1.
Zambia
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The capital city is Lusaka, in the south-central part of Zambia. The population is concentrated mainly around Lusaka in the south and the Copperbelt Province to the northwest, originally inhabited by Khoisan peoples, the region was affected by the Bantu expansion of the thirteenth century. After visits by European explorers in the century, Zambia became the British protectorate of Northern Rhodesia towards the end of the nineteenth century. For most of the period, Zambia was governed by an administration appointed from London with the advice of the British South Africa Company. On 24 October 1964, Zambia became independent of the United Kingdom, Kaundas socialist United National Independence Party maintained power from 1964 until 1991. Kaunda played a key role in diplomacy, cooperating closely with the United States in search of solutions to conflicts in Rhodesia, Angola. From 1972 to 1991 Zambia was a one-party state with the UNIP as the legal political party under the motto One Zambia. Kaunda was succeeded by Frederick Chiluba of the social-democratic Movement for Multi-Party Democracy in 1991, beginning a period of social-economic growth, after Mwanawasas death, Rupiah Banda presided as Acting President before being elected President in 2008. Holding office for three years, Banda stepped down after his defeat in the 2011 elections by Patriotic Front party leader Michael Sata. Sata died on 28 October 2014, the second Zambian president to die in office, Guy Scott served briefly as interim president until new elections were held on 20 January 2015, in which Edgar Lungu was elected as the sixth President. In 2010, the World Bank named Zambia one of the worlds fastest economically reformed countries, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa is headquartered in Lusaka. The territory of what is now Zambia was known as Northern Rhodesia from 1911 and it was renamed Zambia at independence in 1964. The new name of Zambia was derived from the Zambezi river, the area of modern Zambia is known to have been inhabited by the Khoisan until around AD300, when migrating Bantu began to settle around these areas. These early hunter-gatherer groups were either annihilated or absorbed by subsequent more organised Bantu groups. Archaeological excavation work on the Zambezi Valley and Kalambo Falls show a succession of human cultures, in particular, ancient camping site tools near the Kalambo Falls have been radiocarbon dated to more than 36,000 year ago. The fossil skull remains of Broken Hill Man, dated between 300,000 and 125,000 years BC, further shows that the area was inhabited by pre-historic man. The early history of tribes of modern-day Zambia can only be gleaned from knowledge passed down by successive generations through word of mouth, in the 12th century, major waves of Bantu-speaking immigrants arrived during the Bantu expansion. Among them, the Tonga people were the first to settle in Zambia and are believed to have come from the east near the big sea, by the late 12th century, more advanced kingdoms and empires had been established in most regions of modern-day Zambia
2.
Zimbabwe
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Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in southern Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers. It is bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the west and southwest, Zambia to the northwest, although it does not border Namibia, less than 200 metres of the Zambezi River separates it from that country. The capital and largest city is Harare, a country of roughly 13 million people, Zimbabwe has 16 official languages, with English, Shona, and Ndebele the most commonly used. Since the 11th century, present-day Zimbabwe has been the site of several organised states and kingdoms as well as a route for migration. The British South Africa Company of Cecil Rhodes first demarcated the present territory during the 1890s, in 1965, the conservative white minority government unilaterally declared independence as Rhodesia. Zimbabwe then rejoined the Commonwealth of Nations—which it withdrew from in 2003 and it is a member of the United Nations, the Southern African Development Community, the African Union, and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa. Robert Mugabe became Prime Minister of Zimbabwe in 1980, when his ZANU-PF party won the following the end of white minority rule. Under Mugabes authoritarian regime, the security apparatus has dominated the country. Mugabe has maintained the revolutionary socialist rhetoric from the Cold War era, the name Zimbabwe stems from a Shona term for Great Zimbabwe, an ancient ruined city in the countrys south-east whose remains are now a protected site. Two different theories address the origin of the word, many sources hold that Zimbabwe derives from dzimba-dza-mabwe, translated from the Karanga dialect of Shona as large houses of stone. The Karanga-speaking Shona people live around Great Zimbabwe in the province of Masvingo. Zimbabwe was formerly known as Southern Rhodesia, Rhodesia, and Zimbabwe Rhodesia, a further alternative, put forward by nationalists in Matabeleland, had been Matopos, referring to the Matopos Hills to the south of Bulawayo. In a 2001 interview, black nationalist Edson Zvobgo recalled that Mawema mentioned the name during a rally, and it caught hold. The black nationalist factions subsequently used the name the during the Second Chimurenga campaigns against the Rhodesian government during the Rhodesian Bush War of 1964-1979, major factions in this camp included the Zimbabwe African National Union, and the Zimbabwe African Peoples Union. Proto-Shona-speaking societies first emerged in the middle Limpopo valley in the 9th century before moving on to the Zimbabwean highlands, the Zimbabwean plateau eventually became the centre of subsequent Shona states, beginning around the 10th century. Around the early 10th century, trade developed with Arab merchants on the Indian Ocean coast, the main archaeological site uses a unique dry stone architecture. The Kingdom of Mapungubwe was the first in a series of sophisticated trade states developed in Zimbabwe by the time of the first European explorers from Portugal and they traded in gold, ivory, and copper for cloth and glass. From about 1300 until 1600, Mapungubwe was eclipsed by the Kingdom of Zimbabwe and this Shona state further refined and expanded upon Mapungubwes stone architecture, which survives to this day at the ruins of the kingdoms capital of Great Zimbabwe
3.
Namibia
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Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in southern Africa whose western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south, although it does not border Zimbabwe, a part of less than 200 metres of the Zambezi River separates the two countries. Namibia gained independence from South Africa on 21 March 1990, following the Namibian War of Independence. Its capital and largest city is Windhoek, and it is a state of the United Nations, the Southern African Development Community, the African Union. The dry lands of Namibia were inhabited since early times by the San, Damara, since about the 14th century, immigrating Bantu peoples arrived as part of the Bantu expansion. Since then the Bantu groups in total, known as the Ovambo people, have dominated the population of the country, in the late 19th century during European colonization, the German Empire established rule over most of the territory as a protectorate in 1884. It began to develop infrastructure and farming, and maintained this German colony until 1915, after the end of World War I, in 1920 the League of Nations mandated the country to the United Kingdom, under administration by South Africa. It imposed its laws, including racial classifications and rules, from 1948, with the National Party elected to power, South Africa applied apartheid also to what was known as South West Africa. In 1878 the Cape of Good Hope had annexed the port of Walvis Bay and the offshore Penguin Islands, following continued guerrilla warfare, South Africa installed an interim administration in Namibia in 1985. Namibia obtained full independence from South Africa in 1990, but Walvis Bay and the Penguin Islands remained under South African control until 1994. Namibia has a population of 2.1 million people and a stable multi-party parliamentary democracy, Agriculture, herding, tourism and the mining industry – including mining for gem diamonds, uranium, gold, silver, and base metals – form the basis of its economy. The large, arid Namib Desert has resulted in Namibia being overall one of the least densely populated countries in the world, Namibia enjoys high political, economic and social stability. The name of the country is derived from the Namib Desert, before its independence in 1990, the area was known first as German South-West Africa, then as South-West Africa, reflecting the colonial occupation by the Germans and the South Africans. The dry lands of Namibia were inhabited since early times by San, Damara, from about the 14th century, immigrating Bantu peoples arrived during the Bantu expansion from central Africa. From the late 18th century onwards, Oorlam people from Cape Colony crossed the Orange River and their encounters with the nomadic Nama tribes were largely peaceful. The missionaries accompanying the Oorlam were well received by them, the right to use waterholes, on their way further northwards, however, the Oorlam encountered clans of the Herero at Windhoek, Gobabis, and Okahandja, who resisted their encroachment. The Nama-Herero War broke out in 1880, with hostilities ebbing only after the German Empire deployed troops to the places and cemented the status quo among the Nama, Oorlam. The first Europeans to disembark and explore the region were the Portuguese navigators Diogo Cão in 1485 and Bartolomeu Dias in 1486, like most of interior Sub-Saharan Africa, Namibia was not extensively explored by Europeans until the 19th century
4.
