Kalanga is recognised as an official language by the Zimbabwean Constitution of 2013 and is taught in schools in areas where its speakers predominate. The iKalanga language is closely related to the Nambya, TshiVenda, and KheLobedu languages of Zimbabwe and South Africa.
Classification and varieties
Linguists place Kalanga (S.16 in Guthrie's classification) and Nambya (in the Hwange region of Zimbabwe) as the western branch of the Shona group (or Shonic, or Shona-Nyai) group of languages, collectively coded as S.10.
Kalanga has a dialectal variation between its Botswana and Zimbabwean varieties and they use slightly different orthographies. Historically, Wentzel mentioned Kalanga proper in the east and Lilima (Tjililima, Humbe) on the west, as well as varieties that are now rare or extinct: Nyai (Rozvi), Lemba (Remba), Lembethu (Rembethu), Twamamba (Xwamamba), Pfumbi, Jaunda (Jawunda, Jahunda), and †Romwe, †Peri, †Talahundra (Talaunda).[2][4]
^ abMathangwane, Joyce T. (1999). Ikalanga phonetics and phonology: a synchronic and diachronic study. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.
^Wentzel, Petrus Johannes (1981). The Relationship between Venda and Western Shona. Ph.D. Thesis. Univ. of South Africa.
Further reading
Chebanne, A. M. & Rodewald, M. K & Pahlen, K. W. (1995) Ngatikwaleni iKalanga: A Manual for Writing Kalanga as Spoken in Botswana. Gaborone: Botswana Society.
Chebanne, Andy & Schmidt, Daniel (2010). "Kalanga: Summary Grammar". Cape Town, South Africa: CASAS Monograph 75.
Dube, Limukani T. 2021. "Zimbabwe’s Kalanga Orthography: The Strengths and Shortcomings of the 2008 Writing System." Arusha Working Papers in African Linguistics, 3(1): 42-51.
