Introduction
This Webography is to serve as a partial index about Kiswahili language.
Region where swahili is spoken:
Origin
This session lists a series of links regarding the origin of Kiswahili.
Swahili language, or kiSwahili language, or Kiswahili language (African language) : Encyclopedia Britannica's entry detailing some aspects of Kiswahili langage.
Swahili on wikipedia
A Brief History of the Swahili Language : The Swahili language, is basically of Bantu (African) origin. It has borrowed words from other languages such as Arabic probably as a result of the Swahili people using the Quran written in Arabic for spiritual guidance as Muslims.
Swahili People - Wikipedia : Wikipedia entry for Swahili language. Swahili (called Kiswahili in the language itself) is the first language of the Swahili people (Waswahili), who inhabit several large stretches of the Indian Ocean coastline from southern Somalia to northern Mozambique, including the Comoros Islands.
(An ancient Swahili Construction)
SOMALI BANTU — THEIR HISTORY AND CULTURE : A Brief history on Somali Bantu on Colonial Period, life on slavery, social impact of Slavery, life after slavery, 20th Century, Civil War, life in Refugee Camps and Post Civil War.
Brief history of the Bantu people migration into South Africa: Bantu's migration is fundamental to Swahili people and language creation.
KISWAHILI - Stanford Report : Stanford University's African and Middle Eastern Languages & Literatures Language Center.
Bantu Language - Wikipedia: The Bantu languages (technically Narrow Bantu languages) constitute a grouping belonging to the Niger-Congo family. This grouping is deep down in the genealogical tree of the Bantoid grouping, which in turn is deep down in the Niger-Congo tree.
Profile of the Swahili language. This site contains information such as linguistic affiliation, language variation, orthography, a linguistic sketch, Swahili role in society, and its history.
Spread
Swahili Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow Factors of Its Development and Expansion : A view on Swahili's spread on East African coast of the Indian Ocean.
Swahili and the dilemma of Ugandan language policy: The language situation in East Africa is characterized by the widespread use of Swahili.While both in Tanzania and Kenya Swahili has been systematically promoted in all spheres of everyday life, Uganda has lacked a coherent government policy on language development and the position of Swahili in Uganda has always been very ambiguous. The continued vacillation over language policy and the Luganda/Swahili opposition threatening to carve the country into two major camps of language choice which is characteristic of the Ugandan language situation suggests that the language issue is not likely to be solved in the near future.
Kiswahili as a National and International Language:Kiswahili is officially one of the four national languages of the Democratic Republic of the Congo – DRC (former Zaire), and the national language of Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
Formal and Informal Development of the Swahili Language: Focus on Tanzania:Recent formal and informal development of the Swahili language in Tanzania.
Uganda: Kiswahili now a compulsory subject in school: A sociolinguistic view on Ugandan issues in kiswahili teaching.
Swahili in Tanzania : An overview of kishawili in Tanzania.
East African Coastal Historical Towns: Asiatic or African?: A critical review of the two perspectives about the founders and dwellers of East African coastal historical towns. The review shows that the Asiatic perspective is based on the colonial deliberate falsification of African history, and to certain extents limited historical understanding about the East African coast. The African perspective on the contrary, is founded on credible evidence from historical records and recent archaeological findings and interpretations. The evidence strongly suggests that historical Swahili people are descendants of Bantu and Cushitic speaking people who settled along the East African coast in the first millennium.
A time traveler in Kenya: An archeologist rediscovers the roots of the Swahili people in the course of his research in Kenya.
Issues in African History : An overview on origins of african people from an art perspective. the study of african art provides a way of learning about their history.
Standardization
Kiswahili Grammar
Kiswahili Verbs Tenses
Omniglot: Swahili writing system
Ethnologue report on Swahili
Noun Classification in Swahili
Language Policy of Ruling System and its Impacts on Language
The most prominent grammatical characteristic of Bantu languages is the extensive use of affixes :
- See sesotho Grammar
- See luganda Language
Literature, Art and Culture
Selected Bibliography of Swahili Poetry
Swahili Poetry
Tipical Dressing:
Women in Khanga:
Al-Inkishafi is one of the finest religious poem, a Waadhi, in Swahili literature:
Kiswahili art:
