Venda language

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Venda Tshivenḓa
Spoken in:	Image:Flag of South Africa.svg South Africa Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg Zimbabwe
Region:	Limpopo Province
Total speakers:	750,000
Language family:	Niger-Congo  Atlantic-Congo   Volta-Congo    Benue-Congo     Bantoid      Southern Bantoid       Narrow Bantu        Venda
Official status
Official language in:	Image:Flag of South Africa.svg South Africa
Regulated by:	no official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	ve
ISO 639-2:	ven
ISO 639-3:	ven
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Venda, also known as Tshivenḓa, or Luvenḓa, is a Bantu language. The majority of Venda speakers live in South Africa (where Venda is an official language), but there are also speakers in Zimbabwe. During the Apartheid era of South Africa, the bantustan of Venda was set up to cover the Venda speakers of South Africa.

Contents 1 Classification 2 Geographic distribution 2.1 Official status 3 Writing system 4 External links 4.1 Software

[edit] Classification

Venda belongs to the Bantu branch of the Niger-Congo languages.

[edit] Geographic distribution

Venda is spoken by about 666,000 people in the northern part of South Africa's Limpopo Province, as well as 84,000 people in Zimbabwe.

[edit] Official status

Venda is an official language in South Africa.

[edit] Writing system

The Venda language uses the Latin alphabet with 5 additional accented letters. The letters C, J and Q are used only in quoting foreign words and names.

The Venda alphabet

A a	B b	(C c)	D d	Ḓ ḓ	E e	F f
G g	H h	I i	(J j)	K k	L l	Ḽ ḽ
M m	N n	Ṋ ṋ	Ṅ ṅ	O o	P p	(Q q)
R r	S s	T t	Ṱ ṱ	U u	V v	W w
X x	Y y	Z z

letter(s)	value(s) in IPA	notes
a	[a]
b	[b]
bw	[bγw] or [bj]	Varies by dialect
d	[d]
dz	[ʣ]
dzh	[ʤ]	Similar to English "j"
dzw	[ʣw]
ḓ	[d̪]
e	[ɛ], [e]
f	[f]
fh	[ɸ]
g	[ɡ]
h	[ɦ], [h]	Pronounced as [h] before e.
hw	[ɣw]
i	[i]
k	[kˀ]
kh	[kʰ]
khw	[kʰw]
l	[ɭ]
ḽ	[l̪]
m	[m], [ɱ]	Pronounced as [ɱ] before v and vh. M is syllabic, [m̩], when following syllable begins with m.
n	[n]	Pronounced as [n̪] before ḓ and ṱ. N is syllabic, [n̩], when following syllable begins with n.
ng	[ŋɡ]
ny	[ɲ]
nz	[nʣ]
ṋ	[n̪]
ṅ	[ŋ]
ṅw	[ŋw]
o	[ɔ], [o]
p	[pˀ]
ph	[pʰ]
r	[r]
s	[s]
sh	[ʃ]
sw	[ʂ]
t	[tˀ]
th	[tʰ]
ts	[ʦ]
tsh	[tʃʰ]
tsw	[ʦw]
ty	[c]
ṱ	[t̪]
u	[u]
v	[v]
vh	[β]
w	[w]
x	[x]	Similar to the ch in Scottish 'loch.'
y	[j]
z	[z]
zh	[ʒ]
zw	[ʐ]

[edit] External links

• Ethnologue entry for Venda
• Tshivenda - South African Languages
• Batho Portal Welcome page in Venda
• PanAfrican L10n page on Venda

[edit] Software

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

v • d • e Image:Flag of South Africa.svg Languages of the Republic of South Africa
Official languages Afrikaans · English · isiNdebele · Northern Sotho · Sesotho · Siswati · Xitsonga · Setswana · Tshivenḓa · isiXhosa · isiZulu
Non-official languages Fanagalo · Kxoe · Lobedu · Nama · Northern Ndebele · Phuthi · Tsotsitaal · Other Khoisan · South African Sign Language

v • d • e Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg Languages of the Republic of Zimbabwe
English · ChiShona · Northern Ndebele · Fanagalo · Lozi  · Tsoa  · Tsonga · Venda  ·

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af:Venda (taal)

be-x-old:Вэндзкая мова br:Vendeg bg:Венда de:Tshivenda es:Idioma venda fr:Venda (langue) it:Lingua venda nl:Venda (taal) ja:ヴェンダ語 nah:Vēndatlahtōlli no:Venda (språk) nov:Vendum pl:Język venda pt:XiVenda ru:Венда (язык) fi:Vendan kieli ve:TshiVenda