thumb|Distribution of Tswana (in yellow) in Botswana

[[File:South Africa Tswana speakers proportion map.svg|thumb|Geographical distribution of Tswana in South Africa: proportion of the population that speaks Tswana at home.

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[[File:South Africa Tswana speakers density map.svg|thumb|Geographical distribution of Setswana in South Africa: density of Setswana home-language speakers.

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Tswana, also known by its native name Setswana, is a Bantu language indigenous to Southern Africa and spoken by about 8.2 million people. as well as the Sekgaladi and likely the Silozi language.

Tswana is an official language of South Africa and Zimbabwe. It is a lingua franca in Botswana and parts of South Africa, particularly North West Province. Setswana speaking ethnic groups are found in several provinces of South Africa, primarily in the North West, where about four million people speak the language. An urbanised variety is known as Sepitori, and is the principal unique language of the city of Pretoria. The three South African provinces with the most speakers are Gauteng (circa 11%), Northern Cape, and North West (over 70%). Until 1994, South African Batswana were notionally citizens of Bophuthatswana, one of the bantustans of the apartheid regime. The Setswana language in the Northwest Province has variations in which it is spoken according to the ethnic groups found in the Tswana culture (Bakgatla, Barolong, Bakwena, Batlhaping, Bahurutshe, Bafokeng, Batlokwa, Bataung, and Batswapong, among others); the written language remains the same. A small number of speakers are also found in Zimbabwe (unknown number) and Namibia (about 10,000 people).

The first grammar of Tswana was published in 1833 by the missionary James Archbell although it was modelled on isiXhosa grammar. The first grammar of Tswana which regarded it as a separate language from isiXhosa (but still not as a separate language from the Sepedi and Sesotho) was published by the French missionary, E. Casalis in 1841. He changed his mind later, and in a publication from 1882, he noted that the Sepedi and Sesotho were distinct from Tswana.

Solomon Plaatje, a South African intellectual and linguist, was one of the first writers to extensively write in and about the Tswana language.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

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! Front

! Back

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! Close

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! Near-close

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! Open-mid

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! Open

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Some dialects have two additional vowels, the close-mid vowels and . The circumflex on e and o in general Setswana writing is only encouraged at elementary levels of education and not at upper primary or higher; usually these are written without the circumflex.

Consonants

The consonant inventory of Tswana can be seen below.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"

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! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |

! rowspan="2" | Labial

! colspan="3" | Alveolar

! rowspan="2" | Palatal

! rowspan="2" | Velar

! rowspan="2" | Uvular

! rowspan="2" | Glottal

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!

!

!

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! colspan="2" | Nasal

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! rowspan="3" |Plosive/<br />Affricate

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! colspan="2" | Fricative

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! colspan="2" | Liquid

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! colspan="2" | Semivowel

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The consonant is an allophone of when the latter is followed by the vowels or . Two more sounds, v and

z , exist only in loanwords.

Setswana also has three click consonants, but these are only used in interjections or ideophones, and tend only to be used by the older generation, and are therefore falling out of use. The three click consonants are the dental click , orthographically ; the lateral click , orthographically ; and the alveolar click , orthographically . These are found for example in qô-qô (used to announce arrival or knocking on the door; being replaced by ko-ko), x-x (used to express annoyance) and c-c-c.

There are some minor dialectal variations among the consonants between speakers of Setswana. For instance, is realised as either or by many speakers; is realised as in most dialects; and and are realised as and in northern dialects.

The consonant can exist at the end of a word without being followed by a vowel (as in Jwaneng and Barolong Seboni).

Stress

Stress is fixed in Tswana and thus always falls on the penult of a word, although some compounds may receive a secondary stress in the first part of the word. The syllable on which the stress falls is lengthened. Thus, mosadi (woman) is realised as .

Tone

Tswana has two tones, high and low, but the latter has a much wider distribution in words than the former. Tones are not marked orthographically, which may lead to ambiguity.

: go bua "to speak"

: go bua "to skin an animal"

: o bua Setswana "He speaks Setswana"

: o bua Setswana "You speak Setswana"

An important feature of the tones is the so-called spreading of the high tone. If a syllable bears a high tone, the following two syllables will have high tones unless they are at the end of the word.

: simolola > "to begin"

: simologêla > "to begin for/at"

Orthography

Setswana orthography is based on the Latin alphabet.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

|-

! Letter(s)

| a || b || c || d || e || ê || f || g || h || i || j || k || l || m || n || o || ô || p || ph || q || r || s

|š|| t || th || tl || tlh || tsh || u || v || w || x || y || z

|}

The letter š was introduced in 1937, but the corresponding sound is still sometimes written as ⟨sh⟩. The letters ⟨ê⟩ and ⟨ô⟩ are used in textbooks and language reference books, but not so much in daily standard writing.

Grammar

Nouns

Nouns in Setswana are grouped into nine noun classes and one subclass, each having different prefixes. The nine classes and their respective prefixes can be seen below, along with a short note regarding the common characteristics of most nouns within their respective classes.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

! Class

! Singular

! Plural

! Characteristics

|-

! 1.

| mo-

| ba-

| align="left" | Persons

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! 1a.

| –

| bô-

| align="left" | Names, kinship, animals

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! 2.

| mo-

| me-<br />ma-

| rowspan="3" align="left" | Miscellaneous<br />(including bodyparts, tools,<br />instruments, animals, trees, plants)

|-

! 3.

| le-

| ma-

|-

! 4.

| se-

| di-

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! 5.

| n-<br />m-<br />ny-<br />ng-

| rowspan="2" | din-<br />dim-<br />diny-<br />ding-

| align="left" | Animals<br />(but also miscellaneous)

|-

! 6.

| lo-

| align="left" | Miscellaneous<br />(including a number of collective nouns)

|-

! 7.

| bo-

| ma-

| align="left" | Abstract nouns

|-

! 8.

| colspan="2" | go-

| align="left" | Infinitive forms of verbs

|-

! 9.

| colspan="2" | fa-<br />go-<br />mo-

| align="left" | Adverbs

|}

Some nouns may be found in several classes. For instance, many class 1 nouns are also found in class 1a, class 3, class 4, and class 5.

Further reading

References

Notes

Citations

Bibliography

  • Peace Corps Botswana: An Introduction to the Setswana Language
  • Setswana: Grammar Handbook. Peace Corps Language Handbook Series
  • About Setswana