African Portuguese
Encyclopedia
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
is spoken in five African states: Cape Verde
Cape Verde
The Republic of Cape Verde is an island country, spanning an archipelago of 10 islands located in the central Atlantic Ocean, 570 kilometres off the coast of Western Africa...
, Guinea-Bissau
Guinea-Bissau
The Republic of Guinea-Bissau is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Senegal to the north, and Guinea to the south and east, with the Atlantic Ocean to its west....
, São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe, officially the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe, is a Portuguese-speaking island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa. It consists of two islands: São Tomé and Príncipe, located about apart and about , respectively, off...
, Angola
Angola
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...
, and Mozambique
Mozambique
Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique , is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest...
. Like English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
has become a post-colonial language in Africa and one of the working languages of the African Union
African Union
The African Union is a union consisting of 54 African states. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established on 9 July 2002, the AU was formed as a successor to the Organisation of African Unity...
and the Southern African Development Community
Southern African Development Community
The Southern African Development Community is an inter-governmental organization headquartered in Gaborone, Botswana. Its goal is to further socio-economic cooperation and integration as well as political and security cooperation among 15 southern African states...
(SADC). Portuguese co-exists in Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and São Tomé and Principe with Portuguese-based creoles (Upper Guinea and Gulf of Guinea Creoles), and in Angola, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique with autochthonous African languages (mainly Niger–Congo family).
In Africa, Portuguese experiences pressure and possibly competition from French
African French
African French is the generic name of the varieties of French spoken by an estimated 115 million African people spread across 31 francophone African countries...
and English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
. Cape Verde
Cape Verde
The Republic of Cape Verde is an island country, spanning an archipelago of 10 islands located in the central Atlantic Ocean, 570 kilometres off the coast of Western Africa...
, Guinea-Bissau
Guinea-Bissau
The Republic of Guinea-Bissau is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Senegal to the north, and Guinea to the south and east, with the Atlantic Ocean to its west....
and São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe, officially the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe, is a Portuguese-speaking island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa. It consists of two islands: São Tomé and Príncipe, located about apart and about , respectively, off...
are all members of La Francophonie
La Francophonie
Francophonie is an international organization of politics and governments with French as the mother or customary language, where a significant proportion of people are francophones , or where there is a notable affiliation with the French language or culture.Formally known as the Organisation...
and Mozambique
Mozambique
Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique , is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest...
is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations
Commonwealth of Nations
The Commonwealth of Nations, normally referred to as the Commonwealth and formerly known as the British Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of fifty-four independent member states...
and has observer status at La Francophonie. Conversely, Equatorial Guinea
Equatorial Guinea
Equatorial Guinea, officially the Republic of Equatorial Guinea where the capital Malabo is situated.Annobón is the southernmost island of Equatorial Guinea and is situated just south of the equator. Bioko island is the northernmost point of Equatorial Guinea. Between the two islands and to the...
has announced its decision to introduce Portuguese as its third official language, in addition to Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
and French, and has made a request for membership in the CPLP.
Geographic distribution
The nation-states with Portuguese as an official language in Africa are referred to by the acronym PALOP and include the following: AngolaAngola
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...
, Cape Verde
Cape Verde
The Republic of Cape Verde is an island country, spanning an archipelago of 10 islands located in the central Atlantic Ocean, 570 kilometres off the coast of Western Africa...
, Guinea-Bissau
Guinea-Bissau
The Republic of Guinea-Bissau is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Senegal to the north, and Guinea to the south and east, with the Atlantic Ocean to its west....
, Mozambique
Mozambique
Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique , is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest...
and São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe, officially the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe, is a Portuguese-speaking island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa. It consists of two islands: São Tomé and Príncipe, located about apart and about , respectively, off...
. Portuguese is a primarily urban language having a reduced presence in rural areas, except for in Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe, where the language is more widespread.
