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About Shona Language



Countries

Countries
Zimbabwe

Total No. Of Countries
1 14

National Language
Botswana, Mozambique, Zimbabwe

Second Language
Not spoken in any of the countries

Speaking Continents
Africa

Minority Language
Not spoken in any of the countries

Regulated By
-

Interesting Facts
  • Shona language is tonal language.
  • The African people in Zimbabwe is made of 10 ethnic groups, each speaking a different languages, shona is spoken by 60 percent of population.

Similar To
Kalanga and Nambya Language

Derived From
-

Alphabets

Alphabets in
Shona-Alphabets.jpg#200

Alphabets
37 19

Phonology

How Many Vowels
5 2

How Many Consonants
46 34

Scripts
Latin

Writing Direction
-

Hard to Learn

Language Levels
4 3

Time Taken to Learn
30 weeks 10

Greetings

Hello
Mhoro

Thank You
Waita zvako

How Are You?
Wakadini zvako?

Good Night
Urare zvakanaka

Good Evening
Manheru

Good Afternoon
Masikati

Good Morning
Mangwanani

Please
Ndinokumbirawo

Sorry
Ndineurombo

Bye
bye

I Love You
Ndinokuda

Excuse Me
Pamusoro

Dialects

Dialect 1
Hwesa

Where They Speak
Zimbabwe

How Many People Speak
11,000,000.00 36

Dialect 2
Karanga

Where They Speak
southern Zimbabwe

How Many People Speak
1,100,000.00 63

Dialect 3
Zezuru

Where They Speak
central Zimbabwe, Mashonaland

How Many People Speak
16.00 85

Total No. Of Dialects
4 4

How Many People Speak

How Many People Speak?
25.00 million 40

Speaking Population
0.13 % 54

Native Speakers
8.30 million 51

Second Language Speakers
16.00 million 33

Native Name
chiShona

Alternative Names
Chishona, “Swina” (pej.), Zezuru

French Name
shona

German Name
Schona-Sprache

Pronunciation
[ʃoːna]

Ethnicity
Shona people

History

Origin
20th century

Language Family
Niger-Congo Family

Subgroup
Benue-Congo

Branch
Bantu

Language Forms

Early Forms
Old Shona and Middle Shona

Standard Forms
Standard Shona

Language Position
107 77

Signed Forms
Signed Shona

Scope
Individual

Code

ISO 639 1
sn

ISO 639 2

ISO 639 2/T
sna

ISO 639 2/B
sna

ISO 639 3
sna

ISO 639 6
sna

Glottocode
core1255

Linguasphere
99-AUT-a

Types of Language

Language Type
Living

Language Linguistic Typology
-

Language Morphological Typology
-

Summary >>
<< Code

Know Alphabets in Shona

When you start learning to write in any language the Alphabets form a skeleton of any language. Let's talk About Shona Language, where you will learn the number of letter in Shona Alphabets. Every language has its own set of alphabets or characters so it is necessary to know alphabets in Shona. Shona phonology gives Shona vowels and Shona consonants. There are 5 vowels and 46 consonants in Shona language. Based upon the number of alphabet, vowels and consonants in the language we can check if Shona is one of the Most Difficult Languages. All about Shona language is given in detail in this section.

Most Difficult Languages

All Shona countries

Want to explore all Shona countries? About Shona language serves you with all Shona Speaking Countries. Countries that use Shona as official language are called as Shona countries.

  • Countries that use Shona as their National Language are: Botswana, Mozambique, Zimbabwe.

Second language indicates to any language which the person learns in addition to first or native language.

  • Countries that use Shona as second language are: Shona is not spoken as second language in any of the countries.

You can also go through all European Languages and explore more about their speaking population, alphabets, greetings, dialects and many more.

Compare Most Difficult Languages

Learn Shona greetings

Languages are used by every human being to communicate. And communication begins with the greetings. First step to form any interaction is to learn Shona Greetings. Whenever you are travelling to new country where in you don’t know the local language of that country then you should at least be familiar with some greetings to start any formal or informal conversion. When we talk about Shona language, we are always interested in learning useful phrases in Shona language.Learn Shona greetings that can be used in formal situations:

  • Hello: Mhoro
  • Thank you: Waita zvako
  • Good Morning: Mangwanani
  • Good Evening: Manheru
  • Good Afternoon: Masikati

All Shona Language Codes

Get to know all Shona language codes here. There are several languages spoken all over the world where in most of the languages have alternate names which come from diverse sources. All Shona Language Codes are assigned with unique code. There is usually two or three letters code for each language. In most of the applications, these language codes are used where it is tedious to use language names.

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