The official language of

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label= Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kal ...

is English, while Tswana is considered to be a national language. English, which was inherited from

colonial rule Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colony, colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose the ...

, is the language of official business and most written communication. Most of the population speak Tswana, but over 20 smaller languages are also spoken. Some of the country's languages are in danger of becoming

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

Official and national languages

The official

written language A written language is the representation of a spoken or gestural language by means of a writing system. Written language is an invention in that it must be taught to children, who will pick up spoken language or sign language by exposure eve ...

of Botswana is English. Most

written communication Writing is a medium of human communication which involves the representation of a language through a system of physically inscribed, mechanically transferred, or digitally represented symbols. Writing systems do not themselves constitute h ...

and official business texts are written in English. The language of the

Tswana people The Tswana ( tn, Batswana, singular ''Motswana'') are a Bantu-speaking ethnic group native to Southern Africa. The Tswana language is a principal member of the Sotho-Tswana language group. Ethnic Tswana made up approximately 85% of the pop ...

—'' Setswana''—is the country's national language, and is spoken by most of the population.

Other languages

Aside from English and Setswana, other languages are spoken in the country. Over 90% of the population speak a

Bantu language The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀) are a large family of languages spoken by the Bantu people of Central, Southern, Eastern africa and Southeast Africa. They form the largest branch of the Southern Bantoid languages. The t ...

as their

first language A first language, native tongue, native language, mother tongue or L1 is the first language or dialect that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother to ...

. According to the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

's ''

World Factbook ''The World Factbook'', also known as the ''CIA World Factbook'', is a reference resource produced by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) with almanac-style information about the countries of the world. The official print version is available ...

'', the most common Bantu languages spoken are Setswana (77.3% of the population), Kalanga (7.4%), Kgalagadi (3.4%), Shona (2%), Mbukushu (1.6%) and

Ndebele Ndebele may refer to: *Southern Ndebele people, located in South Africa *Northern Ndebele people, located in Zimbabwe and Botswana Languages * Southern Ndebele language, the language of the South Ndebele * Northern Ndebele language, the language ...

(1%). 1.7% speak Tshwa (a Khoe language) and 0.1% speak !Xóõ, a Tuu language (both non-Bantu). English is spoken by 2.8% as their first language, and a small number speak

Afrikaans Afrikaans (, ) is a West Germanic language that evolved in the Dutch Cape Colony from the Dutch vernacular of Holland proper (i.e., the Hollandic dialect) used by Dutch, French, and German settlers and their enslaved people. Afrikaans gr ...

. The number of individual languages listed for Botswana is 31. All are living languages. Of these, 26 are indigenous and 5 are non-indigenous. Furthermore, 4 are institutional, 9 are developing, 8 are vigorous, 9 are in trouble, and 1 is dying.

Languages spoken

The distribution of the three major language families in the Kalahari Basin area

# Ani #

Birwa Al-Birwa ( ar, البروة, also spelled ''al-Birweh'') was a Palestinian Arab village, located east of Acre (Akka). In 1945, it had a population of 1,460, of whom the majority were Muslims and a significant minority, Christians. Its total ...

Chichewa Chewa (also known as Nyanja, ) is a Bantu language spoken in much of Southern, Southeast and East Africa, namely the countries of Malawi , where it is an official language, and Mozambique and Zambia. The noun class prefix ''chi-'' is used for l ...

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...

Gana The word (; Sanskrit: गण) in Sanskrit and Pali means "flock, troop, multitude, number, tribe, category, series, or class". It can also be used to refer to a "body of attendants" and can refer to "a company, any assemblage or association of ...

# Gciriku # Gwi # Hai, , om #

Herero Herero may refer to: * Herero people The Herero ( hz, Ovaherero) are a Bantu ethnic group inhabiting parts of Southern Africa. There were an estimated 250,000 Herero people in Namibia in 2013. They speak Otjiherero, a Bantu language. Though t ...

# ‡Hua
Ju, ’hoansi
# Kalanga # Kgalagadi #

Khoekhoe Khoekhoen (singular Khoekhoe) (or Khoikhoi in the former orthography; formerly also '' Hottentots''"Hottentot, n. and adj." ''OED Online'', Oxford University Press, March 2018, www.oed.com/view/Entry/88829. Accessed 13 May 2018. Citing G. S. ...

Khwedam Khwe (also rendered ''Kxoe, Khoe'' ) is a dialect continuum of the Khoe family of Namibia, Angola, Botswana, South Africa, and parts of Zambia, with some 8,000 speakers. Classification Khwe is a member of the Khoe language family. The 20 ...

# Kua # Kuhane # Kung-Ekoka # Lozi # Mbukushu #

Nambya The Nambya people are an ethnic group of about 100,000 people, based in the north-western parts of Zimbabwe and in the north-eastern parts of Botswana . They are found around the coal mining town of Hwange, surrounding areas of the Victoria Falls a ...

Naro Naro ( scn, Naru ) is a ''comune'' in the province of Agrigento, on the island of Sicily, Italy. It is bounded by the comuni of Agrigento, Caltanissetta, Camastra, Campobello di Licata, Canicattì, Castrofilippo, Delia, Italy, Delia, Favara, Ag ...

# Setswana # Shua # Tshuwau # Tswapong # !Xóõ # Yeyi # Zezuru #

isiXhosa Xhosa (, ) also isiXhosa as an endonym, is a Nguni language and one of the official languages of South Africa and Zimbabwe. Xhosa is spoken as a first language by approximately 8.2 million people and by another 11 million as a secon ...

References

Sources

External links

Ethnologue listing of Botswana languages
*
list of endangered languages in Botswana
from the

Endangered Languages Project The Endangered Languages Project (ELP) is a worldwide collaboration between indigenous language organizations, linguists, institutions of higher education, and key industry partners to strengthen endangered languages. The foundation of the pro ...

(ELP)
The Kalahari Basin area: a 'Sprachbund' on the verge of extinction
from the Kalahari Basin area project (KBA) {{Languages of Africa