Botswana
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Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country located in Southern Africa. The citizens refer to themselves as Batswana, formerly the British protectorate of Bechuanaland, Botswana adopted its new name after becoming independent within the Commonwealth on 30 September 1966. Since then, it has maintained a tradition of stable representative democracy. Botswana is topographically flat, with up to 70 percent of its territory being the Kalahari Desert and it is bordered by South Africa to the south and southeast, Namibia to the west and north, and Zimbabwe to the northeast. Its border with Zambia to the north near Kazungula is poorly defined, a mid-sized country of just over 2 million people, Botswana is one of the most sparsely populated nations in the world. Around 10 percent of the lives in the capital and largest city. The economy is dominated by mining, cattle, and tourism, Botswana boasts a GDP per capita of about $18,825 per year as of 2015, which is one of the highest in Africa. Its high gross national income gives the country a modest standard of living, Botswana is a member of the African Union, the Southern African Development Community, the Commonwealth of Nations, and the United Nations. The country has been among the hardest hit by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the death rate due to AIDS or AIDS-related causes has fallen sharply from 2005 to 2013, and the number of new infections in children has also fallen. As of 2014, Botswana has the third-highest prevalence rate for HIV/AIDS, the history of Botswana starts more than 100,000 years ago, when the first humans inhabited the region. The original inhabitants of southern Africa were the Bushmen and Khoi peoples, both speak Khoisan languages and lived as hunter-gatherers. About a thousand years ago, large chiefdoms emerged that were later eclipsed by the Great Zimbabwe empire, around 1300 CE, peoples in present-day Transvaal began to coalesce into three main linguistic and political groups, including the Batswana. The Batswana, a term used also to all citizens of Botswana. Prior to European contact, the Batswana lived as herders and farmers under tribal rule, as groups broke off and moved to new land, new tribes were created. Some human development occurred before the colonial period, during the 1700s, the slave and ivory trades were expanding. To resist these pressures, Shaka, the king of the Zulu Empire, conquered tribes began to move northwest into Botswana, destroying everything in their path. In their efforts to re-establish themselves at the end of period, tribes began to exchange ivory and skins for guns with European traders. Christian missionaries sent from Europe also spread to the interior, often at the invitation of tribal chiefs who wanted guns, by 1880 every major village had a resident missionary, and their influence became permanent
5.
South Africa
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South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa, is the southernmost country in Africa. South Africa is the 25th-largest country in the world by land area and it is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere. About 80 percent of South Africans are of Sub-Saharan African ancestry, divided among a variety of ethnic groups speaking different Bantu languages, the remaining population consists of Africas largest communities of European, Asian, and multiracial ancestry. South Africa is a multiethnic society encompassing a variety of cultures, languages. Its pluralistic makeup is reflected in the recognition of 11 official languages. The country is one of the few in Africa never to have had a coup détat, however, the vast majority of black South Africans were not enfranchised until 1994. During the 20th century, the black majority sought to recover its rights from the dominant white minority, with this struggle playing a role in the countrys recent history. The National Party imposed apartheid in 1948, institutionalising previous racial segregation, since 1994, all ethnic and linguistic groups have held political representation in the countrys democracy, which comprises a parliamentary republic and nine provinces. South Africa is often referred to as the Rainbow Nation to describe the multicultural diversity. The World Bank classifies South Africa as an economy. Its economy is the second-largest in Africa, and the 34th-largest in the world, in terms of purchasing power parity, South Africa has the seventh-highest per capita income in Africa. However, poverty and inequality remain widespread, with about a quarter of the population unemployed, nevertheless, South Africa has been identified as a middle power in international affairs, and maintains significant regional influence. The name South Africa is derived from the geographic location at the southern tip of Africa. Upon formation the country was named the Union of South Africa in English, since 1961 the long form name in English has been the Republic of South Africa. In Dutch the country was named Republiek van Zuid-Afrika, replaced in 1983 by the Afrikaans Republiek van Suid-Afrika, since 1994 the Republic has had an official name in each of its 11 official languages. Mzansi, derived from the Xhosa noun umzantsi meaning south, is a name for South Africa. South Africa contains some of the oldest archaeological and human fossil sites in the world, extensive fossil remains have been recovered from a series of caves in Gauteng Province. The area is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has termed the Cradle of Humankind
6.
Language family
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A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestral language or parental language, called the proto-language of that family. Linguists therefore describe the languages within a language family as being genetically related. Estimates of the number of living languages vary from 5,000 to 8,000, depending on the precision of ones definition of language, the 2013 edition of Ethnologue catalogs just over 7,000 living human languages. A living language is one that is used as the primary form of communication of a group of people. There are also dead and extinct languages, as well as some that are still insufficiently studied to be classified. Membership of languages in a family is established by comparative linguistics. Sister languages are said to have a genetic or genealogical relationship, speakers of a language family belong to a common speech community. The divergence of a proto-language into daughter languages typically occurs through geographical separation, individuals belonging to other speech communities may also adopt languages from a different language family through the language shift process. Genealogically related languages present shared retentions, that is, features of the proto-language that cannot be explained by chance or borrowing, for example, Germanic languages are Germanic in that they share vocabulary and grammatical features that are not believed to have been present in the Proto-Indo-European language. These features are believed to be innovations that took place in Proto-Germanic, language families can be divided into smaller phylogenetic units, conventionally referred to as branches of the family because the history of a language family is often represented as a tree diagram. A family is a unit, all its members derive from a common ancestor. Some taxonomists restrict the term family to a level. Those who affix such labels also subdivide branches into groups, a top-level family is often called a phylum or stock. The closer the branches are to other, the closer the languages will be related. For example, the Celtic, Germanic, Slavic, Romance, there is a remarkably similar pattern shown by the linguistic tree and the genetic tree of human ancestry that was verified statistically. Languages interpreted in terms of the phylogenetic tree of human languages are transmitted to a great extent vertically as opposed to horizontally. A speech variety may also be considered either a language or a dialect depending on social or political considerations, thus, different sources give sometimes wildly different accounts of the number of languages within a family. Classifications of the Japonic family, for example, range from one language to nearly twenty, most of the worlds languages are known to be related to others
7.
Bantu languages
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The Bantu languages, technically the Narrow Bantu languages, constitute a traditional branch of the Niger–Congo languages. There are about 250 Bantu languages by the criterion of mutual intelligibility, Bantu languages are spoken largely east and south of present-day Cameroon, that is, in the regions commonly known as Central Africa, Southeast Africa, and Southern Africa. Parts of the Bantu area include languages from other language families, the Bantu language with the largest total number of speakers is Swahili, however, the majority of its speakers know it as a second language. According to Ethnologue, there are over 180 million L2 speakers, other major languages include Zulu with 27 million speakers and Shona with about 11 million speakers. Ethnologue separates the largely mutually intelligible Kinyarwanda and Kirundi, which, the Bantu languages descend from a common Proto-Bantu language, which is believed to have been spoken in what is now Cameroon in West Africa. This Bantu expansion came to dominate Sub-Saharan Africa east of Cameroon, the technical term Bantu, meaning human beings or simply people, was first used by Wilhelm Bleek, as this is reflected in many of the languages of this group. Bleek, and later Carl Meinhof, pursued extensive studies comparing the structures of Bantu languages. In recent times, the distinctiveness of Narrow Bantu as opposed to the other Southern Bantoid groups has been called into doubt, a coherent classification of Narrow Bantu will likely need to exclude many of the Zone A and perhaps Zone B languages. There is no true genealogical classification of the Bantu languages, the most widely used classification, the alphanumeric coding system developed by Guthrie, is mainly geographic. The two groups have described as having mirror-image tone systems, where Northwest Bantu has a high tone in a cognate, Central Bantu languages generally have a low tone. Northwest Bantu is clearly not a coherent family, but even for Central Bantu the evidence is lexical, another attempt at a detailed genetic classification to replace the Guthrie system is the 1999 Tervuren proposal of Bastin, Coupez, and Mann. This has been criticized for sowing confusion in one of the few ways to distinguish Bantu languages. Nurse & Philippson evaluate many proposals for low-level groups of Bantu languages, glottolog has incorporated many of these into their classification. The languages that share Dahls Law may also form a valid group, the infobox at right lists these together with various low-level groups that are fairly uncontroversial, though they continue to be revised. The development of a rigorous genealogical classification of many branches of Niger–Congo, Guthrie reconstructed both the phonemic inventory and the vocabulary of Proto-Bantu. The most prominent grammatical characteristic of Bantu languages is the use of affixes. Each noun belongs to a class, and each language may have several numbered classes, the class is indicated by a prefix that is part of the noun, as well as agreement markers on verb and qualificative roots connected with the noun. Plural is indicated by a change of class, with a change of prefix
8.
Writing system
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A writing system is any conventional method of visually representing verbal communication. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a form of information storage. The processes of encoding and decoding writing systems involve shared understanding between writers and readers of the meaning behind the sets of characters that make up a script, the general attributes of writing systems can be placed into broad categories such as alphabets, syllabaries, or logographies. Any particular system can have attributes of more than one category, in the alphabetic category, there is a standard set of letters of consonants and vowels that encode based on the general principle that the letters represent speech sounds. In a syllabary, each symbol correlates to a syllable or mora, in a logography, each character represents a word, morpheme, or other semantic units. Other categories include abjads, which differ from alphabets in that vowels are not indicated, alphabets typically use a set of 20-to-35 symbols to fully express a language, whereas syllabaries can have 80-to-100, and logographies can have several hundreds of symbols. Systems will also enable the stringing together of these groupings in order to enable a full expression of the language. The reading step can be accomplished purely in the mind as an internal process, writing systems were preceded by proto-writing, which used pictograms, ideograms and other mnemonic symbols. Proto-writing lacked the ability to capture and express a range of thoughts. Soon after, writing provided a form of long distance communication. With the advent of publishing, it provided the medium for a form of mass communication. Writing systems are distinguished from other possible symbolic communication systems in that a system is always associated with at least one spoken language. In contrast, visual representations such as drawings, paintings, and non-verbal items on maps, such as contour lines, are not language-related. Some other symbols, such as numerals and the ampersand, are not directly linked to any specific language, every human community possesses language, which many regard as an innate and defining condition of humanity. However, the development of writing systems, and the process by which they have supplanted traditional oral systems of communication, have been sporadic, uneven, once established, writing systems generally change more slowly than their spoken counterparts. Thus they often preserve features and expressions which are no current in the spoken language. One of the benefits of writing systems is that they can preserve a permanent record of information expressed in a language. In the examination of individual scripts, the study of writing systems has developed along partially independent lines, thus, the terminology employed differs somewhat from field to field
9.
