Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Categories: Burundi | Languages of the Democratic Republic of the Congo | Languages of Tanzania | Languages of Uganda | Bantu languages
Kirundi language
| Kirundi | |
|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Burundi |
| Region: | Central Africa |
| Total speakers: | 4.6 million |
| Ranking: | not in top 100 |
| Genetic classification: | Niger-Congo Atlantic-Congo |
| Official status | |
| Official language of: | Burundi |
| Regulated by: | -- |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | rn |
| ISO 639-2 | run |
| SIL | RUD |
Introduction
Kirundi (also written Rundi) is a Bantu language (D62 in Guthrie's classification) spoken by some 6 million people in Burundi and adjacent parts of Tanzania and Congo-Kinshasa, as well as in Uganda. 85% of the speakers are Hutu, 15% are Tutsi.
Kirundi is closely related to Kinyarwanda, the main language of neighbouring country Rwanda and to Giha , a language spoken in western Tanzania.
The inhabitants of Rwanda and Burundi belong to three different ethnic groups: Bahutu, Batutsi, and Batwa (a pygmy people). The fact that these ethnic groups share the same language is assumed to be the result of the Bahutu outnumbering the latter two groups (see Bahutu for a more complete historical perspective).
Kirundi is frequently cited as a language where Meeussen's rule, a rule describing a certain pattern of tonal change in Bantu languages, is active.
References
- Meeussen, A.E. (1959) Essai de grammaire Rundi Annales du Musée Royal du Congo Belge, Série Sciences Humaines - Linguistique, vol. 24. Tervuren.
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