Tswana language Information & Tswana language Links at HealthHaven.com

Tswana
Setswana or Sitswana
Spoken in	Botswana; South Africa; Zimbabwe; Namibia
Region	southern Africa
Total speakers	4,407,174[citation needed]
Language family	Niger-Congo Atlantic-Congo Benue-Congo Bantoid Southern Bantoid Bantu Central Bantu Southern Bantu Sotho-Tswana Tswana; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Official status
Official language in	Botswana; South Africa
Regulated by	No official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1	tn
ISO 639-2	tsn
ISO 639-3	tsn
	Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Tswana (Setswana or Sitswana), is a Bantu language written in the Latin alphabet. English is the national and majority language of Botswana, whose people are the Batswana (singular Motswana). Although English is the official language of Botswana, the majority of speakers also understand Setswana. There are also speakers in Zimbabwe, Namibia. and South Africa. Internationally there are about 4 million speakers. Before South Africa became a multi-racial democracy, the bantustan of Bophuthatswana was set up to cover the Tswana speakers of South Africa.

Tswana is a Bantu language, belonging to the Niger-Congo language family. It is most closely related to two other languages in the Sotho language group, Sesotho (Southern Sotho) and Northern Sotho (Sesotho sa Leboa). It has also been known as Beetjuans, Chuana (hence Bechuanaland), Coana, Cuana, and Sechuana.

[edit] Phonology

[edit] Consonants

Tswana has the following consonant inventory.^[1]

**IPA chart Tswana consonants**
		Labial	Alveolar	Latero- alveolar	Postalveolar/ Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
Plosive	non-aspirated	p b	t (d)¹			k
Plosive	aspirated	pʰ	tʰ			kʰ	qʰ
Affricate	non-aspirated		ts	tɬ	tʃ dʒ
Affricate	aspirated		tsʰ	tɬʰ	tʃʰ
Fricative		f	s		ʃ		χ²	h
Nasal		m	n		ɲ	ŋ
Sonorant			r	l	j	w

The sound [d] appears as an allophone of /l/ when followed by /i/ or /u/. It is now represented as a <d> in current orthography as well (unlike for similar cognates in Sotho).
The voiceless uvular fricative is represented orthographically as <g>, as in Botswana's capital Gaborone. It may be realised as a velar fricative (/x/) by some speakers, and is described as such in some learning materials.

[edit] Vowels

Tswana has nine vowel sounds, which can be resolved into seven phonemes:

**IPA chart Tswana vowels**
		Front	Back
Close	tense	i <i>	u <u>
Close	lax	ɪ <e>	ʊ <o>
Mid		ɛ <ê>	ɔ <ô>
Open		a <a>

The close lax vowels /ɪ/ and /ʊ/ open and tense slightly to provide allophones [e] and [o] in stressed position; eg koloi [kʊˈlo.i] "wagon".
The mid vowels can be distinguished from the close lax vowels in writing by use of the circumflex, so <e> is /ɪ/ while <ê> is /ɛ/. Unfortunately for the learner, this distinction is not usually maintained in modern writing, except in some dictionaries and learning materials, or if there would otherwise be confusion.

[edit] Tone

Tswana is a tonal language, with a distinction between high tone and the more common "null" or low tone. Tone is phonemic, distinguishing between words on a lexical level, as well as having a grammatical function.

[edit] Stress

Tswana is a fixed-stress language, with stress always falling on the penultimate syllable of a word.

Syllables must end in a vowel (unless they are syllabic consonants), and there are no diphthongs: thus dia "to delay" is bisyllabic [ˈdi.a]; and dintshi "eyelashes" is trisyllabic [diˈn.tsʰi].

[edit] Some simple Tswana phrases

Dumela, rra/mma - Hello, Sir/Madam.

Formal inquiry after health:

O tsogile jang?—How are you? (literally, 'how did you awake?').
Ke tsogile sentle, rra/mma. Wena, o tsogile jang?—I'm well, Sir/Madam. How are you? OR I'm well/okay. How are you?

(Replace tsogile with tlhotse for afternoon greetings.)

Informal inquiry after health:

Le kae?—How are you? (literally translated Le kae? also means Where are you? when referring to more than one person)
Re teng, rra/mma—We're well, Sir/Madam. (Ke teng, rra/mma for I am well.)

Casual slang:

O a re eng? (pronounced wah-reng)—How's it going?
Ga ke re seppe. (pronounced hah kay ray seppay)—It goes well.
Eitha (pronounced ate-uh)—Hey
Go jwang? (pronounced hoe jwang)—what's up?
Mari ke sharp (pronounced mare keh shap)—I'm good.
Sharp! (pronounced shup)—Bye

Other useful phrases:

Ke a leboga, rra/mma.—Thank you, Sir/Madam (formal)
Ke itumetse, rra/mma." and "tanki" (slang)—Thanks, Sir/Madam (informal)
Ke _____—I'm _____.
Leina la me ke _______.—My name is _____.
Leina la gago ke mang?—What is your name? (formal)
O mang?—What's your name? (informal)
Ke tshwerwe ke tlala.—I'm hungry (literally, I'm held by hunger)
Ke tshwerwe ke lenyora.—I'm thirsty (literally, I'm held by thirst)
Ke rata ___.—I like ___.
Ga ke rate___.—I don't like ___.
Ke batla ___.—I want ___.
Ga ke batle ____—I do not want ____
Dijo tse di monate!—This food is good!
Lekgolo—One Hundred
A re tsamaye!—Let's go!
Kokelwana e ko kae? —Where is the clinic?
Ke nako mang?—What time is it?
Ke kopa thuso, tswee-tswee.—I need help, please.
A nka go thusa?—May I help you?
A o ya ko ____?—Are you going to _____?
____ ke eng ka Setswana?—What is _____ in Setswana?

Farewells:

Robala sentle.—Sleep well.
Boroko!—Good night!
Tsamaya sentle.—Go well (said to the person/group leaving).
Sala sentle—Stay well (said to the person/group staying).

Food:

Morogo—Vegetables
Motogo—Soft Porridge
Bogobe—Porridge (Pap)
Nama—Meat
Dinawa—Beans

Proportion of the population that speaks Setswana at home, by municipality, in South Africa

[edit] Loan words and derivations

Setswana speakers use many loan words in their day-to-day speech. These words are usually assimilated from the pop-culture in America, Europe, and South Africa (such as sharp or cool as adjectives, or Hola for hello). These words are frequently slang words or words for modern or Western concepts. Many Setswana words are derived from English, German, and Dutch words such computere for computer or fensetere for window (from Afrikaans venster or perhaps from German Fenster). Many Setswana words for Western technology are their counterparts re-written and re-pronounced in consonant-vowel syllabic cluster form.

[edit] Notes

As opposed to the Ndebele languages spoken in Zimbabwe and South Africa, there are no significant differences between standard Tswana as spoken in South Africa and standard Tswana as spoken in Botswana.

[edit] External links

[edit] Software

Spell checker for OpenOffice.org and Mozilla, OpenOffice.org, Mozilla Firefox web-browser, and Mozilla Thunderbird email program in Tswana
Translate.org.za Project to translate Free and Open Source Software into all the official languages of South Africa including Tswana
Keyboard with extra Tswana characters

[edit] References

^ Tables based on The Sound System of Setswana, University of Botswana 1999 (2001)

[0] Tables based on The Sound System of Setswana, University of Botswana 1999 (2001)

[1]

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