Latin script
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Latin script is used as the standard method of writing in most Western and Central European languages, as well as in many languages in other parts of the world. Latin script is the basis for the largest number of alphabets of any writing system and is the most widely adopted writing system in the world, Latin script is also the basis of the International Phonetic Alphabet. The 26 most widespread letters are the contained in the ISO basic Latin alphabet. The script is either called Roman script or Latin script, in reference to its origin in ancient Rome, in the context of transliteration, the term romanization or romanisation is often found. Unicode uses the term Latin as does the International Organization for Standardization, the numeral system is called the Roman numeral system, and the collection of the elements, Roman numerals. The numbers 1,2,3. are Latin/Roman script numbers for the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, the Latin alphabet spread, along with Latin, from the Italian Peninsula to the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The Latin script also came into use for writing the West Slavic languages and several South Slavic languages, the speakers of East Slavic languages generally adopted Cyrillic along with Orthodox Christianity. The Serbian language uses both scripts, with Cyrillic predominating in official communication and Latin elsewhere, as determined by the Law on Official Use of the Language and Alphabet. As late as 1500, the Latin script was limited primarily to the languages spoken in Western, Northern, the Orthodox Christian Slavs of Eastern and Southeastern Europe mostly used Cyrillic, and the Greek alphabet was in use by Greek-speakers around the eastern Mediterranean. The Arabic script was widespread within Islam, both among Arabs and non-Arab nations like the Iranians, Indonesians, Malays, and Turkic peoples, most of the rest of Asia used a variety of Brahmic alphabets or the Chinese script. It is used for many Austronesian languages, including the languages of the Philippines, Latin letters served as the basis for the forms of the Cherokee syllabary developed by Sequoyah, however, the sound values are completely different. In the late 19th century, the Romanians returned to the Latin alphabet, under French rule and Portuguese missionary influence, a Latin alphabet was devised for the Vietnamese language, which had previously used Chinese characters. In 1928, as part of Mustafa Kemal Atatürks reforms, the new Republic of Turkey adopted a Latin alphabet for the Turkish language, kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Iranian-speaking Tajikistan, and the breakaway region of Transnistria kept the Cyrillic alphabet, chiefly due to their close ties with Russia. In the 1930s and 1940s, the majority of Kurds replaced the Arabic script with two Latin alphabets, although the only official Kurdish government uses an Arabic alphabet for public documents, the Latin Kurdish alphabet remains widely used throughout the region by the majority of Kurdish-speakers. In 2015, the Kazakh government announced that the Latin alphabet would replace Cyrillic as the system for the Kazakh language by 2025. In the course of its use, the Latin alphabet was adapted for use in new languages, sometimes representing phonemes not found in languages that were written with the Roman characters. These new forms are given a place in the alphabet by defining an alphabetical order or collation sequence, a digraph is a pair of letters used to write one sound or a combination of sounds that does not correspond to the written letters in sequence. Examples are ⟨ch⟩, ⟨ng⟩, ⟨rh⟩, ⟨sh⟩ in English, a trigraph is made up of three letters, like the German ⟨sch⟩, the Breton ⟨c’h⟩ or the Milanese ⟨oeu⟩
10.
Guthrie classification of Bantu languages
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The 250 or so Narrow Bantu languages are conventionally divided up into geographic zones first proposed by Malcolm Guthrie. These were assigned letters A–S and divided into decades, individual languages were assigned unit numbers, only Guthries Zone S is considered to be a genealogical group, since then a Zone J has been set up as another possible genealogical group bordering the Great Lakes. The list is first summarized, with links to articles on accepted groups of Bantu languages, Following that is the complete 1948 list, as updated by Guthrie in 1971 and by Maho in 2009. The list below reflects Guthrie as updated by Maho, not included in detail are the Northeast Bantu languages characterized by Dahls Law, which is thought to be a genealogical group, cuts across the Guthrie system, and is covered at Northeast Bantu. Other groups with dedicated articles, such as Southern Bantu are also only summarized here, so that the listing is only a summary. Note that Ethnologue made multiple changes to Guthrie in an attempt to make the more historically accurate. However, the changes are inconsistent, and Ethnologue has not been followed here, thus a code may mean different things depending on whether Guthrie or SIL is being followed. The updates in Maho, on the hand, are designed to be compatible with the original values of the codes. Accepted genealogical groups within the Guthrie zones are boldfaced, S Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, N Gabon A10 Lundu–Balong, Oroko, the other languages apart from A15 Manenguba may be Sawabantu as well. Guthries A60 and part of his A40 have been removed to the Southern Bantoid Mbam languages, Sawabantu may include some of the A10 languages apart from Manenguba, whereas Bube may belong in Mbam. Southern Bantoid Jarawan was assigned to Zone A by Gerhardt and Blench, specifically to A60, according to several scholars, including Blench, there can be no coherent concept of Bantu as long as many of the Zone A and perhaps Zone B languages are included. B10–30 may belong together as Kele–Tsogo, B40 with Kongo–Yaka, there are proposals for three larger clades, Mboshi–Buja covering C10–20 and C37+41, and Bangi–Tetela covering C30 with C50–80, and C40a together with D20–30 in Boan. Most of D40–60 has been moved to Great Lakes Bantu languages, lengola, Bodo, and Nyali may belong together as Lebonya, and Beeke in Boan. F10 Tongwe-Bende F30 Mbugwe–Rangi languages. Isanzu Much of F20 and F30, including the major language Sukuma, have been reclassified as Northeast Bantu, Mbugwe–Rangi, however, form a valid node by themselves. Isanzu is sometimes classified as F30, as a variety of Nilamba, E Tanzania, Comoros G50 Kilombero The languages of Zone G have been reclassified, G60 Bene–Kinga to Northeast Bantu, and the other branches more specifically to Northeast Coast Bantu languages. NW Angola, W Congo H10 Kongo languages H20 Kimbundu languages H30–40 Yaka languages H10 and H40 are sometimes considered Forest Bantu, H10 Kunyi, Suundi, and Vili have been split between B40 and L10. H40 is split between H30 and L10, Kongo–Yaka may form a family, perhaps with B40 Sira. Uganda, Rwanda–Burundi, near lakes Kivu & Victoria J Great Lakes E Angola, k43 Mbukushu K20 Lozi is now classified as Southern Bantu
11.
Lozi people
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The Lozi people are an ethnic group primarily of western Zambia, inhabiting the region of Barotseland. They number approximately 575,000 in Zambia out of a population of 10 million, Lozi are also found in Namibia, Angola, Botswana, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe. The Lozi are also known as the Malozi, Silozi, Kololo, Barotose, Rotse, Rozi, Rutse, the Lozi speak Silozi, a central Bantu language. The word Lozi means plain in the Makololo language, in reference to the Barotse Floodplain of the Zambezi on and it may also be spelt Lotse or Rotse, the spelling Lozi having originated with German missionaries in what is now Namibia. Mu- and Ba- are corresponding singular and plural prefixes for certain nouns in the Silozi language, Lozi tradition states that they have always inhabited Barotseland. In about 1830, an army that originated in the Sotho-speaking Bafokeng region of South Africa, known as the Makololo, led by a warrior called Sebetwane, invaded Barotseland and they ruled until 1864 when the Sotho clique was overthrown following a Lozi revolt. The political organisation of the Lozi has long centred on a monarchy, whose reigning head, great Britain, however, was uninterested in acquiring the territory. A granting of a charter for the British South Africa Company of Cecil Rhodes allowed the company to acquire Barotseland under the guise of the British government. Although under protectorate status, Lewanika eventually realized that he had been tricked and petitioned for the status to be corrected. Although Barotseland was incorporated into Northern Rhodesia, it retained a degree of autonomy. In the run-up to independence, the Litunga, the Ngambela and about a dozen senior indunas went to London for talks with the Colonial Office, in an attempt to have Barotseland remain a Protectorate. The Litunga, Sir Mwanawina Lewenika III, quoted his grandfathers words to Queen Victoria, that My country is your blanket, there remains some support in the region for greater autonomy within Zambia or for full independence. Lozi society is stratified, with a monarch at the top. The monarch or Barotse Royal Establishment is known as Mulonga, criticisms of a Litunga by a foreigner are treated as criticisms of the Lozi nation as a whole. The Lozi are not separate into clans, unlike most African ethnic groups, Lozi culture is strongly influenced by the flood cycle of the Zambezi river, with annual migrations taking place from the flood plain to higher ground at the start of the wet season. The most important of these festivals is the Kuomboka, in which the Litunga moves from Lealui in the plain to Limulunga on higher ground. The Kuomboka usually takes place in February or March, an organisation promoting the development of the Lozi people Information on the Kuomboka Barotseland. com A history of the Lozi
12.
