English Words Of African Origin
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English Words Of African Origin
Most words of African origin used in English are nouns describing animals, plants, or cultural practices that have their origins in Africa (mostly sub-Saharan African; Arabic words not included unless another African language is an intermediary). The following list includes some examples. * Adinkra – from Akan, visual symbols that represent concepts or aphorisms. Adopted in theoretical physics for graphical representation of supersymmetric algebras. * Aṣẹ - from Yoruba, "I affirm" or "make it happen" *ammonia – from the Egyptian language in reference to the god Amun * Bantu - from Bantu languages, "people" *babalawo – from Yoruba, priest of traditional Yoruba religion * banana – adopted from Wolof via Spanish or Portuguese * banjo – from Mandinka ''bangoe'', which refers to the Akonting *basenji – breed of dog from Central Africa – Congo, Central African Republic etc. * boma – from Swahili * bongo – West African *buckra – "white man or person", from ...
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Nouns
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for: * Living creatures (including people, alive, dead or imaginary): ''mushrooms, dogs, Afro-Caribbeans, rosebushes, Nelson Mandela, bacteria, Klingons'', etc. * Physical objects: ''hammers, pencils, Earth, guitars, atoms, stones, boots, shadows'', etc. * Places: ''closets, temples, rivers, Antarctica, houses, Grand Canyon, utopia'', etc. * Actions: ''swimming, exercises, diffusions, explosions, flight, electrification, embezzlement'', etc. * Qualities: ''colors, lengths, deafness, weights, roundness, symmetry, warp speed,'' etc. * Mental or physical states of existence: ''jealousy, sleep, heat, joy, stomachache, confusion, mind meld,'' etc. Lexical categories (parts of speech) are defined in terms of the ways in which their members combine with other kinds of expressions. The syntact ...
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Banjo
The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashioned by African Americans in the United States. The banjo is frequently associated with folk, bluegrass and country music, and has also been used in some rock, pop and hip-hop. Several rock bands, such as the Eagles, Led Zeppelin, and the Grateful Dead, have used the five-string banjo in some of their songs. Historically, the banjo occupied a central place in Black American traditional music and the folk culture of rural whites before entering the mainstream via the minstrel shows of the 19th century. Along with the fiddle, the banjo is a mainstay of American styles of music, such as bluegrass and old-time music. It is also very frequently used in Dixieland jazz, as well as in Caribbean genres like biguine, calypso and mento. Histo ...
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Buharism
Buharism refers to the socio-political and economic ideology of Nigerian President and former military head of state Muhammadu Buhari. Following the 1983 Nigerian coup d'etat The year 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to Internet protocol suite, TCP/IP is officially completed (this is consid ... which truncated the Second Nigerian Republic, General Muhammadu Buhari became Nigerian military juntas of 1966–79 and 1983–99, military head of state. He immediately launched an unprecedented military-led Social engineering (political science), social engineering campaign, War Against Indiscipline, with the aim of forcibly promoting civic virtues. Buharism came to represent a national Third Way, third force at the height of the Cold War era, favouring neither communism nor capitalism. His economic ideology was solely predicated on the practicalities nee ...
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Ibibio Language
Ibibio is the native language of the Ibibio people of Nigeria, belonging to the Ibibio-Efik dialect cluster of the Cross River languages. The name ''Ibibio'' is sometimes used for the entire dialect cluster. In pre-colonial times, it was written with Nsibidi ideograms, similar to Igbo, Efik, Anaang, and Ejagham. Ibibio has also had influences on Afro-American diasporic languages such as AAVE words like buckra, and buckaroo, which come from the Ibibio word mbakara, and in the Afro-Cuban tradition of abakua. Geographic distribution Ibibio is the language of the Ibibio people. The Ibibio people are found in Southeastern Nigeria in Akwa Ibom State, Cross River State, and Eastern Abia State (Arochukwu and Ukwa East LGA's). Ibibio communities in Opobo Nkoro and Oyigbo LGA's of Rivers State are largely unknown. Some Ibibio are found in other countries (Western Cameroon, Bioko and Ghana). Phonology Consonants * are bilabial, whereas is labiodental. ** has two allophones, w ...
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Efik Language
Efik (''Usem Efịk'') is the indigenous language of the Efik people, who are situated in the present-day Cross River state and Akwa Ibom state of Nigeria, as well as in the North-West of Cameroon. The Efik language is mutually intelligible with other lower Cross River languages such as Ibibio, Annang, Oro and Ekid but the degree of intelligibility in the case of Oro and Ekid is unidirectional; in other words, speakers of these languages speak and understand Efik (and Ibibio) but not vice versa. The Efik vocabulary has been enriched and influenced by external contact with the British, Portuguese and other surrounding communities such as Balondo, Oron, Efut, Okoyong, Efiat and Ekoi (Qua). Classification The Efik Language has undergone several linguistic classifications since the 19th century. The first attempt at classifying the Efik Language was by Dr. Baikie in 1854. Baikie, p.420 Dr Baikie had stated, "All the coast dialects from One to Old Kalabar, are, either directly ...
