Monday, April 11, 2011

Learn Shona Blog: From Haiti to the Ukraine, Learning Shona in the Zimbabwean Diaspora



Zimbabweans are making their mark in far-flung parts of the world; a recent survey by LearnShona.com has shown. It seems that people as far as Haiti, the Philippines, China, Iraq, Brazil, Serbia and the Ukraine are being inspired to learn Shona by meeting Zimbabweans near them.

Using data from downloads of Shona courses offered on the LearnShona.com website, the team was able to analyse the geographical footprint of Zimbabwean Diaspora. The reason most commonly cited for wanting to learn Shona was having a Zimbabwean partner, whilst many Zimbabweans abroad also wanted to reconnect with people from home by speaking the same language.

The greatest representations by far are in US, UK, and Southern Africa, with approximately 20% coming from the US, 15% from the UK, and 12% from Southern Africa. It seems that the Diaspora is much more dispersed than is widely known. South America, Far East Asia, South Asia, Russia, the Middle East, West Africa, Scandinavia, Southern Europe and all parts of Oceania have people wanting to learn Shona and communicate better with Zimbabweans around them.

Zimbabwe's economic partners in the Far East feature fairly prominently in the distribution, with people in countries such as China and Malaysia being inspired to learn Shona.

A recent surge of interest has also come from Zimbabweans - in Zimbabwe! For some, learning to speak the same language is seen as being a friendly neighbour, or even a prerequisite for participating fully in cultural discourse, at least in northern areas of Zimbabwe. Indeed, over 90% of interest in learning Shona online from Zimbabwe comes from people based in Harare.