South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
also has approximately 300,000 speakers of Portuguese, primarily settlers from Madeira
Madeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
and white Angolans
Portuguese Angolans
Portuguese Angolan is a person of Portuguese descent born or permanently living in Angola.-History:The first Portuguese settlements in Angola were established in the 16th century. Some Portuguese settlers married native Africans resulting in a mixed-race population...
and Mozambicans
Portuguese Mozambicans
Portuguese Mozambicans are Mozambican-born descendants of Portuguese settlers.-History:Portuguese explorers turned to present-day Mozambique and two other PALOP nations to bring black slaves to Portugal before bringing them to work for their plantations in their Latin American province, the...
who emigrated from 1975 onwards, following the independence of the former colonies. The civil wars in Angola and Mozambique also resulted in more recent migrations of refugees (some of whom speak Portuguese) to neighbouring countries such as Democratic Republic of Congo, Namibia
Namibia
Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia , is a country in southern Africa whose western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and east. It gained independence from South Africa on 21 March...
, Zambia
Zambia
Zambia , officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. The neighbouring countries are the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Tanzania to the north-east, Malawi to the east, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia to the south, and Angola to the west....
and South Africa. Other migrations involved returning Afro-Brazilian
Afro-Brazilian
In Brazil, the term "preto" is one of the five categories used by the Brazilian Census, along with "branco" , "pardo" , "amarelo" and "indígena"...
ex-slaves to places such as Nigeria
Nigeria
Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
, Benin
Benin
Benin , officially the Republic of Benin, is a country in West Africa. It borders Togo to the west, Nigeria to the east and Burkina Faso and Niger to the north. Its small southern coastline on the Bight of Benin is where a majority of the population is located...
, Togo
Togo
Togo, officially the Togolese Republic , is a country in West Africa bordered by Ghana to the west, Benin to the east and Burkina Faso to the north. It extends south to the Gulf of Guinea, on which the capital Lomé is located. Togo covers an area of approximately with a population of approximately...
, Angola and Mozambique. There are also some returning white Portuguese African refugees and their descendants from Brazil, Portugal, and South Africa to their former African-controlled territories, mostly to Angola and Mozambique, and most importantly, there is the arrival of Portuguese post-colonial settlers in Angola in the recent years, because of Portugal's economic interests and Angolan economic boom.
Senegal
Senegal
Senegal , officially the Republic of Senegal , is a country in western Africa. It owes its name to the Sénégal River that borders it to the east and north...
has its own Lusophone connection with a significant community of Cape Verdeans in Dakar and speakers of Guinea-Bissau Creole in its southern region of Casamance, which was once part of the Portuguese colonial empire. Portuguese is taught as a foreign language throughout the country. In 2008, Senegal became an observer nation in the CPLP.
Equatorial Guinea
Equatorial Guinea
Equatorial Guinea, officially the Republic of Equatorial Guinea where the capital Malabo is situated.Annobón is the southernmost island of Equatorial Guinea and is situated just south of the equator. Bioko island is the northernmost point of Equatorial Guinea. Between the two islands and to the...
, at one point a Portuguese colony, is home to a Portuguese-based Creole and is an observer nation in the CPLP. Portuguese is in the process of being declared an official in Equatorial Guinea.
Mauritius
Mauritius
Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...
, a multilingual island in the Indian Ocean, has strong cultural ties with Mozambique. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to encounter the island. In 2006, Mauritius joined the CPLP as an associate member.
As a fellow member of the SADC
Southern African Development Community
The Southern African Development Community is an inter-governmental organization headquartered in Gaborone, Botswana. Its goal is to further socio-economic cooperation and integration as well as political and security cooperation among 15 southern African states...
, Zambia
Zambia
Zambia , officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. The neighbouring countries are the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Tanzania to the north-east, Malawi to the east, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia to the south, and Angola to the west....
has introduced Portuguese language instruction in its primary school system, partially due to the presence of a large Angolan population there
Angolans in Zambia
-Migration history:With Zambia's 1964 independence from the British Empire, many members of national liberation movements in neighbouring countries, including Angola, found the country a hospitable base for their operations...
.
The role of Portuguese in Africa
As an official language, Portuguese serves in the realms of administration, education, law, politics and media. Given the existing linguistic diversity of the PALOPs, Portuguese also serves the purpose of lingua francaLingua franca
A lingua franca is a language systematically used to make communication possible between people not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both mother tongues.-Characteristics:"Lingua franca" is a functionally defined term, independent of the linguistic...
allowing communication between fellow citizens of different ethno-linguistic backgrounds.
