Can the Ngonis click again?

The Ngonis won the war, but lost the language. Pictures by Jack Zimba.

A Ngoni warrior stabs his spear in the air.

What does the future hold for young Ngonis?

Paramount Chief Mpezeni IV.

Gankhanani Moyo says relearning the language will be hard.

 

George Zulu is determined to have the Zulu language reintroduced among the Ngonis.

Can the Ngonis click again?

·      After losing their language, they want to regain it

JACK ZIMBA

More than a century ago, the Ngoni people were a marauding, warring tribe marching through the eastern and northern parts of modern day Zambia. Ultimately, they won the war, but they lost their language, Zulu, when they married women from the conquered tribes such as the Nsenga and Chewa. Now, they want to regain their language.

 

A PRAISE singer bursts into isibongo (Zulu poetic praise) for Paramount Chief Mpezeni IV of the Ngoni people during the Nc’wala ceremony at Mtenguleni, and there are shouts of “bayethe inkosi!” from the half-dressed impis, shoving their spears and knobkerries in the air.
But that is just how far the Ngonis can go in imitating their ancestor, the great King Shaka.
They can stomp and howl like Shaka’s descendants, but they cannot speak like Shaka.
Instead, they sound like the tribes they defeated – the Nsenga, the Chewas and Tumbukas.
Yes, the Ngonis may have won the war over a century ago, but they lost their language to their enemies.
What now passes as Ngoni language is mainly the Nsenga language with a few words from other dialects, with no characteristic click sounds.
Up north in Lundazi, the Ngonis have adopted Tumbuka language.
Today, only a few people in Ngoniland are able to speak Zulu, and it is those that have learned the language through travels to South Africa.
Philip Tembo is 69 years old, and was born in Feni village in Chipata, near the border with Malawi. He is now headman of the village.
Although both his parents were Ngoni, he says they never really spoke the Zulu language.
“Our parents never used the language a lot, they always spoke to us in Nsenga,” he says.
Mr Tembo cannot speak a word in Zulu.
“I don’t know the Ngoni language not even a bit,” he says. He is clearly embarrassed about it.
“How many people in your village are able to speak Zulu,” I ask the headman.
“None,” he replies.
Mr Tembo says he still desires to learn the Zulu language.
George Zulu is Paramount Chief Mpezeni’s advisor, and is well vest in Ngoni culture and history.
He says it is imperative for the Ngonis to regain their language in order to have proper identity.
“Everybody in this world is identified by language. The English are Englishmen because of language; the French are recognised by language, the Chinese, the Jews and the Arabs, the Zulus, the Bembas, Tonga and everybody is recognised by language. It sums up who you are,” he says.
Mr Zulu is passionate about regaining the lost language. It is something that was triggered by one embarrassing moment over a decade ago.
Mr Zulu recounts once when he and Paramount Chief Mpezeni travelled to South Africa in 1998 as guests of Zwelithini kaBhekuzulu, king of the Zulus.
“We were met by the king in Durban and he came to greet us in Zulu because he thought we as Zulus could speak Zulu,” he recalls.
But neither Mr Zulu nor Mpezeni could return the Zulu greeting.
Instead Mr Zulu answered in English.
King Zwelithini was not pleased.
He was disappointed that his guests, who shared the same ancestry as he, could not speak Zulu.
“You even lost the language,” he said.
Mr Zulu says that embarrassing episode was even reported in the local newspaper.
Since then, he has been on a mission to reintroduce Zulu language in Ngoniland. He says the paramount chief is also eager to regain the language.
“We are determined to return to our original language, we must be original, because at the moment we are not original. We are just a copycat of the Nsenga people,” says Mr Zulu.
He adds: “We are Zulus by tribe, but Nsengas by language. But we don’t want our children also not to go and know where they came from. They will know where they came from through language.”
He says the loss of language has eroded the Ngoni culture “a great deal”.
“A few things that were done in Zulu that time are differently done in Nsenga this time,” he says.
“It has eroded most parts of our tradition, because tradition is language. We should be singing in our own Zulu so that we are identified as part of South Africans who walked away,” he says.
It is also for spiritual connection.
“How do we worship our ancestors, how do we go to Nsingo and Zwangendaba and praise them? They will not understand. We are speaking a foreign language, maybe an enemy language,” he says.
Zwangendaba is the king who led the Nguni (Ngoni is an adulteration) people from present-day South Africa back in the 19^th century, escaping Shaka’s wars, while Nsingo was the warrior prince who resisted the British colonialists to his death. He has now gained notable place among the Ngonis, who recognise his sacrifice.
Mr Zulu says the Ngonis would be a stronger people today if they had not lost the language.
“Language is tribe, language is tradition,” he says.
What remains of the Zulu language among the Ngonis today are a few songs, including a beautiful anthem.
“We had rallying songs which only the Zulus could understand. When Nsingo called in Zulu, it was only the Zulus that could understand, but today if we cry out, everybody will understand what we are up to,” says.
“We should have taught the conquered tribes the Zulu language,” says Mr Zulu retrospectively.
But perhaps learning other languages was a survival tactic by the Ngonis at the time.
In fact, the Ngonis had a deliberate policy to assimilate the tribes they conquered.
“Wherever we were they knew that the Zulus are here because of our language, our click sounds, so it was also our advantage that we filter in so that we are not identified by language, so we inherited Nsenga language,” says Mr Zulu.
But with that, the Ngonis doubtless also gave up part of their culture.
“We want our culture back in full,” says Mr Zulu.
He hopes to involve UNESCO, and also work with the Zulu king in South Africa in reviving the Zulu language among the Ngonis.
He says the programme has already been tried among the Ngonis of Mzimba in Malawi, and has been successful.
“We don’t want to be left behind, we must have the will power to return to our language,” he says.
He says learning the Zulu language would also advantage the Ngoni people in terms of trade with South Africa.
Gankhanani Moyo is a cultural expert and a lecturer at the University of Zambia. He also has traces of Ngoni blood in him.
His grandfather was Ngoni, and spoke Zulu, but it is because he was once an immigrant worker on the gold mines of South Africa.
Mr Moyo says culture cannot exist without language.
“Culture cannot be transmitted without a language; all culture is transmitted through a language because everything about our world is related to us through language,” he argues
He says although some elements of the Ngoni culture have been preserved, it is not as successful as it would have been if the language had been kept.
“A lot of cultural elements have been lost due to the fact that the language that carried those elements has been changed,” says Mr Moyo.
He adds: “Change of language means change of culture. Language does not exist outside culture.”
He says what the Ngonis have done is to essentially declare themselves Nsenga without openly doing so, and risk losing the Ngoni culture entirely.
“There is a possibility, a very high likelihood that if no deliberate efforts are made by the Ngonis to return their language for the sake of their culture then the culture might change entirely,” he says.  
Mr Moyo, however, thinks it will be a big challenge for the Ngonis to relearn Zulu and replace Nsenga.
“One of the best ways of learning a language to be in a linguistic environment where the language is being used,” he says. “It will be a challenge.”
“Relearning that language might also imply relearning the culture. I know, because I’m also Ngoni, that it may be very difficult for us to admit today that we have actually lost, not just our language, but our culture,” he says.
Other scholars have also expressed pessimism at the prospect of the Zulu language being reintroduced among the Ngoni people.
Pascal Kishindo, who is professor of linguistics at Chancellor College of the University of Malawi, once described the Ngoni language as a dead language, and equated attempts to revive it to flogging a dead Horse.