Luvale (also spelt Chiluvale, Lovale, Lubale, Luena, Lwena) is a

Bantu language The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu language, Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀), or Ntu languages are a language family of about 600 languages of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern, East Africa, Eastern and Southeast Africa, South ...

spoken by the

Lovale people The Luvale people, also spelled Lovale, Balovale, Lubale, as well as Lwena or Luena in Angola, are a Bantu peoples, Bantu ethnic group found in northwestern Zambia and southeastern Angola. They are closely related to the Lunda people, Lunda and Nde ...

Angola Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-Central Africa, central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking world, Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and List of c ...

and

Zambia Zambia, officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa. It is typically referred to being in South-Central Africa or Southern Africa. It is bor ...

. It is recognized as a regional language for educational and administrative purposes in Zambia, where about 168,000 people speak it as of 2006. Luvale uses a modified form of the

latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...

in its written form. Luvale is closely related to Chokwe.

Vocabulary

It contains many

loanwords A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...

from Portuguese from colonial contact during 20th century, such as:

Phonology

Consonants In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract, except for the h sound, which is pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Examples are and pronou ...

Vowels

Speakers

* Bernard K. Mbenga * Samba Yonga * Mokoomba

References

External links

* *Moses C.B. Mulongesa, '','' Lubuto Library Special Collections, accessed May 3, 2014. *, Lubuto Library Special Collections
OLAC resources in and about the Luvale language
Chokwe-Luchazi languages Languages of Angola Languages of Zambia Library of Congress Africa Collection related {{Bantu-lang-stub