Additionally, Portuguese connects the PALOP countries to one another and to Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
, East Timor
East Timor
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, commonly known as East Timor , is a state in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the nearby islands of Atauro and Jaco, and Oecusse, an exclave on the northwestern side of the island, within Indonesian West Timor...
and Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, itself a former Portuguese colony.
Music is one way in which the linguistic profiles of PALOP have increased. Many recording artists from PALOP, in addition to singing in their maternal languages, sing in Portuguese to one degree or another. The success of these artists in the world music industry increases international awareness of Portuguese as an African language.
As a literary language, Portuguese has a strong role in the PALOP. Authors such as Luandino Vieira, Mia Couto
Mia Couto
António Emílio Leite Couto , better known as Mia Couto, is a world-renowned Mozambican writer.-Early years:Couto was born in the city of Beira, Mozambique’s second largest city, where he was also raised and schooled. He is the son of Portuguese emigrants who moved to the former Portuguese colony in...
, Lopito Feijóo, Luis Kandjimbo, Manuel Rui
Manuel Rui
Manuel Rui is an Angolan writer who has authored poetry, novels, theater plays, and short stories.-Biography:Manuel Rui, whose full name is Manuel Rui Alves Monteiro, was born in 1941 in Huambo . Rui studied at the University of Coimbra, in Portugal, and received a law degree there in 1969...
or Ondjaki
Ondjaki
Ndalu de Almeida is a writer from Angola, writing under the pen name Ondjaki. He lives in Luanda, the capital of the country, and has written poetry, children's books, short stories, novels, drama and film scripts....
have made valuable contributions to lusophone literature, prompting an African scent and ideas to the language and creating a place for the Portuguese language in the African imaginary.
Media
Portuguese is the language of journalism, which serves as a vehicle for the dissemination of the language. Literacy being an issue, radio serves as an important source of information for Lusophone Africans.BBC Para África, RFI
Radio France Internationale
Radio France Internationale was created in 1975 as part of Radio France by the Government of France, and replaced the Poste Colonial , Paris Mondial , Radio Paris , RTF Radio Paris and ORTF Radio Paris...
and RTP África
RTP África
RTP África is a terrestrial television channel for the Portuguese-speaking African countries owned by RTP with programming from Portuguese public and private television channels and African public networks, RTP África also airs its own news, food and music TV shows...
are all media outlets that make a point of presenting Portuguese as an African language aside from its origins in Europe.
African varieties of Portuguese abroad
As a result of immigration to Portugal various varieties of African Portuguese have influenced contemporary speech in Portugal. In the 1970s, it came from white people from the former coloniesPortuguese Africans
Portuguese Africans are Portuguese people born or permanently settled in Africa .The largest Portuguese African population lives in South Africa , while there are important minorities living in Namibia and the Portuguese-speaking African countries Portuguese Africans are Portuguese people born or...
(referred to as Retornados). More recent immigration from the PALOPs has resulted in a visible demographic of black and brown Portuguese who have strong links to Lusophone Africa.
In Brazil, many of the indigenous African languages that influence African Portuguese had the same influence historically on the formation of Brazilian Portuguese
Brazilian Portuguese
Brazilian Portuguese is a group of Portuguese dialects written and spoken by most of the 190 million inhabitants of Brazil and by a few million Brazilian emigrants, mainly in the United States, United Kingdom, Portugal, Canada, Japan and Paraguay....
during the colonial period, especially lexically. The settlement of white African refugees from their former territories to Brazil also added the influence of dialects of African Portuguese on Brazilian Portuguese.
Local norms and norms of reference
In Africa, Standard Portuguese (Português-padrão), based on European PortugueseEuropean Portuguese
European Portuguese refers to the variety of Portuguese spoken in continental Portugal, as well as the Azores and Madeira islands...
spoken in Coimbra and Lisbon, forms the basis for the written and spoken norm, although there are local variations of the language. As the number of both L1 and L2 speakers increases, one can see the emergence of distinct national varieties of Portuguese specific to each country. Some aspects of phonology of African dialects in Angola, and São Tomé and Príncipe share similarities with Brazilian dialects, this has historical motivations, although younger generations and upper class, in both countries, tend to use standard (European) pronunciation.
