List of official names of South Africa

There are eleven official names of South Africa,[1] one in each of its eleven official languages. The number is surpassed only by India. These languages include English, Afrikaans, the Nguni languages (Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele, and Swazi), the Sotho-Tswana languages (Tswana, Sotho, and Pedi), Venda, and Tsonga.

There are smaller but still significant groups of speakers of Khoi-San languages which are not official languages, but are one of the eight unofficially recognised languages. There are even smaller groups of speakers of endangered languages, many of which are from the Khoi-San family, but receive no official status; however, some groups within South Africa are attempting to promote their use and revival.

The official names are:[2]

LanguageLong formShort form
AfrikaansRepubliek van Suid-AfrikaSuid-Afrika
EnglishRepublic of South AfricaSouth Africa
PediRepabliki ya Afrika-BorwaAfrika Borwa
Southern NdebeleiRiphabliki yeSewula AfrikaiSewula Afrika
Southern SothoRephaboliki ya Afrika BorwaAfrika Borwa
SwaziiRiphabhulikhi yeNingizimu AfrikaiNingizimu Afrika
TsongaRiphabliki ra Afrika DzongaAfrika-Dzonga
TswanaRephaboliki ya Aforika BorwaAforika Borwa
VendaRiphabuḽiki ya Afurika TshipembeAfurika Tshipembe
XhosaiRiphabliki yomZantsi AfrikauMzantsi Afrika
ZuluiRiphabhuliki yaseNingizimu AfrikaiNingizimu Afrika

And one former name:

LanguageLong formShort formPeriod
DutchRepubliek van Zuid-AfrikaZuid-Afrika1961–1983

South Africa's country code, ZA, is an abbreviation of this former official name, Zuid-Afrika.

See also

References
  1. The Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, Chapter 1 Archived June 29, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  2. For the text of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa in all 11 official languages, each version of which contains the name of the country in the respective language, refer to the website of the Constitutional Court of South Africa.
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