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Buckra
Buckra or Backra is a term of West African origin. It is mainly used in the Caribbean and in the Southeast United States. Originally, it was used by slaves to address their white slave master. Later the meaning was broadened to describe white people in general. Etymology "Buckra" has been found in many variants, successively bacceroe, bochara, backra, baccra, bakra, buckera, buckra, bockra,''Dictionary of Jamaican English''
p. 18. University of the West Indies Press, 2002
and more. It probably derives from the Ibibio language, Ibibio and Efik language, Efik Anaang people, Annang word mbakara, meaning (white) European or master.''Buckra''

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Bongo Drum
Bongos ( es, bongó) are an Afro-Cuban percussion instrument consisting of a pair of small open bottomed hand drums of different sizes. They are struck with both hands, most commonly in an eight-stroke pattern called ''martillo'' (hammer). The larger drum is called a hembra (Spanish for female) and the smaller drum is called the macho (Spanish for male). They are mainly employed in the rhythm section of son cubano and salsa ensembles, often alongside other drums such as the larger congas and the stick-struck timbales. This brought bongos into our cultural vocabulary, from Beatniks to Mambo to the current revival of Cuban folkloric music. Bongo drummers (''bongoseros'') emerged as the only drummers of son cubano ensembles in eastern Cuba toward the end of the 19th century. It is believed that Bongos evolved from the Abakua Drum trio 'Bonko' and its lead drum 'Bonko Enmiwewos'. These drums are still a fundamental part of the Abakua Religion in Cuba. If joined with a wooden peck in ...
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Swahili Language
Swahili, also known by its local name , is the native language of the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique (along the East African coast and adjacent litoral islands). It is a Bantu language, though Swahili has borrowed a number of words from foreign languages, particularly Arabic, but also words from Portuguese, English and German. Around forty percent of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including the name of the language ( , a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coast'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab slave traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region. The number of Swahili speakers, be they native or second-language speakers, is estimated to be approximately 200 million. Due to concerted efforts by the government of Tanzania, Swahili is one of three official languages (th ...
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Boma (enclosure)
A boma is a livestock enclosure, community enclosure, stockade, corral, small fort or a district government office, commonly used in many parts of the African Great Lakes region, as well as Central and Southern Africa. It is particularly associated with community decision making. It is incorporated into many African languages, as well as colonial varieties of English, French and German. As a livestock enclosure, a ''boma'' is the equivalent of '' kraal''. The former term is used in areas influenced by the Swahili language, and the latter is employed in areas influenced by Afrikaans. In the form of fortified villages or camps, ''bomas'' were commonplace in Central Africa in the 18th and 19th century. They were commonplace throughout Africa, including in areas affected by the slave trade, tribal wars and colonial conquest, and were built and used by both sides. Apart from the neatly built stockades shown in illustrations of bomas, the term, in practice, more often resembled ...
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Central African Republic
The Central African Republic (CAR; ; , RCA; , or , ) is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Chad to the north, Sudan to the northeast, South Sudan to the southeast, the DR Congo to the south, the Republic of the Congo to the southwest, and Cameroon to the west. The Central African Republic covers a land area of about . , it had an estimated population of around million. , the Central African Republic is the scene of a civil war, ongoing since 2012. Most of the Central African Republic consists of Sudano-Guinean savannas, but the country also includes a Sahelo- Sudanian zone in the north and an equatorial forest zone in the south. Two-thirds of the country is within the Ubangi River basin (which flows into the Congo), while the remaining third lies in the basin of the Chari, which flows into Lake Chad. What is today the Central African Republic has been inhabited for millennia; however, the country's current borders were established by ...
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Democratic Republic Of The Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in Central Africa. It is bordered to the northwest by the Republic of the Congo, to the north by the Central African Republic, to the northeast by South Sudan, to the east by Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi, and by Tanzania (across Lake Tanganyika), to the south and southeast by Zambia, to the southwest by Angola, and to the west by the South Atlantic Ocean and the Cabinda exclave of Angola. By area, it is the second-largest country in Africa and the 11th-largest in the world. With a population of around 108 million, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is the most populous officially Francophone country in the world. The national capital and largest city is Kinshasa, which is also the nation's economic center. Centered on the Cong ...
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Central Africa
Central Africa is a subregion of the African continent comprising various countries according to different definitions. Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Rwanda, and São Tomé and Príncipe are members of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS). Six of those states (the Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon) are also members of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC) and share a common currency, the Central African CFA franc. The African Development Bank defines Central Africa as the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon. Middle Africa is an analogous term used by the United Nations in its geoscheme for Africa. It includes the same countries as the African Development Bank's definition, ...
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