Northern Sotho language
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Northern Sotho is a Bantu language spoken primarily in South Africa, where it is one of the 11 official languages. According to the 2011 census it was the first language of 4,618,576 people in South Africa, principally in the provinces of Limpopo, Gauteng and Mpumalanga. Urban varieties of Northern Sotho, such as Pretoria Sotho, have acquired clicks in a process of such sounds spreading from Nguni languages. Northern Sotho is one of the Sotho languages of the Bantu family, Northern Sotho is thus most closely related to Sesotho, Setswana, sheKgalagari and siLozi. Lobedu exists only in a form, and the standard Northern Sotho language. The monarch associated with this community is Queen Modjadji. Lobedu is spoken mainly in the area of Modjadjiskloof in the Limpopo Province and its speakers are known as the Balobedu. Sepulana also exists in form and forms part of the standard Northern Sotho. Sepulana is spoken in Bushbuckridge area by the Mapulana people, Northern Sotho has often been equated with its major component Sepedi, and continued to be known as Pedi or Sepedi for some years after the new South African constitution appeared. However, the Pan South African Language Board and the Northern Sotho National Lexicography Unit now specifically prefer, apart from Sepedi itself, the other languages or dialects covered by the term Northern Sotho appear to be a diverse grouping of communal speech-forms within the Sotho-Tswana group. They are apparently united by the fact that they are neither as Southern Sotho nor as Tswana. Maho leaves SePhalaborwa and the East Sotho varieties of SeKutswe, SePai and their precise classification would appear to be a matter for further research. Some examples of Northern Sotho words and phrases, slang jargon Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin, world Atlas of Language Structures Online
13.
Tswana language
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The Tswana language, Setswana, is a language spoken in southern Africa by about five million people. Tswana is a language and lingua franca of Botswana. The two South African provinces with largest number of speakers are Gauteng Province and North West Province, until 1994, South African Tswana people were notionally citizens of Bophuthatswana, one of the bantustans of the apartheid regime. The first European to describe the Tswana language was the German traveller H. Lichtenstein and he mistakenly regarded Tswana as a dialect of the Xhosa language, and the name he used for the language Beetjuana may also have covered the Northern- and Southern Sotho languages. In the following years he published other books of the Bible. Masego was the first to speak the language, the first grammar of the Tswana language was published in 1833 by the missionary James Archbell, although it was modelled on a Xhosa grammar. The first grammar of Tswana which regarded it as a language from Xhosa 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 Northern-, in 1876 the South African intellectual and linguist Solomon Plaatje was born, and he became one of the first writers to extensively write in and about the Tswana language. The vowel inventory of Tswana can be seen below, some dialects have two additional vowels, the close-mid vowels /e/ and /o/. The consonant inventory of Tswana can be seen below, the consonant /d/ is merely an allophone of /l/, when the latter is followed by the vowels /i/ or /u/. Tswana also has three click consonants, but these are used in interjections or ideophones, and tend only to be used by the older generation. The three click consonants are the dental click /ǀ/, orthographically ⟨c⟩, the lateral click /ǁ/, orthographically ⟨x⟩, there are some minor dialectal variations among the consonants between speakers of Tswana. For instance, /χ/ is realised as either /x/ or /h/ by many speakers, /f/ is realised as /h/ in most dialects, and /tɬ/ and /tɬʰ/ are realised as /t/ and /tʰ/ in northern dialects. Stress is fixed in Tswana and thus falls on the penult of a word. The syllable on which the falls is lengthened. Tswana has two tones, high and low, although the latter has a wider distribution in words than the former. Tones are not marked orthographically which may lead to ambiguity, if a syllable bears a high tone, the following two syllables will also get high tones, unless they are at the end of the word. The nine classes and their respective prefixes can be seen below, some nouns may be found in several classes
14.
Sotho language
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Like all Bantu languages, Sesotho is an agglutinative language, which uses numerous affixes and derivational and inflexional rules to build complete words. Within the Sotho-Tswana group, Sesotho proper is most closely related to Lozi, the Northern Sotho group is geographical, and includes a number of dialects also closely related to Sesotho-Lozi. Tswana is also known as Western Sesotho, Sotho is a tribal suffix, i. e. the name of the Sotho people or Basotho, while Sesotho is the term for the language of the Basotho. Use of Sesotho rather than Sotho language in English has seen increasing use since the 1980s, especially in South African English, the Nguni language Phuthi has been heavily influenced by Sesotho, its speakers have mixed Nguni and Sotho–Tswana ancestry. It seems that it is sometimes treated erroneously as a dialect of Sesotho called Sephuthi, however, Phuthi is mutually unintelligible with standard Sesotho and thus cannot in any sense be termed a dialect of it. These were the first peoples to be called Basotho, before many of their descendants, the situation is even further complicated by various historical factors, such as members of parent clans joining their descendants or various clans calling themselves by the same names. According to the South African National Census of 2011, there were almost four million first language Sesotho speakers recorded in South Africa – approximately eight per cent of the population. Sesotho is also the language spoken by the people of Lesotho. The census fails, to record other South Africans for whom Sesotho is a second or third language, such speakers are found in all major residential areas of Metropolitan Municipalities - such as Johannesburg, and Tshwane - where multilingualism and polylectalism are very high. Sesotho is one of the official languages of South Africa. Sesotho is one of the languages from which the pseudo-language Tsotsitaal is derived. Tsotsitaal is not a language, as it is primarily a unique vocabulary. It is a part of the culture in most Southern Gauteng townships and is the primary language used in Kwaito music. The sound system of Sesotho is unusual in many respects and it has ejective consonants, click consonants, a uvular trill, a relatively large number of affricate consonants, no prenasalised consonants, and a rare form of vowel-height harmony. In total, the language contains some 39 consonantal and 9 vowel phonemes and it also has a large number of complex sound transformations which often change the phones of words due to the influence of other sounds. The most striking properties of Sesotho grammar, and the most important properties which reveal it as a Bantu language, are its noun gender, the grammatical gender system does not encode sex gender, and indeed, Bantu languages in general are not grammatically marked for gender. Another well-known property of the Bantu languages is their agglutinative morphology, additionally, they tend to lack any grammatical case systems, indicating noun roles almost exclusively through word order. Sotho calendar Sotho people South African Translators Association Sesotho Online A gentle introduction to the Sesotho language, weblog on Sesotho Translate. org. za Project translating Free and Open Source Software into South African languages, including Sesotho
15.
United Nations
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The United Nations is an intergovernmental organization to promote international co-operation. A replacement for the ineffective League of Nations, the organization was established on 24 October 1945 after World War II in order to prevent another such conflict, at its founding, the UN had 51 member states, there are now 193. The headquarters of the UN is in Manhattan, New York City, further main offices are situated in Geneva, Nairobi, and Vienna. The organization is financed by assessed and voluntary contributions from its member states, the UNs mission to preserve world peace was complicated in its early decades by the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union and their respective allies. The organization participated in actions in Korea and the Congo. After the end of the Cold War, the UN took on major military, the UN has six principal organs, the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, the Secretariat, the International Court of Justice, and the UN Trusteeship Council. UN System agencies include the World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, the World Food Programme, UNESCO, the UNs most prominent officer is the Secretary-General, an office held by Portuguese António Guterres since 2017. Non-governmental organizations may be granted consultative status with ECOSOC and other agencies to participate in the UNs work, the organization won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, and a number of its officers and agencies have also been awarded the prize. Other evaluations of the UNs effectiveness have been mixed, some commentators believe the organization to be an important force for peace and human development, while others have called the organization ineffective, corrupt, or biased. Following the catastrophic loss of life in the First World War, the earliest concrete plan for a new world organization began under the aegis of the US State Department in 1939. It incorporated Soviet suggestions, but left no role for France, four Policemen was coined to refer to four major Allied countries, United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and China, which emerged in the Declaration by United Nations. Roosevelt first coined the term United Nations to describe the Allied countries, the term United Nations was first officially used when 26 governments signed this Declaration. One major change from the Atlantic Charter was the addition of a provision for religious freedom, by 1 March 1945,21 additional states had signed. Each Government pledges itself to cooperate with the Governments signatory hereto, the foregoing declaration may be adhered to by other nations which are, or which may be, rendering material assistance and contributions in the struggle for victory over Hitlerism. During the war, the United Nations became the term for the Allies. To join, countries had to sign the Declaration and declare war on the Axis, at the later meetings, Lord Halifax deputized for Mr. Eden, Wellington Koo for T. V. Soong, and Mr Gromyko for Mr. Molotov. The first meetings of the General Assembly, with 51 nations represented, the General Assembly selected New York City as the site for the headquarters of the UN, and the facility was completed in 1952. Its site—like UN headquarters buildings in Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi—is designated as international territory, the Norwegian Foreign Minister, Trygve Lie, was elected as the first UN Secretary-General
16.
