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Author: TRK

July – The Presidential Month

July – The Presidential Month

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[ENG] The third Monday of July is celebrated as President’s Day every year in Botswana, and is a paid public holiday. This holiday is usually extended into the subsequent Tuesday, making it one of Botswana’s two guaranteed four-day long weekends (with the other being Easter Weekend).Despite this last fact, there are still many people who are always seemingly confused by the occurrence of President’s Day and Sir Seretse Khama Day every July – and the fact that these are two different holidays is always news…

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Dinako [Time Concepts in Setswana]

Dinako [Time Concepts in Setswana]

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Setswana terminologies and concepts related to time, including traditional markers of times of the day (prior to the use of the 24-hour clock), times on the clock, days of the week, months, seasons, relative times, and other related concepts. A good starting point would be to explain that although we use the Gregorian Calendar and the 24-hour clock to define time now, traditionally Batswana used a lunar calendar, which started at the beginning of the planting season, and their years…

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The Day of the African Child

The Day of the African Child

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47 years after that fateful day in June of 1976, the imaging of the Day of the African Child is still primarily Sam Nzima’s photos of the mortally wounded Hector Pieterson in the arms of an older child, Mbuyisa Makhubo, and running next to them with manifest anguish on her face, Hector’s older sister, Antoinette. Much as I hold a strong position that the fate of today’s African Child should be what the world focuses on, I will take a…

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Dipalo [Numbers and Counting]

Dipalo [Numbers and Counting]

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Numbers and Counting in Setswana [ENG] The Setswana word for numbers is the same word for mathematics. This makes a lot of sense, given that there are basically only thirteen different number words, and in order to get other numbers, you simply just “do the maths”. For instance, 273 is pronounced as 2*100 + 7*10 + 3 (makgolo a mabedi le masome a masupa le boraro). One may observe however, that there are in fact fourteen different listed below, contrary to…

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Ditlhopha tsa Maina (Noun Classes)

Ditlhopha tsa Maina (Noun Classes)

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Noun classes are very important elements of Setswana grammar, and play a pivotal role in determining the correct syntax of a sentence. The spellings of verbs, adjectives, possessives, demonstratives, agreement markers, relative markers, and other grammar constructs are determined by the class to which the subject noun belongs. In fact, this is a characteristic that is common among Bantu languages in general, and creates for a scientific approach to learning them, which is particularly useful for first. To put the cherry…

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Setswana Language History (part 2)

Setswana Language History (part 2)

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Setswana Language History Part 2: The Written Language The evolution of Setswana orthography is itself a story worthy of a Hollywood blockbuster, with plot twists and whodunits that would rival any Alfred Hitchcock mystery. It started with European missionaries, each not only struggling with learning the new African language from the point of view of their various vernaculars and Christian denominational perspectives. And then when it was all eventually falling into place and the native speakers were now on board, it emerged…

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Setswana Language History (part 1)

Setswana Language History (part 1)

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Setswana Language History Part 1: The Spoken Language The history of the Setswana language itself goes way into prehistoric times, and nobody can say for certain what happened all those thousands of years ago, during the times of the proto-Bantu. However, we can focus on the history of the orthography of the language, as well as other evolutionary factors that have influenced Setswana to be what it is today. This first section deals with the preliterary history of the language,…

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Diane le Maele

Diane le Maele

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Figurative speech [manatetshapuo] is an essential part of any language, and helps establish a speaker as a well established and competent consumer of said language. It basically turns talking into an art form, rather than just a basic means of communication. Like many other languages, Setswana has a rich variety of artistic language, ranging from diane (proverbs), maele (idioms), dikapuo (figures of speech), dithamalakane (riddles) to poetic diction like tshwantshiso (metaphors), tshwantshanyo (similes), mothofatso (personification), among others. Manatesapuo ke bontlha bongwe ja teme nngwe le nngwe,…

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Hello World!

Hello World!

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DUMELANG Welcome to your one-stop shop for everything Botswana Setswana. Interesting choice of words, but it should be noted that although Setswana is the primary language of communication in Botswana, the majority of its native speakers are in South Africa; and there are some small minorities in other countries like Namibia and Zimbabwe.Although it is one language, there are instances of significant orthographical and neological differences, particularly between South African and Botswanan conventions. Hence “Botswana Setswana”. Your host here, Reginald…

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