African languages

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This is an archived version of this page, as edited by Kerowren (talk | contribs) at 15:32, 3 June 2007 (→‎Wikipedias set up). It may differ significantly from the current version.

This is a page to gather useful information about African languages in Wikimedia projects, in order to increase the number of writers on the continent itself. Specifically African languages with many speakers, but not many writers, so excluding French, English, Portuguese, Spanish, Arabic and Afrikaans, which have fairly active Wikipedias already.

Si tu veux tu peux écrire en français ici, soit on traduira les phrases en anglais, soit on créera une traduction en français.

The term African languages refers to the approximately 1800 languages spoken in Africa. Some African languages, such as Swahili, Hausa, and Yoruba, are spoken by millions of people. Others, such as Laal, Shabo, and Dahalo, are spoken by a few hundred or fewer.

Generally, books are expensive in Africa. Many languages have a purely oral tradition. Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia projects are an excellent way to improve the situation of African languages.

Would you be willing to help develop the presence of African languages on Wikipedia and Wiktionary? That is, to help set up Wikipedias in African languages, and to accelerate the process of adding words to the Wiktionaries.


Your knowledge

In which languages are you able to write? Also, since you're studying, you might know more people who are interested in a project like this.

  • Guaka:
    • basic knowledge of Bambara
    • in possession of Bambara-French, French-Bambara dictionary
    • English, German, French, Dutch, little Spanish
    • currently in Mali
  • moyogo:
    • learning Lingala
    • in possession of French-Bangala-Lingala dictionary, three Lingala teaching books and a Lingala dictionary
    • French, English, little Dutch, intermediary Spanish
    • currently in the Netherlands
  • Inisheer:
    • learning kinyarwanda
    • english-kinyarwanda (tiny) dictionnary, one teaching book
    • French, English, German, little Spanish
    • currently in Switzerland
  • your name, alias
    • your knowledge of African languages
    • your African languages dictionaries
    • your knowledge of other languages
    • other useful information

Wikipedias set up

  • Afrikaans, 4400/6300 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Akan, 4 articles (alternatif/officiel; july 2006) from 1 contributor
  • Amharic 246/349 (alternatif/officiel; july 2006) front page
  • Bamanankan, 51/130 articles (alternatif/officiel; july 2006)
  • Chi Chewa 9 articles (aug. 2006)
  • ChiShona 37 articles (aug. 2006)
  • ChiTumbuka 15 articles (aug. 2006)
  • Ɛʋɛ 6/13 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Fulfulde 5/15 articles (alternatif/officiel; jan 2007) from 1 contributor
  • Gĩkũyũ or Kikuyu 8/15 articles (jan 2007)
  • Haussa 10/19 articles (alternatif/officiel; july 2006)
  • Igbo 186 articles (june 2007)
  • isiZulu 25/81 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Kikongo 111/169 articles (alternatif/officiel; jan. 2007)
  • Kinyarwanda 4/36 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Kirundi 6/12 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Kiswahili 2100/3000 articles (jan 2007), interface translated, modest activity
  • Lingala 157/506 articles (alternatif/officiel; march 2007)
  • Malagasy 198 articles (aug. 2006)
  • Malti 1483 articles (march 2007)
  • Sesotho 5/38 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Setswana 18 articles (aug. 2006)
  • Soomaali, 53/106 articles (jan. 2007), struggling along precariously on a combination of transwikied content and non-native speakers
  • Tigrinya 4/10 articles (jan. 2007)
  • Twi 14/17 articles (alternatif/officiel; jan 2007)
  • Wolof 11/226 articles (alternatif/officiel; july 2006) from 3 contributors
  • Xhosa 14/31 articles (alternatif/officiel; jan 2007)
  • Xitsonga 2/6 articles (alternatif/officiel; july 2006)
  • Yoruba 708/751 articles (alternatif/officiel; january 2007)

Words in Wiktionary

Bamanankan

Dogon

Kinyarwanda

Lingala

Swahili

Hausa

Yoruba

Number of speakers

please update or correct
  • Amharic: Ethiopia
  • Bambara: 6 million first language speakers, >20 million second language speakers (including Dioula) in Mali and other West African countries
  • Fulfulde:
  • Haussa:
  • Kinyarwanda: 8 to 9 million native speakers in Rwanda. Kinyarwanda speakers and Kirundi speakers (4,5 million) perfectly understand each other.
  • Lingala: 300,000 native speakers, 7 to 10 million second language speakers (including Bangala) in eastern Congo-Brazzaville, western Congo-Kinsasha, northern Angola and southern Centrafrique
  • Mandinka: spoken by some 1.2 million Mandinka in Senegal, The Gambia, and Guinea-Bissau; it is the main language of The Gambia.
  • Oromiffa: Ethiopia
  • Swahili: ± 50,000,000 speakers
  • Yoruba:
  • Wolof:

See also

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