Kirundi
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| Kirundi | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Burundi | |
| Region: | Central Africa | |
| Total speakers: | 4.6 million | |
| Language family: | Niger-Congo Atlantic-Congo Volta-Congo Benue-Congo Bantoid Southern Bantoid Narrow Bantu Central Kirundi |
|
| Official status | ||
| Official language in: | Burundi | |
| Regulated by: | no official regulation | |
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | rn | |
| ISO 639-2: | run | |
| ISO 639-3: | run | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
Kirundi (also written Rundi) is a Bantu language (D62 in Guthrie's classification) spoken by some 6 million people in Burundi and adjacent parts of Tanzania and Congo-Kinshasa, as well as in Uganda. 84% of the speakers are Hutu, 15% are Tutsi and 1% are Twa.
Kirundi is closely related to Kinyarwanda, the main language of neighbouring country Rwanda and to Giha, a language spoken in western Tanzania. Kirundi and Kinyarwanda are mutually intelligible.
The inhabitants of Rwanda and Burundi belong to three different ethnic groups: Bahutu, Batutsi, and Batwa (a pygmy people). The fact that these ethnic groups share the same language is assumed to be the result of the Bahutu outnumbering the latter two groups (see Bahutu for a more complete historical perspective).
Kirundi is frequently cited as a language where Meeussen's rule, a rule describing a certain pattern of tonal change in Bantu languages, is active.
| Example translations | |
|---|---|
| Ego | Yes |
| Oya | No |
| Uravuga icongereza? | Do you speak English? |
| Bite? | What's Up? |
| Mwaramutse | Hi/Good Morning |
| Ikirundi n'ikinyarwanda bisa nk'igi czek n'igi slovak | Kirundi and Kinyarwanda are closely related like Czech and Slovak |
| Amata | Milk |
| Ejo | Yesterday |
| Eejo° | Tomorrow |
| Nzoza ejo/Nzoz'ejo | I will come tomorrow |
| Ubu | Now |
| Faransa/Ubufaransa | France |
| Ngereza/Ubwongereza | England |
| Leta zunz'ubumwe z'amerika | United States of America |
| Ubudagi | Germany |
| Ububirigi | Belgium |
| °N.B. eejo is pronounced the same as ejo: the other e is written for differentiation. |
|
[edit] References
- Meeussen, A.E. (1959) Essai de grammaire Rundi Annales du Musée Royal du Congo Belge, Série Sciences Humaines - Linguistique, vol. 24. Tervuren
[edit] External links
- Ethnologue on Rundi
- PanAfrican L10n page on Kirundi...
- Ethnologue on Rundi
- Learning Kirundi (in Spanish)
- Online Kirundi/English dictionary
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