Xhosa

See also: xhosa

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Xhosa (ísí)Xhosa (“Xhosa language”) and (úḿ)Xhosa (“Xhosa person”), where the sequence xh denotes a click (/ˈǁʰoːsa/):

• Audio:

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Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkoʊ.sə/, /ˈkɔ.sə/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkəʊ.sə/, /ˈkɔː.sə/

Noun

Xhosa (countable and uncountable, plural Xhosas or Xhosa)

1. (countable) Any member of a Bantu people from South Africa, most of whom live in the Eastern Cape.
   • 1994, Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, London: Abacus, published 2010, pages 14-15:

     my father remained aloof from Christianity and instead reserved his own faith for the great spirit of the Xhosas, Qamata, the God of his fathers.

   • 2011, Xoliswa Ndoyiya, Ukutya Kwasekhaya: Tastes from Nelson Mandela's Kitchen, page 49:

     In many Xhosa households, Wednesday is umngqusho day. It's the way we all grew up. Like Fridays in the Eastern Cape are always dumplings with meat day.

2. (uncountable) The language of these people, a Bantu language related to Zulu.

Translations

Xhosa language

• Afrikaans: Xhosa (af), Khosa
• Albanian: gjuha Xhosa
• Arabic: الْكُوسِيَّة f (al-kūsiyya)
• Breton: Xhosaeg
• Bulgarian: кхоса (khosa)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 科薩語 / 科萨语 (zh) (Kēsà yǔ)

• Chuvash: коса чӗлхи (kos̬a č̬ĕlh̬i)
• Dutch: Xhosa (nl)
• Esperanto: kosa lingvo
• Finnish: xhosa (fi)
• French: xhosa (fr)
• Galician: xhosa m
• Ido: Xosa-linguo
• Irish: Cóisis f
• Italian: xhosa (it) m
• Japanese: コサ語 (ja) (kosa-go)
• Korean: 코사어 (kosa'eo)
• Limburgish: Xhosa (li)
• Navajo: Xhosa Dineʼé bizaad
• Polish: xhosa
• Portuguese: xhosa (pt) m, xossa m
• Russian: ко́са (ru) (kósa)
• Spanish: xhosa (es) m
• Swahili: Kixhosa
• Swedish: xhosa (sv)
• Xhosa: isiXhosa
• Zulu: isiXhosa

Xhosa people

• Afrikaans: Xhosa (af)
• Arabic: كُوسِيُّون m (kūsiyyūn)
• Bengali: কোসা (kōśa)
• Esperanto: koso (eo) (man or woman), kosino (woman)
• French: Xhosa (fr) m or f
• Swahili: Mxhosa
• Swedish: xhosa (sv)
• Xhosa: amaXhosa

See also

• Wiktionary's coverage of Xhosa terms
• Xhosa - English Dictionary: from Webster's Dictionary - the Rosetta Edition.
• Xhosa - English & English - Xhosa Translator at Albion College

Further reading

• ISO 639-1 code xh, ISO 639-3 code xho (SIL)
• Ethnologue entry for Xhosa, xho ⁠