final syllable and is short.

Whenever tone displacement is blocked, this results in a depressor syllable with a high tone, which will have the low-tone onset as described above. When the following syllable already has a high or falling tone, the tone disappears from the syllable as if it had been shifted away, but the following syllable's tone is not modified.

Some examples:

• izipunu "spoons", the plural of isipunu from the previous section, is phonemically /ízipúnu/. Because /z/ is a depressor consonant, tone assimilation is prevented. Consequently, the word is pronounced as [ízìpʼúːnù] sentence-finally, with a low tone in the second syllable.
• izintombi "girls" is phonemically /izíntombí/. /z/ is a depressor, and is not blocked, so the tone shifts to the third syllable. This syllable can be either long or short depending on sentence position. When long, the pronunciation is [ìzìntômbí], with a falling tone. However, when the third syllable is short, the tone is high, and dissimilation of the final syllable occurs, resulting in [ìzìntómbì].
• nendoda "with a man" is phonemically /nʱéndoda/. /nʱ/ is a depressor, but so is /d/, so tone displacement is blocked. Consequently, the pronunciation is [nʱěndɔ̀ːdà], with rising pitch in the first syllable due to the low-onset effect.

Palatalization

Palatalization is a change that affects labial and alveolar consonants whenever they are immediately followed by /j/. While palatalization occurred historically, it is still productive and occurs as a result of the addition of suffixes beginning with /j/. A frequent example is the diminutive suffix -yana.

Moreover, Zulu does not generally tolerate sequences of a labial consonant plus /w/. Whenever /w/ follows a labial consonant, it changes to /j/, which then triggers palatalization of the consonant. This effect can be seen in the locative forms of nouns ending in -o or -u, which change to -weni and -wini respectively in the locative. If a labial consonant immediately precedes, palatalization is triggered. The change also occurs in nouns beginning in ubu- with a stem beginning with a vowel.

The following changes occur as a result of palatalization:

Orthography

Zulu is mostly written with the regular letters we use every day, called the Latin alphabet, and sometimes with a special writing style called Ditema syllabics. In some places, like Malawi, a different script called Mwangwego might be used for a version of Zulu called Ngoni.

The Zulu language uses the same 26 basic letters as English, but they can sound different. Sometimes, Zulu uses two letters together to make a special sound. It doesn’t use special marks to show how loud or long a sound is.

Older books might use extra letters or special ways to write sounds, but most modern writing keeps it simple. When writing names or words that start with vowels, Zulu sometimes puts a hyphen between parts to make it clearer, like in i-Afrika.

Morphology

Main article: Zulu grammar

Zulu has some special ways of building words and putting them together. One of these ways is putting the subject, then the verb, and finally the object in that order. Zulu nouns are grouped into different classes, and words that describe these nouns must match the class of the noun. For example, in the sentence "All the strong people on the farm are felling trees," many words change to match the class of the noun "people."

Verbs in Zulu also have different forms to show when something happens and whether it is ongoing or finished. Words can be changed by adding pieces to the beginning or end to show new ideas or to change the meaning in specific ways.

The root word for "Zulu" can be combined with other pieces to make new words. Here is a table showing some examples:

Sample phrases and text

Here are some phrases you might hear or use if you visit a place where people speak Zulu.

This is a part of the beginning of the Constitution of South Africa:

Translation:

Counting in Zulu

In Zulu, people count using their fingers. They start with the little finger on the left hand and move towards the left thumb. Then they continue with the right-hand thumb and go to the right little finger. Each finger is raised as they count from one to five on the left hand, and then they do the same on the right hand.

The words for numbers six to nine in Zulu describe the finger or the action, like "thumb" for six, or the position, like "two remaining" for eight.

Months

Months in Zulu

Oral literature

Zulu has many proverbs, tales, riddles, and songs that have been passed down through generations.

Proverbs

In 1912, a missionary named Franz Mayr collected 150 Zulu proverbs and shared them with English translations. Some of these proverbs teach important lessons, like waiting to hear the whole story before judging someone. Another example is that everyone looks after their own interests.

Tales

In 1868, Henry Callaway collected traditional Zulu stories. These stories include adventures of a famous trickster, tales of heroes and their families, and legends about magical birds. Many stories feature strong and clever women as the main characters.

Riddles

Callaway also collected Zulu riddles. These riddles challenge people to think and solve puzzles, such as guessing what animal can be found in two places at once or what always stands but never sits.

Songs

In 1920, someone named Madikane Čele shared Zulu songs in a book. These songs include war songs, lullabies, dance songs, and love songs, with the original Zulu words and their English meanings.

John Colenso

[Zulu-English Dictionary]

Henry Callaway

Colony of Natal

Zulu trickster figure

honeyguide

Natalie Curtis Burlin

[Songs and Tales from the Dark Continent]

Zulu words in South African English

South African English uses many words from the Zulu language. Some Zulu words have even become common in standard English, like the names of animals such as impala and mamba. Here are a few examples of Zulu words you might hear:

• muti (from umuthi) – medicine
• donga (from udonga) – ditch
• indaba – conference
• induna – chief right handman or leader
• shongololo (from ishongololo) – millipede
• ubuntu – compassion/humanity.