Afrikaans Language

Afrikaans
Pronunciation	[ɐfriˈkɑːns]
Native to	South Africa, Namibia
Native speakers	7.1 million (2011 census) 10.3 million L2 speakers in South Africa (2002)
Language family	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic Low Franconian Dutch Afrikaans
Writing system	Latin using Afrikaans alphabet Afrikaans Braille
Signed forms	Signed Afrikaans
Official status
Official language in	South Africa
Recognised minority language in	Namibia
Regulated by	Die Taalkommissie
Language codes
ISO 639-1	af
ISO 639-2
ISO 639-3
Glottolog	afri1274
Linguasphere	52-ACB-ba
Regions shaded dark blue represent areas of concentrated Afrikaans-speaking communities
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Afrikaans (/ˌæfrᵻˈkɑːnᵗs/, /ˌɑː-/, or /-ˈkɑːnz/) is a West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia, and to a lesser extent, Botswana and Zimbabwe. It evolved from the Dutch vernacular of South Holland (Hollandic dialect) spoken by the mainly Dutch settlers of what is now South Africa, where it gradually began to develop distinguishing characteristics in the course of the 18th century. Hence, it is a daughter language of Dutch, and was previously referred to as "Cape Dutch" (a term also used to refer collectively to the early Cape settlers) or "kitchen Dutch" (a derogatory term used to refer to Afrikaans in its earlier days). Although, it is variously described as a creole, a partially creolised language the least. The term is ultimately derived from Dutch Afrikaans-Hollands meaning "African Dutch". It is the first language of most of the Afrikaner and Coloured people of Southern Africa.