Unit Two: Studying Africa through the Social Studies

Module Eight: Culture and Society in Africa

Teacher's Edition

Activity Two
Worksheet Two
Languages in Africa - Explore

Map 2:Colonial Languages

Map 2 (found below) shows languages that were introduced to Africa when Africa was colonized by European countries. During this time, several European countries took control of territories in Africa that they claimed for themselves. Some regions had more than one European country that claimed them at various points in history. As a result, European languages, or colonial languages, became the official language(s) in most Africa countries. While this remains the case even today, most Africans speak indigenous African languages as a first language and colonial languages are generally spoken as a second or third language. Often schools are instructed in European languages, and official government business is conducted using European languages.

The interaction of colonial languages and African speakers created new African uses of these European, or colonial, languages. Ghanaian English, for example, includes words and phrases unique to Ghana, as Ghanaians have taken English and made it their own. In some cases, hybrid languages, such as pidgin or Creole, grew out of the meeting of African and European languages.

Use the map below to answer the following questions on colonial languages in Africa. Write your answers on a sheet of paper and file it in your Exploring Africa Workbook.

1. How many countries have more than one colonial language listed for them? Can you name any of these countries?

2. What are the six European languages that are colonial languages of Africa?

3. Do you know what language family these European languages belong to? If not, how would you find out?

Teacher Discussion:

Students should see that identifying and classifying languages can tell a lot about the culture and history of a place. For example, the history of European colonialism has had a significant impact on the lives of Africans even today, which is evident through the languages used in each country. Teachers should follow up with a brief discussion on how cultures change over time, which is reflected in the changes in language over time. Languages change as a result of contact with other groups in the world, as well as, separating from groups to develop their own distinct language. It should be evident to the students that Africa has been linguistically influenced by and has linguistically influenced other regions of the world. And this continues to happen today. Indeed, Africa has been globally connected for a long time, which is reflected in the rich and diverse compilation of languages spoken on the continent today.

Teacher answers:

Map 1:

1. The largest language family in Africa is the Niger-Congo. All together there are 1436 languages in this family.

2. Students will probably suggest that the Afro-Asiatic family and Austronesian family extend to Asia and Australia respectively. It is true that there are a large number of Afro-Asiatic languages in Asia. However, Austronesian is a large language family that extends to many regions of Asia and islands in the Pacific, but not Australia. Some students may have suggested Creole as well. Creole is a language family that consists of certain languages worldwide on every continent that were formed as a combination of two or more different languages being fused together. For example during the African diaspora, Africans were sent around the world where they mixed their African languages with local languages creating new Creole languages.

3. a) Niger-Congo
b) Niger-Congo
c) Afro-Asiatic
d) Khosian
e) Austronesian
f) Nilo-Saharan
g) Niger-Congo
h) Creole
i) Niger-Congo
j) Nilo-Saharan

Map 2:

1. Countries with more than one colonial language listed (8 total):
Egypt (French and English)
Somalia (English and Italian)
Cameroon (French, English, and German)
Togo (French and German)
Tanzania (German and English)
Namibia (English and German)
Mauritius (English and French)
Seychelles (English and French)

2. The six colonial languages of Africa are:
French
English
German
Portuguese
Spanish
Italian

3. These languages belong to the Indo-European language family. Languages in this family are mainly spoken in Europe and parts of Asia, although Indo-European languages have spread all over the world. In all, 425 Indo-European languages are spoken throughout the world.

Go to Activity Three.
Go to Teacher Page Module 8 or select from the other activities in this module.