Africa is huge. Possibly so much bigger than one could ever imagine from just looking at a map. And it is highly populated. Not to mention truly diverse. That diversity has led to a vast variety of languages spoken across the continent: amazingly 2000! By way of comparison, there are a mere 250 in Europe.
Some of those languages are spoken by just a few thousand people and others only in small regions. Others however have taken on a significant role over the centuries.
Today we’d like to focus on the top three African languages spoken in the old cradle of humanity: Arabic, Swahili and Hausa.
When talking about which languages are spoken in Africa, we have to first make a distinction between what are considered African languages and those that are colonial languages. Before the “Scramble for Africa” in 1885, European countries relied essentially on a few coastal commercial bases and Western languages were not spoken on the continent, with just a few exceptions.
Colonialization forced local populations to speak the languages of the colonisers, namely French, English, Portuguese and albeit to a lesser extent, Spanish as well. After decolonization, the European languages continued to hold an official role, but they cannot be considered African languages given that they were the languages of the colonisers and did not undergo any form of regional evolution.
Arabic is a different story though. Dating back to the Islamic invasions of the 7th century, Arabic became the language of North Africa, having supplanted other local languages and undergone specific regional evolutions.
Ethnic and cultural fragmentation and colonisation inhibited the diffusion of supranational languages in Africa however some do have regional importance, with them becoming the common language for large and populated areas.
The fifth most spoken language in the world according to the number of native speakers, counting almost 400 million across three continents. In Africa, Arabic is spoken across the North following the VII century Islamic conquests. To access the markets in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Sudan and Mauritania, it is imperative to use Arabic.
Maghreb and North Africa have fairly mature markets, with a significant penetration of Western and European products and culture. There is still good potential for growth, but they are nonetheless solid economies already, in particular Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco, where competition can be particularly strong.
Swahili is likely one of the most famous African languages, along with Zulu (which although just as important, is not as diffused) and is the language of eastern Africa. It developed in Zanzibar and spread across an extremely large area, becoming the official language of some of the area’s main economies: Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. There are in the region of 90 million native speakers and it is the second language of almost 300 million people. Its permeability has made it the perfect language in terms of its usability, with more than 40% of its vocabulary being of foreign origin. It is one of the official languages of the African Union and the Eastern Africa Community. Its regional importance means it is an ideal language to have commercial content translated into to gain access to a market that has enormous potential.
Coming from the same family as Swahili, Hausa does have a different history and diffusion as it developed in western Africa, in the Niger basin. Today almost 100 million people speak the language, which is mainly diffused in Nigeria, Niger, Togo, Ghana, Benin and Cameroon.
It is a language that offers an interesting prospect for the future. Although the economies in said countries are already stable, it may take a while to develop systems and chains that are of concrete interest. That is in itself an excellent reason to look to the future and to set up in countries with undoubtable potential, which we will highly likely be hearing about a lot in the future.
On the one hand, translating into African languages helps in becoming established in the local markets insofar as it consolidates the concept of reliability and closeness to consumers, hence a continued presence in the future. On the other hand, however, the colonial languages cannot be overlooked as they do guarantee the maximum diffusion of content (especially French). Translating taking into account the local variations of the European languages spoken in Africa could be of use in terms of being able to establish immediate contact, in particular online communication, for example via social media and websites.
To guarantee that your products and contents are successful in the African market, it is necessary to rely on a professional translation agency that has in-depth know-how of the linguistic and cultural situation in the relevant countries. Traducendo Ltd only uses professional translators who are experts in Arabic, Swahili, Hausa and other main languages on the continent to offer our commercial and institutional customers top quality and accurate service. Whether or not you need to translate a promotional campaign or a development and cooperation project report, Traducendo Ltd is your ideal partner for having content translated into African languages. Please contact us for a quote.
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