Unleashing Kiswahili's Potential In the Digital Era

“Kiswahili is a language that speaks to both past and present. With over 200 million speakers, it is one of the most widely used African languages. In addition to being a language of trade, diplomacy and unity, Kiswahili is a rich source of cultural expression.”- Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO. Swahili, also known by its local name Kiswahili, is the native language of the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Swahili speakers are spread across a wide region and are also found in Oman and Yemen in the Middle East. Swahili is one of the official languages of the African Union (AU). Swahili is a language that is a culmination of different Bantu languages, Arabic, and a few words from European languages. All this was made possible by the interaction between merchants and explorers who visited the East African coast in the 1800s. In the 1950s the United Nations (UN) established the Kiswahili Language Unit of United Nations Radio. Today, Kiswahili is the only African language within the Directorate of the Global Communications at the United Nations. On September 11, 2017 the United Nations General Assembly, through its resolution on multilingualism, welcomed the implementation of a day dedicated to each of its official languages in order to inform and raise awareness of their history, culture and use. Additionally, the UN encouraged the Secretary-General and institutions such as the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to consider extending this important initiative to other non-official languages spoken throughout the world. The Kiswahili Language plays in promoting cultural diversity, creating awareness and fostering dialogue among civilizations and noted the need to promote multilingualism as a core value of the United Nations and an essential factor in harmonious communication between peoples, which promotes unity in diversity and international understanding, tolerance and dialogue. The resolution proclaimed 7 July of each year as World Kiswahili Language Day. This year’s theme is “Unleashing Kiswahili’s potential in the Digital Era.”. Kiswahili is the first African language to the recognized in such a manner by the UN. Additionally, the UN states that by acknowledging the significance of Kiswahili in the digital era, the goal is also to leverage its power to promote cultural exchange, knowledge sharing, and economic development among Kiswahili speakers worldwide. Indeed, Kiswahili can act as a bridge, connecting diverse communities and facilitating inclusive participation in the digital world. History. Over 50 million people in Eastern and Central Africa speak Kiswahili. It is widely used in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. A little over one million people speak it as their first language. Most others speak Kiswahili fluently as a second, third or fourth language. Those who speak it as a first language are found along the coast of east Africa stretching from southern Somalia to the border between Tanzania and Mozambique. There are also many native Kiswahili speakers on the Indian Ocean islands of Unguja and Pemba (which together make up Zanzibar), Lamu, the Comoro Islands and the north western part of Madagascar. Many Kiswahili speakers like to refer to themselves in terms of where they come from. So Kiswahili speakers from Unguja, for example, will refer to themselves as Waunguja or Wazanzibari, those from Kenya as Wakenya and those from Tanzania as Watanzania. The East African coast was visited by Arabs and Persians as early as the second century A.D. These visitors settled in Africa and married local people. Many local people modified and adopted the visitors’ traditions. On the island of Unguja, for example, the traditional New Year, Mwaka Kogwa, is celebrated during the month of June. This celebration is similar to the Persian New Year of Neiruz. Later visits by Arabs to the area also introduced the Islamic religion, and today many Kiswahili speakers throughout East Africa are Muslim. Travelers from Portugal, Germany, England and various Asian countries also went to East Africa. Each group left its mark on both the culture and the language. Lamu as a center of Kiswahili language, cultures, would be a place of interest to students. Kiswahili is one of the most widely used languages of the African family, and the most widely spoken in sub-Saharan Africa. It is among the 10 most widely spoken languages in the world. The language is one of the lingua franca in many countries within East, Central and Southern Africa as well as in the Middle East. It is also taught across major universities and colleges globally. Language And Culture. Kiswahili is a Bantu language of the Niger-Congo family and has a typical, complicated Bantu structure. For example, Kiswahili utilizes over 13 noun classes, the equivalence of a romance language having 13 genders. Three full noun classes are devoted to different aspects of space and time. Kiswahili represents an African World view quite different from that of an European language. Nouns are grouped into different classes according to their meanings. Human beings, for example, belong to one class: mtu ‘person’/watu ‘people.’ Trees, on the other hand, belong to another class: mti ‘tree’/miti ‘trees’. The word Kiswahili is a general term for many varieties of the language spoken along the East African coast. It comes from the Arabic word sahel, meaning ‘coast.’ Ki- is a prefix referring to language. In some varieties of Kiswahili, the language prefix appears as chi-, as in Chimiini, which is spoken in Somalia, or shi-, as in Shingazija, a variant spoken on the Ngazija island of Comoro. On this Day, let us commemorate linguistic heritage and the cultural richness languages communicate. Let us commit to protecting the diversity of languages. 'Haraka haraka haina Baraka'- Hurry hurry has no blessings! Happy World Kiswahili Language Day! Wayne Campbell is an educator and social commentator with an interest in development policies as they affect culture and or gender issues. waykam@yahoo.com @WayneCamo © #WorldKiswahiliLanguageDay