Kingdom of Luba
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The Kingdom of Luba or Luba Empire was a pre-colonial Central African state that arose in the marshy grasslands of the Upemba Depression in what is now southern Democratic Republic of Congo. Archaeological research shows that the Upemba depression had been occupied continuously since at least the 5th century AD, by the 6th century, fishing people lived on lakeshores, worked iron, and traded palm oil. Soon they began trading dried fish to the inhabitants of the adjacent forest regions, by the 10th century, the people of Upemba had diversified their economy, combining fishing, farming and metal-working. Metal-workers relied on traders to bring them the copper and charcoal that they needed in smelting, traders exported salt and iron items, and imported glass beads and cowry shells from the distant Indian Ocean. The Luba Kingdom was founded by King Kongolo Maniema around 1585 and his nephew and immediate successor, Kalala Ilunga, expanded the empire over the upper left bank territories of the Lualaba River. At its peak, the state had about a million people paying tribute to its king and it was based on the twin principles of sacred kingship and rule by council. Law and order were handled by the king, known as the Mulopwe, the kings reigned over their subjects through clan kings known as Balopwe. The diverse populations of the Luba were linked by the Bambudye, the Mbudye tradition states that all of the rulers of the Luba Empire traced their ancestry to Kalala Ilunga, a mystical hunter credited with toppling the cruel ruler known as Nkongolo. This figure is also credited with the introduction of advanced iron forging techniques to the Luba peoples, Luba kings became deities upon their deaths, and the villages from which they ruled were transformed into living shrines devoted to their legacies. The Luba heartland was dotted with these landmarks, Central to Luba regalia for kings and other nobles were mwadi, female incarnations of the ancestral kings. Staffs, headrests, bow stands and royal seats featuring this subject represented the divine status of the ruler, the Luba Kingdom kept official men of memory who were part of a group called the Mbudye. They were responsible for maintaining the oral histories associated with kings, their villages, parallels to these kinds of officials can be found in neighboring kingdoms such as Kuba and Lunda. The local economy led to the development of several small Luba kingdoms, Luba traders linked the Zaire forest to the north with the mineral-rich region in the center of modern Zambia known as the Copperbelt. The trade routes passing through Luba territory were also connected with wider networks extending to both the Atlantic and Indian Ocean coasts, with the formation of the Luba kingdom, the economy was complex and based on a tribute system that redistributed agricultural, hunting and mining resources among nobles. The ruling class held a monopoly on trade items such as salt, copper. This allowed them to continue their dominance in much of Central Africa, as in the Kuba Kingdom, the Luba Kingdom held the arts in high esteem. A carver held relatively high status, which was displayed by an adze that he carried over his shoulder, Luba art was not very uniform because of the vast territory which the kingdom controlled. The important role of woman in the myths and political society resulted in many objects of prestige being decorated with female figures
17.
Kingdom of Lunda
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The Kingdom of Lunda, was a pre-colonial African confederation of states in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo, north-eastern Angola and northwestern Zambia. Its central state was in Katanga, initially the core of what would become the Lunda kingdom was a simple village called a gaand in the KiLunda language. It was ruled over by a called the Mwaanta Gaand or Mwaantaangaand. One of these rulers, Ilunga Tshibinda, came from the kingdom of Luba where his brother ruled and married a princess from an area to the south and their son became the first paramount ruler of the Luunda creating the title of Mwanta Yaav. The Lunda Kingdom controlled some 150,000 km2 by 1680, the state doubled in size to around 300,000 km2 at its height in the nineteenth century. The Mwata Yamvos of Lunda became powerful militarily from their base of 175,000 inhabitants, through marriage with descendants of the Luba kings, they gained political ties. The kingdom became a confederation of a number of chieftainships that enjoyed a degree of autonomy, with Mwata Yamvo as paramount ruler. The strength of the kingdom enabled it to conquer the territory of other tribes, in the eighteenth century a number of migrations took place as far as the region to the south of Lake Tanganyika. The Bemba people of Northern Zambia descended from Luba migrants who arrived in Zambia throughout the seventeenth century, at the same time, a Lunda chief and warrior called Mwata Kazembe set up an Eastern Lunda kingdom in the valley of the Luapula River. The kingdom of Lunda came to an end in the century, when it was invaded by the Chokwe. The Chokwe then established their own kingdom with their language and customs, Lunda chiefs and people continued to live in the Lunda heartland but were diminished in power. List of Rulers of the Lunda Kingdom Luba Empire Pogge, Im Reich des Muata Jamwo, Buchner, Das Reich des Muata Jamwo (in Deutsche Geographische Blätter, africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800
18.
Katanga Province
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Katanga was one of the eleven provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1966 and 2015, when it was split into the Tanganyika, Haut-Lomami, Lualaba and Haut-Katanga provinces. Between 1971 and 1997, its name was Shaba Province. Farming and ranching are carried out on the Katanga Plateau, the eastern part of the province is considered a rich mining region, which supplies cobalt, copper, tin, radium, uranium, and diamonds. The regions former capital, Lubumbashi, is the second largest city in the Congo, copper mining in Katanga dates back over 1,000 years and mines in the region were producing standard sized ingots of copper for international transport by the end of the 1st Millennium AD. In the 1890s the province was beleaguered by Cecil Rhodes from the South, msiri, the King of Katanga, held out against both but eventually Katanga was subsumed by the Belgian Congo. From 1900, the Societe Generale de Belgique practically controlled all of the mining in the province through Union Miniere du Haut Katanga and this included uranium, radium, copper, cobalt, zinc, cadmium, germanium, manganese, silver, gold, and tin. By the start of WWII, the mining companies constituted a state within the Belgian Congo, in 1960, after the Democratic Republic of the Congo had received independence from Belgium, Katanga attempted to secede from the country. This was supported by Belgium but opposed by the Congolese Prime Minister Lumumba and it led to the Katanga Crisis which lasted from 1960 to 1965. The breakaway State of Katanga existed from 1960 to 1963, militias such as Mai Mai Kata Katanga led by Gédéon Kyungu Mutanga fought for Katanga to secede and his group briefly took over the provincial capital Lubumbashi in 2013. Following the implementation of the countrys 2005 constitution, in 2015 Katanga Province was split into the provinces of Tanganyika, Haut-Lomami, Lualaba, copper mining is an important part of the economy of Katanga province. Cobalt mining by individual contractors is also prevalent, there are a number of reasons cited for the discrepancy between the vast mineral wealth of the province and the failure of the wealth to increase the overall standard of living. The local provincial budget was $440 million in 2011, Lubumbashi, the mining capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, is a hub for many of the countrys biggest mining companies. The Democratic Republic of Congo produces more than 3 percent of the copper and half its cobalt. Major mining concessions include Tilwezembe, Kalukundi, Gécamines, La Générale des Carrières et des Mines, is the state-owned copper-cobalt mining company which had monopoly concessions in the province. Katanga Mining Ltd is majority-owned by Swiss commodity trader Glencore DCC A joint venture of Katanga Mining and Gécamines began mining Tilwezembe, the province formed the Congolese border with Angola and Zambia. The province also bordered Tanzania - although Katanga province and Tanzania did not share a land border -, Katanga has a wet and dry season. The University of Lubumbashi, located in the part of Lubumbashi city, is the largest university in the province. Université Méthodiste au Katanga, the oldest private institution in the province, is located at Mulungwishi
19.
Congo River
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The Congo River is a river in Africa. It is the second largest river in the world by discharge, the Congo-Chambeshi river has an overall length of 4,700 km, which makes it the ninth-longest river. Measured along the Lualaba, the Congo River has a length of 4,370 km. The Congo Basin has an area of about 4 million km2. The name River Congo originated from the Kingdom of Kongo which was located on the bank of the river. The kingdom in turn is named for the Bantu population, in the 17th century reported as Esikongo, South of the Kongo kingdom proper lay the similarly named Kakongo kingdom, mentioned in 1535. Abraham Ortelius in his map of 1564 labels as Manicongo the city at the mouth of the river. The tribal names in kongo possibly derive from a word for a gathering or tribal assembly. Little is known about the peoples of the inner Congo, but It is probable that the word Kongo itself implies a public gathering, the usual interpretations, admittedly unsatisfactory, make the mistake of being too concrete, for example, they may claim that Kongo comes from nkongo. The modern name of the Kongo people or Bakongo was introduced in the early 20th century, the name Zaire is from a Portuguese adaptation of a Kikongo word nzere, a truncation of nzadi o nzere. The Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of the Congo are named after it, the state of Zaire during 1971–1997 was also named after the river, after its name in French and Portuguese. The Congos drainage basin covers 4,014,500 square kilometres, the Congos discharge at its mouth ranges from 23,000 to 75,000 cubic metres per second, with an average of 41,000 cubic metres per second. The river and its tributaries flow through the Congo Rainforest, the second largest rain forest area in the world, second only to the Amazon Rainforest in South America. Because its drainage basin includes both north and south of the equator, its flow is stable, as there is always at least one part of the river experiencing a rainy season. The Chambeshi River in Zambia is generally taken as the source of the Congo in line with the accepted practice worldwide of using the longest tributary, as with the Nile River. The Congo River Basin is one of the distinct physiographic sections of the larger Mid-African province, sorted in order from the mouth heading upstream. Lower Congo Downstream of Kinshasa, there are no important tributaries, luvua Luapula Chambeshi Although the Livingstone Falls prevent access from the sea, nearly the entire Congo above them is readily navigable in sections, especially between Kinshasa and Kisangani. Large river steamers worked the river until quite recently, the Congo River still is a lifeline in a land with few roads or railways
20.
