KHOE (KHOI), NAMA AND SAN According to legislation the Pan South African Language Board established by national legislation must (a) promote, and create conditions for, the development and use of (i) all official languages; (ii) the Khoi, Nama and San languages ; and (iii) sign language ; and (b) promote and ensure respect for (i) all languages commonly used by communities in South Africa, including German, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Portuguese, Tamil, Telegu and Urdu; and (ii) Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit and other languages used for religious purposes in South Africa. FROM: South African Constitution (1996) - Founding Provisions !XÛ / !KUNG / KUNG / XU / VASAKELA Family: Khoesan Group: Ju or Northern Khoesan Subgroup: not applicable Number of speakers: 3 500 (Crawhall, Nigel 2000) KHOEKHOEGOWAP / KHOI / HOTTENTOTS / NAMA / NAMAN / NAMAKWA / NAMAQUA / DAMA / DAMARA / DAMAQUA / TAMA / TAMMA / TAMAKWA / KHOEKHOE / BERDAMA / BERGDAMARA / KHOI Family: Khoesan Group: Central or Khoe Subgroup: Khoekhoe There are two extinct South African languages from the same family and subgroup, these being Xirigowap and !Goragowap, known in English as Griqua and Korana respectively. It is possible that there are isolated unidentified individuals who still speak these languages as an L1. There are no communities who speak these extinct languages.Khoekhoegowap is an ancient language, related to others from its family, such as Naro to the east and Khwedam to the north. However Khoekhoegowap is distinct and not mutually intelligible. | |
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