[georgeg]

Am Kenyan - Born and raised and I lived at the Kenyan Coast. Kiswahili is very widely spoken and loved here. I studied Kiswahili as a language and i very much admire the rich vocabulary and idioms. It is both a national and an official language in Kenya and most of Eastern Africa.

Majority of Kenyans and East-africans are multi-lingual and they will speak on average 3 languages (English, Kiswahili, the mother-tongue and most likely an additional local language.) if they are Bantu, they will also understand 3 or more other languages and same if they are Nilotic or Cushitic.

If your are foreigner, visiting for tourism - you will very much unlikely understand Kenyans! and if you are a foreigner of they type " i lived in Kenya for 10 years" most likely in a posh residence in Nairobi or Mombasa -- Kenyans are likely to have spoken to you in English throughout! Do not mistake that for the idea that Kenyans only speak in English - remember i said majority are multilingual and given that we have over 42 different languages - the language that mostly unites us is Swahili - it is also deemed less elitist.

The language is spoken across the entire East africa - (Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique (Swahili name - Msumbiji), Burundi, Rwanda and Eastern DRC Congo.)

The article is an excerpt from a more detailed book and I agree with most it - but the author could have done a better job at investigating the origin of the language and early spread. It has borrowed heavily from Bantu, Arabic (countless words) and Portuguese (e.g. Pesa - money in Swahili, Meza - a table in Swahili).

[brnt]

I've noticed that Westerners from larger countries, and from English speaking countries in particular, always struggle with grasping that in some and perhaps many places, people just speak a handful of languages. I am from a small European country, and I was also raised and schooled in four, and on top come electives and classics if you are so inclined.

The impression what is commonly spoken is very much biased by this assumption. Many just don't speak one language all day long.

[occamrazor]

Where from? I am not aware of any country that uses more than two languages in school (except for foreign language classes of course)

[cobbaut]

Belgium also, Dutch-French-German and English.

[occamrazor]

Where in Belgium? Only in the small German-speaking region or also elsewhere?

[ir123]

I had 3 languages in my Indian school

[unmole]

India officially follows a three language policy in schools.

[simongray]

Gonna guess Luxembourg.

[occamrazor]

Luxembourg has two (French and German), and English as a foreign language.

[simongray]

Also Luxembourgish, so three + English.

[occamrazor]

AFAIK Luxembourgish is used only in Kindergarten, not in higher school grades.

[jph00]

To clarify for folks reading the parent comment and unaware: "kiswahili" and "swahili" are two words for the same language.

[_Chief]

that's right. "Ki" in this context is a prefix that's used to denote a language or the language spoken by a people ("ki ya lugha" - ki of language). This is exactly like English has language suffixes -ish, -ic, -iese, -ian; for example English, spanish, arabic, japanese, vietnamese. Where "ki" globally serves in Swahili, for example kiswahili (language for the swahili - people of the coast), kiingereza (english), kirusi (russian), and if you don't know the correct language used in a place/country it's valid to say kiukraine (language spoken by the people of ukraine)

As a Kenyan I found this read quite delightful, containing a lot I didn't know of the history of a language we speak.

> Nyerere personally translated two of William Shakespeare’s plays into Swahili to demonstrate the capacity of Swahili to bear the expressive weight of great literary works.

[rvba]

How do you negotiate which language to use? Is there any custom when 2 people meet?

What happens when few people meet? How do you agree which language to use?

When someone advertises that they will speak in public do they announce in what language?