Zambezi
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The Zambezi is the fourth-longest river in Africa, the longest east-flowing river in Africa and the largest flowing into the Indian Ocean from Africa. The area of its basin is 1,390,000 square kilometres, the Zambezis most noted feature is Victoria Falls. Other notable falls include the Chavuma Falls at the border between Zambia and Angola, and Ngonye Falls, near Sioma in Western Zambia, there is also a smaller power station at Victoria Falls. The area around the source is a monument, forest reserve. Eastward of the source, the watershed between the Congo and Zambezi basins is a belt of high ground, running nearly east-west. This distinctly cuts off the basin of the Lualaba from that of the Zambezi, in the neighborhood of the source the watershed is not as clearly defined, but the two river systems do not connect. The region drained by the Zambezi is a vast broken-edged plateau 900–1200 m high, composed in the interior of metamorphic beds. Coal is also found in the district just below Victoria Falls, gold-bearing rocks occur in several places. The river flows to the south-west into Angola for about 240 kilometres, then is joined by tributaries such as the Luena. It turns south and develops a floodplain, with extreme variation between the dry and rainy seasons. It enters dense evergreen Cryptosepalum dry forest, though on its western side, where it re-enters Zambia it is nearly 400 metres wide in the rainy season and flows rapidly, with rapids ending in the Chavuma Falls, where the river flows through a rocky fissure. The river drops about 400 metres in elevation from its source at 1,500 metres to the Chavuma Falls at 1,100 metres, in a distance of about 400 kilometres. From this point to the Victoria Falls, the level of the basin is very uniform, the first of its large tributaries to enter the Zambezi is the Kabompo River in the north-western province of Zambia. A major advantage of the Kabompo River was irrigation, civilization was built on farming, and the surplus of crops. The savanna through which the river has flowed gives way to a wide floodplain, a little farther south is the confluence with the Lungwebungu River. This is the beginning of the Barotse Floodplain, the most notable feature of the upper Zambezi, for more than 200 km downstream the annual flood cycle dominates the natural environment and human life, society and culture. Eighty kilometres further down, the Luanginga, which with its tributaries drains an area to the west. A few kilometres higher up on the east the main stream is joined in the season by overflow of the Luampa/Luena system
21.
Barotseland
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The Barotse speak a complex language, Silozi, derived from several languages but primarily Sesotho. Barotseland covers an area of 126,386 square kilometres, but is estimated to have twice as large at certain points in its history. Under the British colonial administration, Barotseland enjoyed relative autonomy from the late 19th-century, Barotseland was essentially a nation-state, a protectorate within the larger protectorate of Northern Rhodesia. In return for this status, the Litunga gave the BSAC mineral exploration rights in Barotseland. This traditional constitutional monarchy has Nilotic origins with the kingdom divided into north and south. The Government of Barotseland is the Kuta, presided over by the Ngambela, before the advent of European explorers such as David Livingstone the Barotse had no written history, so the history was passed down by word of mouth. It is believed that the Barotse Nation was founded by Queen Mbuywamwambwa and its people were migrants from the Congo. Other ethnic groupings that constitute the current Barotse kingdom migrated from South Africa, Angola, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Congo. The Barotse reached the Zambezi River in the 17th Century and their kingdom grew until it comprised some 25 peoples from Southern Rhodesia to the Congo, at the time, Barotseland was already a monarchy. A detailed investigation into the history of the Barotse was carried out in 1939 in connection with the Balovale Dispute, in 1845 Barotseland had been conquered by the Makalolo from Lesotho – which is why the Barotse language, Silozi, is a variant of Si-suto. The Makololo were in power when Livingstone visited Barotseland, but after thirty years the Luyi successfully overthrew the Kololo king, Barotselands status at the onset of the colonial era differed from the other regions which became Zambia. It was the first territory north of the Zambezi to sign a minerals concession and this was prompted by Lewanikas fears of an invasion by the Matebele under Lobengula. By 1880 the kingdom was stabilised and King Lewanika signed a treaty on 26 June 1889 to provide the international recognition as a State. After the discovery of diamonds, King Lewanika began trading with Europe, the first trade concession was signed on 27 June 1889 with Harry Ware, in return King Lewanika and his kingdom were to be protected. Ware transferred his concession to John Cecil Rhodes of the British South Africa Company, in the 1930s, there was trouble between the Barotse and the Balovale and Balunda tribes who occupied the land to the north of the land occupied by the Barotse. The Barotse claimed that these were vassal tribes, while they claimed that they were not, eventually the Government set up a Commission to adjudicate, and the Barotse lost. The national flag of Barotseland has a red field and a white stripe, the agreement was based on a long history of close social, economic and political interactions, but granted significant continued autonomy to Barotseland. The Barotseland Agreement granted Barotse authorities local self-governance rights and rights to be consulted on specified matters, including land, natural resources
22.
Barotse Floodplain
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The Barotse Floodplain also known as the Bulozi Plain, Lyondo or the Zambezi Floodplain is one of Africas great wetlands, on the Zambezi River in the Western Province of Zambia. It is a designated Ramsar site, regarded as being of conservation value. The name recognises the floodplain as spawning the culture and way of life of the Lozi people, Rotse being a variant of Lozi, and Ba meaning people. They became a kingdom in Central/Southern Africa under their King or Litunga, Lewanika. The region is a plateau at an elevation of about 1000 m tilting very slightly to the south. The Zambezi and its headwaters rise on the ground to the north. A flood moves down the river reaching a region, formed from Kalahari sands. To the south around the Ngonye Falls harder rock is found at the surface and has resisted the tendency to cut a channel down into it. Behind it the floodplain has formed, below the falls the river falls nearly twice as fast as it does on the plain, and flows more swiftly in a narrower valley less prone to flooding. The floodplain stretches from the Zambezis confluence with the Kabompo and Lungwebungu Rivers in the north, to a point about 230 km south, above the Ngonye falls and south of Senanga. Along most of its length its width is over 30 km, reaching 50 km at the widest, just north of Mongu, principal town of the plain, situated at its edge. The main body of the plain covers about 5500 km², but the flooded area is 10750 km² when the floodplains of several tributaries are taken into account. See also Climate of Zambia The peak of the flood occurs on the floodplain about 3 months after the peak of the season in January–February. The flood usually peaks in April, and recedes in May to July, at the rivers lowest water in November the floodplain still contains about 537 km² of lagoons, swamps and channels. It provides a good soil, but in the dry season it bakes hard in the heat of the sun. As the floods recede, water is left behind in lagoons, swamps, the flood provides aquatic habitats for fish such as tigerfish and bream, crocodiles, hippopotamus, waterbirds, fish-eating birds, and lechwe, the wading antelope. After the flood, the plain is a habitat for grazing animals such as wildebeest, zebra, tsessebe and small antelope such oribi and steenbok, in addition the entire western of the Zambezi within the country is a Game Management Area. About 250,000 people live on the plain with a number of cattle
23.
Shaka
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Shaka kaSenzangakhona, also known as Shaka Zulu, was one of the most influential monarchs of the Zulu Kingdom. He was born near present-day Melmoth, KwaZulu-Natal Province, due to persecution as a result of his illegitimacy, Shaka spent his childhood in his mothers settlements where he was initiated into an ibutho lempi. In his early days, Shaka served as a warrior under the sway of Dingiswayo, the initial Zulu maneuvers were primarily defensive in nature, as Shaka preferred to apply pressure diplomatically, aided by an occasional strategic assassination. His changes to local society built on existing structures, although he preferred social and propagandistic political methods, he also engaged in a number of battles, as the Zulu sources make clear. In turn, he was assassinated by his own half brothers, Dingane. When Senzangakhona died in 1816 Shakas younger half-brother Sigujana assumed power as the heir to the Zulu chiefdom. Sigujanas reign was short however as Shaka, with the help of Dingiswayo and his half brother Ngwadi, had Sigujana assassinated in a coup that was relatively bloodless, when the Mthethwa forces were defeated and scattered temporarily, the power vacuum was filled by Shaka. He reformed the remnants of the Mthethwa and other regional tribes, when Dingiswayo was murdered by Zwide, Shaka sought to avenge his death. At some point Zwide barely escaped Shaka, though the details are not known. In that encounter Zwides mother Ntombazi, a Sangoma, was killed by Shaka. Shaka chose a particularly gruesome revenge on her, locking her in a house and placing jackals or hyenas inside, they devoured her and, in the morning, despite carrying out this revenge, Shaka continued his pursuit of Zwide. It was not until around 1825 that the two leaders met, near Phongola, in what would be their final meeting. Phongola is near the present day border of KwaZulu-Natal, a province in South Africa, Shaka was victorious in battle, although his forces sustained heavy casualties, which included his head military commander, Umgobhozi Ovela Entabeni. In Qwabe, Shaka may have intervened in a succession dispute to help his own choice, Nqetho, into power. As Shaka became more respected by his people, he was able to spread his ideas with greater ease, because of his background as a soldier, Shaka taught the Zulus that the most effective way of becoming powerful quickly was by conquering and controlling other tribes. His teachings greatly influenced the outlook of the Zulu people. The Zulu tribe soon developed a warrior mindset, which Shaka turned to his advantage, Shakas hegemony was primarily based on military might, smashing rivals and incorporating scattered remnants into his own army. He supplemented this with a mixture of diplomacy and patronage, incorporating friendly chieftains, including Zihlandlo of the Mkhize, Jobe of the Sithole and these peoples were never defeated in battle by the Zulu, they did not have to be
24.
