We Speak One Language

Future Trans Localize to the Middle East & Africa We Speak One Language Hebrew Language Issue 3, September 2011 The earliest Hebrew script was de- million Inside this issue: rived from a Phoenician script. The people modern Hebrew script was developed in Israel, Hebrew Language from a script known as Proto-Hebrew/ where it Early Aramaic. The earliest known is an writing in Hebrew dates from the 11th official Zulu Language century BC. lan- Hebrew is a member of the Canaan- guage ite group of Semitic languages. It was along Some letters (kaf, mem, the language of the early Jews, but with nun, fe and tzadi) have a from 586 BC it started to be replaced Arabic. and a further 2 to 3 million final form (sofit), which is by Aramaic. By 70 AD use of Hebrew people speak the language in Ar- used when they appear at as an everyday language had largely gentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, the end of a word. ceased, but it continued to be used France, Germany, Palestinian for literary and religious functions, as West Bank and Gaza, Panama, the There are no separate UK and USA. well as a lingua franca among Jews numerals in Hebrew, in- from different countries. stead standard western Notable features During the mid-19th century the first numerals (1, 2, 3, etc) are Type of writing system: abjad efforts were made to revive Hebrew used. as a everyday language. One man who played a major role in these Direction of writing: right to left Long vowels can be indi- efforts was Eliezer Ben Yehuda in horizontal lines. cated by the letters alef, (1858-1922), who was the first to vav, and yod. Short vow- make exclusive use of Hebrew in his Number of letters: 22 conso- els are not usually home, and encouraged the use of nants, plus final letters and marked, except in the Hebrew among others, as well as its diacritics Bible, poetry and books use in schools. for children and foreign Used to write: Hebrew, Judeo- learners. Today Hebrew is spoken by some 5 Arabic, Ladino, Yiddish and http://www.omniglot.com/ many other Jewish languages. writing/hebrew.htm Zulu language Zulu (Zulu: isiZulu) is the lan- using the Latin alphabet. The Zulu 1883. In 1901, John Dube (1871– guage of the Zulu people with language, like other Nguni lan- 1946), a Zulu from Natal, created about 10 million speakers, the vast guages, is heavily influenced by the the Ohlange Institute, the first na- majority (over 95%) of whom live Xhosa language. tive educational institution in South in South Africa. Zulu is the most Africa. He was also the author of widely spoken home language in History Insila kaShaka, the first novel writ- South Africa (24% of the popula- ten in isiZulu (1933). Another pio- tion) as well as being understood The Zulu, like Xhosa and other Ngu- neering Zulu writer was Reginald ni people, have lived in Dhlomo, author of several histori- South Africa for a long cal novels of the 19th-century lead- time. The Zulu language ers of the Zulu nation: U-Dingane has a lot of click sounds (1936), U-Shaka (1937), U- typical of Southern African Mpande (1938), U-Cetshwayo languages. These click (1952) and U-Dinizulu (1968). sounds are not found in Other notable contributors to Zulu the rest of Africa. The literature include Benedict Wallet Nguni people have lived Vilakazi and, more recently, Os- together with other South- wald Mbuyiseni Mtshali. ern tribes like the San and Khoi. The written form of Zulu was con- trolled by the Zulu Language Zulu, like all indigenous Board of KwaZulu-Natal. This Southern African lan- board has now been disbanded guages, was an oral lan- and superseded by the Pan South by over 50% of the population guage until contact with missionar- African Language Board, which (Ethnologue 2005). It became one ies from Europe, who documented promotes the use of all eleven of South Africa's eleven official the language using the Latin alpha- official languages of South Africa languages in 1994. bet. The first grammar book of the Zulu language was published in [1] According to Ethnologue, it is the Norway in 1850 by the Norwegian http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ second most widely spoken Bantu missionary Hans Schreuder.[2] The Zulu_language Language after Shona. Like many first written document in Zulu was a other Bantu languages, it is written Bible translation that appeared in .

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