Xhosa

Borrowed from Xhosa (ísí)Xhosa (“Xhosa language”) and (úḿ)Xhosa (“Xhosa person”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkəʊ.sə/, /ˈkɔː.sə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkoʊ.sə/, /ˈkɔ.sə/
• Rhymes: -əʊsə, -ɔːsə
• Hyphenation: Xho‧sa

• Audio (Southern England):

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Xhosa (countable and uncountable, plural Xhosas or Xhosa)

1. (countable) A 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.
   • 2020 April 28, Christina Macfarlane, “‘There is nothing worse than hunger,’ says South Africa hero Siya Kolisi of helping townships during lockdown”, in CNN‎^[1]:

     “With the food packages that we drop off, we are adding messages in the local dialect of Xhosa, because this is predominately for the Xhosa areas,” Kolisi said.

Xhosa (comparative more Xhosa, superlative most Xhosa)

1. Of or pertaining to the Xhosa people.
2. Of or pertaining to the Xhosa language.

• Wiktionary’s coverage of Xhosa terms

• ISO 639-1 code xh, ISO 639-3 code xho (SIL)
• Ethnologue entry for Xhosa, xho ⁠
• “Xhosa”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• “Xhosa” (US) / “Xhosa” (UK) in Macmillan English Dictionary.
• “Xhosa”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “Xhosa”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “Xhosa, n. & adj.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.