Mfecane
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As King Shaka created the militaristic Zulu Kingdom in the territory between the Tugela River and Pongola River, his forces caused a wave of warfare and disruption to sweep to other peoples. This was the prelude of the Mfecane, which spread from there, Mfecane is used primarily to refer to the period when Mzilikazi, a king of the Matabele, dominated the Transvaal. During his reign, roughly from 1826 to 1836, he ordered widespread killings and he reorganised the territory to establish the new Ndebele order. The death toll has never been determined, but the whole region became nearly depopulated. Normal estimates for the death toll range from 1 million to 2 million, theories vary as to the causes of the catastrophic warfare and migration of many tribes in the area. While corn was more productive than the grains from native grasses, the agricultural surpluses and increased population enabled Shaka to raise a standing army of Zulus. By the end of the 18th century, the Zulus occupied much of their arable land, declining rainfall and a ten-year drought in the early 19th century set off a competition for land and water resources among the peoples of the area. Other possible causes were the Zulus adoption of new tactics and weapons during this period, instead of using throwing spears, the Zulus used broad-bladed, stabbing spears known as iklwa, which were deadly in close combat. The Zulus also instituted a form of conscription, in every man had to serve the king as soldier in special age regiments. Many of the Nguni peoples adopted the practice, putting most of their men under arms. This greatly expanded the scale of regional warfare and they were respectively led by king Sobhuza of Ngwane, Zwide, and Dingiswayo and were the most powerful tribes. The language now known as Zulu was spoken by the Ndwandwes, at that time the Zulus were a very weak tribe under the leadership of Senzangakhona. They spoke a language in which l is pronounced as y, so that suka lapha, meaning go from here. These three tribes are to this day found in the same areas, the Zulus were a weak minority occupying a small piece of land in the area now known as Makhosini near Babanango. The Ikhoshlo side of Buthelezi led by Mvulane became instrumental in the defeat of Phungashe by Shaka, mvulanes son Ngqengelele became Shakas induna and chief advisor. Ngqengeles son, Mbangambi led his section of Buthelezis against Hhamu of Ngenetsheni, most of the members of the Buthelezi Tribe had left with Khoboyela and Ngqengelele. When Shaka attacked the Ngwane, Sobhuzas men were outnumbered by the combination of the Mthethwas, the Buthelezis under Ngqengelele, in summary, the causes of mfecane are, the need for land, population growth in Natal, the Boer trek, Shakas military and expansionist strategy. In addition, the slave trade through Delagoa Bay is another cause
25.
Zambezi Region
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The Zambezi Region, until 2013 known as the Caprivi Region, is one of the 14 regions of Namibia, located in the extreme north-east of the country. It is largely concurrent with the Caprivi Strip and takes its name from the Zambezi River that runs along its border, the terrain is mostly made up of swamps, floodplains, wetlands and woodland. In addition to the Zambezi River, the strip also holds the Cuando and Kwando River, tributaries of the river here go by different names, including the Linyata and the Chobe. The provinces far east is where the Cuando meets the Zambezi, the Zambezi Region is almost entirely surrounded by foreign countries. Its only domestic border is a connection in the west with Kavango East. In the northwest, it borders the Cuando Cubango Province of Angola, in the north, it borders the Western Province of Zambia. In the south, it borders the North-West District of Botswana, the Namibia-Zambia-Botswana tripoint lies less than 100 metres from the Zimbabwe border and as such Namibia is sometimes erroneously thought to border Zimbabwe. The region is home to 450 animal species, including elephants, the Caprivi strip is also a prime bird-watching area, with almost 70 percent of bird species found in Namibia being recorded here. Bwabwata National Park is 6,100 square kilometres and extends for about 180 km from the Kavango River River in the west to the Kwando River in the east, deciduous woodlands are dominated by trees such as wild seringa, copalwood and Zambezi teak. Animals likely to be seen are elephant, roan and kudu, as many as 339 bird species have been recorded in the west of the Zambezi Region. The wild and little visited Mamili National Park is Namibias equivalent of the Okavango Delta, the focal points of the 320 km2 national park are Nkasa and Lupala, two large islands in the Kwando/Linyati river. During the dry season the islands can be reached by road but after the rains 80% of the area becomes flooded, mudumu National Park is a vast 1,000 km2 expanse of dense savannah and mopane woodland with the Kwando River at its western border. The park is home to populations of sitatunga and red lechwe while spotted neck otter, hippo. Animals to be encountered are elephant, buffalo, roan, sable, kudu, impala, oribi, zebra, until the end of the 19th century, the area was known as Itenge, and it was under the rule of the Lozi kings. In the late 19th century the strip of land was administered as part of the British protectorate of Bechuanaland, the German Empire in 1890 laid claim to the British-administered island of Zanzibar, Britain objected and the dispute was settled at the Berlin Conference later that year. On 1 July 1890, the British acquired Zanzibar and Germany acquired the territory became known as the Caprivi Strip. Caprivi was named after German Chancellor Leo von Caprivi, who negotiated the land in an 1890 exchange with the United Kingdom. Leo von Caprivi arranged for the Caprivi strip to be annexed to German South West Africa in order to give Germany access to the Zambezi River as part of the Heligoland-Zanzibar Treaty
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Christian mission
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A Christian mission is an organized effort to spread Christianity. Missions often involve sending individuals and groups, called missionaries, across boundaries, most commonly geographical boundaries and this involves evangelism, and humanitarian work, especially among the poor and disadvantaged. There are a few different kinds of trips, short-term, long-term, relational. Some might choose to dedicate their lives to missions as well. Missionaries have the authority to preach the Christian faith, and provide work to improve economic development, literacy, education, health care. Christian doctrines permit the provision of aid without requiring religious conversion, the earliest examples of Christian missionary activity are those recorded in writings that would eventually come to form the New Testament. Early writings include the letters of Apostle Paul, written in the course of his activity in Asia Minor. His activities were preceded by an expansion of Christianity from the first followers of Jesus in Jerusalem throughout Syro-Palestine and this is also described in the Acts of the Apostles. The earliest Christian mission, then, the Great Commission and Dispersion of the Apostles, was active within Second Temple Judaism, as Christianity had not yet split from Judaism. Whether a Jewish proselytism existed or not that would have served as a model for the early Christians is unclear, soon, the expansion of the Christian mission beyond Judaism to those who were not Jewish became a contested issue, notably at the Council of Jerusalem. The Apostle Paul was a proponent of this expansion, and contextualized the Christian message for the Greek and Roman cultures, permitting it to reach beyond its Hebrew. From Late Antiquity onward, much activity was carried out by members of religious orders. Monasteries followed disciplines and supported missions, libraries, and practical research, all of which were perceived as works to reduce human misery and suffering, for example, Nestorian communities evangelized parts of Central Asia, as well as Tibet, China, and India. Cistercians evangelized much of Northern Europe, as well as developing most of European agricultures classic techniques, st Patrick evangelized many in Ireland. St David was active in Wales, during the Middle Ages, Ramon Llull advanced the concept of preaching to Muslims and converting them to Christianity by means of non-violent argument. A vision for mission to Muslims would die with him. Additional events can be found at the timeline of Christian missions, during the Middle Ages Christian monasteries and missionaries such as Saint Patrick, and Adalbert of Prague propagated learning and religion beyond the boundaries of the old Roman Empire. In the seventh century Gregory the Great sent missionaries, including Augustine of Canterbury, the Hiberno-Scottish mission began in 563
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Letter case
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Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger upper case and smaller lower case in the written representation of certain languages. The writing systems that distinguish between the upper and lower case have two sets of letters, with each letter in one set usually having an equivalent in the other set. Basically, the two variants are alternative representations of the same letter, they have the same name and pronunciation. Letter case is generally applied in a fashion, with both upper- and lower-case letters appearing in a given piece of text. The choice of case is often prescribed by the grammar of a language or by the conventions of a particular discipline, in mathematics, letter case may indicate the relationship between objects, with upper-case letters often representing superior objects. In some contexts, it is conventional to use only one case, the terms upper case and lower case can be written as two consecutive words, connected with a hyphen, or as a single word. These terms originated from the layouts of the shallow drawers called type cases used to hold the movable type for letterpress printing. Traditionally, the letters were stored in a separate case that was located above the case that held the small letters. Majuscule, for palaeographers, is technically any script in which the letters have very few or very short ascenders and descenders, or none at all. By virtue of their impact, this made the term majuscule an apt descriptor for what much later came to be more commonly referred to as uppercase letters. The word is often spelled miniscule, by association with the word miniature. This has traditionally been regarded as a mistake, but is now so common that some dictionaries tend to accept it as a nonstandard or variant spelling. Miniscule is still less likely, however, to be used in reference to lower-case letters, the glyphs of lower-case letters can resemble smaller forms of the upper-case glyphs restricted to the base band or can look hardly related. There is more variation in the height of the minuscules, as some of them have higher or lower than the typical size. In Times New Roman, for instance, b, d, f, h, k, l, t are the letters with ascenders, and g, j, p, q, y are the ones with descenders. In addition, with old-style numerals still used by traditional or classical fonts,6 and 8 make up the ascender set. Writing systems using two separate cases are bicameral scripts, languages that use the Latin, Cyrillic, Greek, Coptic, Armenian, Adlam, Varang Kshiti, Cherokee, and Osage scripts use letter cases in their written form as an aid to clarity. Other bicameral scripts, which are not used for any modern languages, are Old Hungarian, Glagolitic, the Georgian alphabet has several variants, and there were attempts to use them as different cases, but the modern written Georgian language does not distinguish case