In Angolan Journalism, both the "estar+gerund" and the "estar+infinitive" constructions are acceptable for the present progressive tense. Another example is in pronominal syntax where the placement of object pronouns can be placed before or after the relevant verb. In Cape Verdean Portuguese
Cape Verdean Portuguese
Cape Verdean Portuguese is the variety of Portuguese spoken in Cape Verde.- Status :While Cape Verdean Creole is the mother tongue of nearly all the population in Cape Verde, Portuguese is the official language. Creole is, therefore, used colloquially, in everyday usage, while Portuguese is used...
, compound tenses are favoured over simple tenses due to the influence of Cape Verdean Creole.
Unlike Portugal and Brazil, the PALOPs are multilingual societies. Wilson Trajano Filho differentiates between Brazil and Portugal which are focused speech communities and the PALOPs which are diffused speech communities. Omar Ribeiro Thomaz maintains that Portuguese is used to communicate concepts and realities unique to each society.
In the varieties of Portuguese spoken in the Mainland PALOPs, this results in large amounts of lexical borrowing from these languages. In Angola and Mozambique, large numbers of Portuguese words have been incorporated into their indigenous languages. Portuguese is the main source of new words for the various lusophone creoles spoken on the continent. This complex relationship between Portuguese and these other languages has implications for language planning in the African member states of the CPLP.
Creoles
Any discussion of the role of the Portuguese language in Africa must take into account the various Portuguese creoles that have developed there. These languages co-exist with Portuguese and, in the countries where they are spoken, form a continuum with the lexifying language.In Cape Verde, Crioulo levinho refers to a variety of Cape Verdean Creole which takes on various features of Portuguese and is a result of processes of code switching
Code-switching
In linguistics, code-switching is the concurrent use of more than one language, or language variety, in conversation. Multilinguals—people who speak more than one language—sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other...
, bilingualism and diglossia
Diglossia
In linguistics, diglossia refers to a situation in which two dialects or languages are used by a single language community. In addition to the community's everyday or vernacular language variety , a second, highly codified variety is used in certain situations such as literature, formal...
in the archipelago. In Sāo Tome e Principe, Santomense Portuguese is a variety of Portuguese strongly influenced by Forro
Forro language
Forro is a Portuguese-based creole language spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe.The name means "freed slave" in Portuguese. The language is also called crioulo santomense. It should not be confused with the dialect of Portuguese spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe.- History :São Tomé is an island of the...
in syntax and vocabulary. Since the lexicons of those languages are derived from Portuguese, even creole-speakers who do not speak Portuguese have a passive knowledge of it.
In addition, Portuguese creoles have often been (and often continue to be) written using Portuguese orthography. An important issue in discussions of standardization of creoles is whether it is better to devise a truly phonetic orthography or to choose an etymological one based on Portuguese.
See also
- Portuguese languagePortuguese languagePortuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
- Angolan PortugueseAngolan PortugueseAngolan Portuguese is a variety of Portuguese used mostly in Angola where it is an official language. It is generally used in Angola by 80% of all residents, of which 60% of the inhabitants of Luanda, with around 7.5 million first-language speakers....
- Cape Verdean PortugueseCape Verdean PortugueseCape Verdean Portuguese is the variety of Portuguese spoken in Cape Verde.- Status :While Cape Verdean Creole is the mother tongue of nearly all the population in Cape Verde, Portuguese is the official language. Creole is, therefore, used colloquially, in everyday usage, while Portuguese is used...
- Guinean PortugueseGuinean PortugueseGuinean Portuguese is the variety of Portuguese spoken in Guinea-Bissau, where it is the official language.-Prevalence:...
- Mozambican PortugueseMozambican PortugueseMozambican Portuguese refers to the varieties of Portuguese spoken in Mozambique. It is the official language and, according to the most recent census, is spoken by approximately 40% of the population, mostly as a lingua franca, with only 6.5% speaking it natively...
- São Tomean PortugueseSão Tomean PortugueseSão Tomean Portuguese is a dialect of Portuguese spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe....
- PALOP
- CPLP
- Portuguese EmpirePortuguese EmpireThe Portuguese Empire , also known as the Portuguese Overseas Empire or the Portuguese Colonial Empire , was the first global empire in history...