The African Language Solutions Blog

South Africa is the home of eleven different official languages. As you can image, this can lead to misunderstands and sticky situations. This is why a new, multilingual app has been launched to make communication between the speakers of all these different languages a little easier. Website Enca gives account of a new mobile application….

President Yahya Jammeh announced that Gambia will no longer use a foreign language, i.e. English. Since independence in 1965 Gambia has used English as its official language, but what will replace it? At present it appears nothing will replace it as Jammeh has given no indication of when this will happen and which language or…

During the inauguration of the language department of the University of Cape Coast in Ghana, Ghanaian language teachers were asked to put more effort into teaching their students the Fante language. Using the language more often will improve their attitudes towards the local languages, the speakers say. In an article on Vibe Ghana, the editors…

Reports have revealed that many indigenous languages spoken in Nigeria face troublesome times if no immediate actions are taken to protect them. BBC News discusses the bad state of Nigeria’s local languages in a recent online article. The article shares the results of a newspaper report from the Guardian stating that due to outside influences…

Patrick Kabanda believes that strengthening the creative sector might be the best way to build a solid African economy. According to Kabanda on the World Policy blog, creative jobs do not have a very high status in Uganda. When he was younger, he wanted to become a musician, but his mother always said this job…

How important is it for older African children to be taught in their own language? According to Laurinda Luffman, most people agree that educating nursery and primary school children in their mother tongue gives the best school results. She wonders, however, if this is also true for older children on the African continent. In an…

According to an article on IOL News, Afrikaans is being left out in the new language policy created by the South African government. As a result, the writer says, the language is slowly pushed to the margins of South African society. In an article on IOL News, Andries Visagie points out the downfall of the…

Even though the spoken Somali language is thriving, experts believe measures need to be taken to strengthen the written Somali language as the number of people who can properly write in the language is dwindling. In an article on Sabahi Online, Abdi Moalim gives us an insight into the state of the Somali language. He…

The dynamics of languages change over time. You could probably count the number of people on your hand who spoke Chinese 10 years ago; now most of us can say “neehow”. Does Swahili have the same potential? This is the question posed in the article, “Seven reasons to pay attention to the Swahili language”. What…

The team at Management Today have cast their votes for the top 10 emerging economies for 2014 –  4 of the 10 are in Africa! So who have they picked and why? Outside of Africa the economies they say we should keep an eye on include Iraq, Macau, Mongolia, Panama, Serbia and Timor-Leste. Within Africa…