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International Phonetic Alphabet
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The International Phonetic Alphabet is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin alphabet. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association as a representation of the sounds of spoken language. The IPA is used by lexicographers, foreign students and teachers, linguists, speech-language pathologists, singers, actors, constructed language creators. The IPA is designed to represent only those qualities of speech that are part of language, phones, phonemes, intonation. IPA symbols are composed of one or more elements of two types, letters and diacritics. For example, the sound of the English letter ⟨t⟩ may be transcribed in IPA with a letter, or with a letter plus diacritics. Often, slashes are used to signal broad or phonemic transcription, thus, /t/ is less specific than, occasionally letters or diacritics are added, removed, or modified by the International Phonetic Association. As of the most recent change in 2005, there are 107 letters,52 diacritics and these are shown in the current IPA chart, posted below in this article and at the website of the IPA. In 1886, a group of French and British language teachers, led by the French linguist Paul Passy, for example, the sound was originally represented with the letter ⟨c⟩ in English, but with the digraph ⟨ch⟩ in French. However, in 1888, the alphabet was revised so as to be uniform across languages, the idea of making the IPA was first suggested by Otto Jespersen in a letter to Paul Passy. It was developed by Alexander John Ellis, Henry Sweet, Daniel Jones, since its creation, the IPA has undergone a number of revisions. After major revisions and expansions in 1900 and 1932, the IPA remained unchanged until the International Phonetic Association Kiel Convention in 1989, a minor revision took place in 1993 with the addition of four letters for mid central vowels and the removal of letters for voiceless implosives. The alphabet was last revised in May 2005 with the addition of a letter for a labiodental flap, apart from the addition and removal of symbols, changes to the IPA have consisted largely in renaming symbols and categories and in modifying typefaces. Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet for speech pathology were created in 1990, the general principle of the IPA is to provide one letter for each distinctive sound, although this practice is not followed if the sound itself is complex. There are no letters that have context-dependent sound values, as do hard, finally, the IPA does not usually have separate letters for two sounds if no known language makes a distinction between them, a property known as selectiveness. These are organized into a chart, the chart displayed here is the chart as posted at the website of the IPA. The letters chosen for the IPA are meant to harmonize with the Latin alphabet, for this reason, most letters are either Latin or Greek, or modifications thereof. Some letters are neither, for example, the letter denoting the glottal stop, ⟨ʔ⟩, has the form of a question mark
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Open front unrounded vowel
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The open front unrounded vowel, or low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨a⟩, there are also differing interpretations of the exact quality of the vowel, the classic sound recording of by Daniel Jones is slightly more front but not quite as open as that by John Wells. In practice, it is considered normal by many phoneticians to use the symbol ⟨a⟩ for a central unrounded vowel. This is the practice, for example, in the historical study of the English language. If one needs to specify that the vowel is front, they can use symbols like ⟨a̟⟩, or ⟨æ̞⟩, the Hamont dialect of Limburgish has been reported to contrast long open front, central and back unrounded vowels, which is extremely unusual. Its vowel height is open, also known as low, which means the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth – that is, as low as possible in the mouth. Its vowel backness is front, which means the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant, note that rounded front vowels are often centralized, which means that often they are in fact near-front. It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded, many languages have some form of an unrounded open vowel. For languages that have only an open vowel, the symbol for this vowel ⟨a⟩ may be used because it is the only open vowel whose symbol is part of the basic Latin alphabet. Whenever marked as such, the vowel is closer to a central than to a front, the cardinal vowels with Daniel Jones
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Voiced bilabial stop
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The voiced bilabial stop is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨b⟩, the voiced bilabial stop occurs in English, and it is the sound denoted by the letter ⟨b⟩ in boy. Many Indian languages, such as Hindustani, have a two-way contrast between breathy voiced /bʱ/ and plain /b/, features of the voiced bilabial stop, Its manner of articulation is occlusive, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract. Since the consonant is also oral, with no outlet, the airflow is blocked entirely. Its place of articulation is bilabial, which means it is articulated with both lips and its phonation is voiced, which means the vocal cords vibrate during the articulation. It is a consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth only. Because the sound is not produced with airflow over the tongue, the airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds
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Voiceless palato-alveolar affricate
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The voiceless palato-alveolar sibilant affricate or voiceless domed postalveolar sibilant affricate is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The sound is transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet with ⟨t͡ʃ⟩, ⟨t͜ʃ⟩ or ⟨tʃ⟩ and it is familiar to English speakers as the ch sound in chip. Historically, this sound often derives from a former voiceless velar stop /k/, or a dental stop by way of palatalization. Some scholars use the symbol /t͡ʃ/ to transcribe the laminal variant of the voiceless retroflex affricate, in such cases, the voiceless palato-alveolar affricate is transcribed /t͡ʃʲ/. Its phonation is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords, in some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless, in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds. It is a consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth only. It is a consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream along the center of the tongue. The airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds. Mandarin Chinese, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Catalan, and Thai have a voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate /t͡ɕ/ and its place of articulation is postalveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue behind the alveolar ridge. Its phonation is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords, in some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless, in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds. It is a consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth only. It is a consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream along the center of the tongue. The airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds
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Close-mid front unrounded vowel
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The close-mid front unrounded vowel, or high-mid front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨e⟩, for the close-mid front rounded vowel that is usually transcribed with the symbol ⟨ɪ⟩ or ⟨i⟩, see near-close near-front unrounded vowel. If the usual symbol is ⟨e⟩, the vowel is listed here, the IPA prefers the terms close and open for vowels, and the name of this article follows this preference. However, a number of linguists prefer the terms high. Its vowel height is close-mid, also known as high-mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a vowel and a mid vowel. Its vowel backness is front, which means the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant, note that rounded front vowels are often centralized, which means that often they are in fact near-front. It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded
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Open-mid front unrounded vowel
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The open-mid front unrounded vowel, or low-mid front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is a Latinized variant of the Greek lowercase epsilon, the IPA prefers terms close and open for vowels, and the name of the article follows this. However, a number of linguists, perhaps a majority, prefer the terms high. Its vowel height is open-mid, also known as low-mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a vowel and a mid vowel. Its vowel backness is front, which means the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant, note that rounded front vowels are often centralized, which means that often they are in fact near-front. It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded
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Near-close near-front unrounded vowel
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The near-close near-front unrounded vowel, or near-high near-front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɪ⟩, the International Phonetic Association advises serifs on the symbols ends. Some sans-serif fonts do meet this typographic specification, prior to 1989, there was an alternate symbol for this sound, ⟨ɩ⟩, the use of which is no longer sanctioned by the IPA. Despite that, some modern writings still use it, sometimes, especially in broad transcription, this vowel is transcribed with a simpler symbol ⟨i⟩, which technically represents the close front unrounded vowel. The Handbook of the International Phonetic Association defines as a close front unrounded vowel, therefore. The symbol ⟨ɪ⟩ is often used to transcribe the close-mid near-front unrounded vowel. It occurs in some dialects of English as well as other languages. Certain sources may even use ⟨ɪ⟩ for the close-mid front unrounded vowel, for the close-mid front unrounded vowel that is not usually transcribed with the symbol ⟨ɪ⟩, see close-mid front unrounded vowel. For the fully central equivalents of these vowels, see near-close central unrounded vowel, the IPA prefers the terms close and open for classifying vowels. Some linguists use the high and low, respectively, instead of close. Its vowel height is near-close, also known as near-high, which means the tongue is not quite so constricted as a close vowel, also known as front-central or centralized front, which means the tongue is positioned almost as far forward as a front vowel. It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded
