<story><title>How Swahili became Africa&apos;s most spoken language</title><url>https://theconversation.com/the-story-of-how-swahili-became-africas-most-spoken-language-177259</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>georgeg</author><text>Am Kenyan - Born and raised and I lived at the Kenyan Coast. Kiswahili is very widely spoken and loved here. I studied Kiswahili as a language and i very much admire the rich vocabulary and idioms.  It is both a national and an official language in Kenya and most of Eastern Africa.&lt;p&gt;Majority of Kenyans and East-africans are multi-lingual and they will speak on average 3 languages (English, Kiswahili, the mother-tongue and most likely an additional local language.) if they are Bantu, they will also understand 3 or more other languages and same if they are Nilotic or Cushitic.&lt;p&gt;If your are foreigner, visiting for tourism - you will very much unlikely understand Kenyans! and if you are a foreigner of they type &amp;quot; i lived in Kenya for 10 years&amp;quot; most likely in a posh residence in Nairobi or Mombasa -- Kenyans are likely to have spoken to you in English throughout! Do not mistake that for the idea that Kenyans only speak in English - remember i said majority are multilingual and given that we have over 42 different languages - the language that mostly unites us is Swahili - it is also deemed less elitist.&lt;p&gt;The language is spoken across the entire East africa - (Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique (Swahili name - Msumbiji), Burundi, Rwanda and Eastern DRC Congo.)&lt;p&gt;The article is an excerpt from a more detailed book and I agree with most it - but the author could have done a better job at investigating the origin of the language and early spread. It has borrowed heavily from Bantu, Arabic (countless words) and Portuguese (e.g. Pesa - money in Swahili, Meza - a table in Swahili).</text></comment>
<story><title>How Swahili became Africa&apos;s most spoken language</title><url>https://theconversation.com/the-story-of-how-swahili-became-africas-most-spoken-language-177259</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>AdamN</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m not sure how true this article is, hopefully some others in Africa can speak to their personal experiences.&lt;p&gt;For me, when I lived in Kenya English was the lingua franca for official&amp;#x2F;business activity.  Some older professional Kenyans I knew learned Swahili only after learning English (and their mother language, Luo for instance).  On the street, Swahili was standard.&lt;p&gt;The Tanzanians I met however, considered Nairobi Swahili not even &amp;#x27;real&amp;#x27; Swahili and more of a mish-mash for disparate speakers who might otherwise choose their mother tongue when possible.&lt;p&gt;And then there&amp;#x27;s Sheng - a creole that is an even further evolution from Swahili and various other languages.</text></comment>