Swahili people in the context of "Swahili coast"

A demonym (/ˈdɛmənɪm/; from Ancient Greek δῆμος (dêmos) 'people, tribe' and ὄνυμα (ónuma) 'name') or 'gentilic' (from Latin gentilis 'of a clan, or gens') is a word that identifies a group of people (inhabitants, residents, natives) in relation to a particular place. Demonyms are usually derived from the name of the place (hamlet, village, town, city, region, province, state, country, and continent). Demonyms are used to designate all people (the general population) of a particular place, regardless of ethnic, linguistic, religious or other cultural differences that may exist within the population of that place. Examples of demonyms include Cochabambino, for someone from the city of Cochabamba; Tunisian for a person from Tunisia; and Swahili, for a person of the Swahili coast.

Many demonyms function both endonymically and exonymically (used by the referents themselves or by outsiders); others function only in one of those ways.

Swahili, also known as Kiswahili, is a Bantu language originally spoken by the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya, and Mozambique (along the East African coast and adjacent littoral islands). Estimates of the number of Swahili speakers, including both native and second-language speakers, vary widely. They generally range from 150 million to 200 million; with most of its native speakers residing in Tanzania and Kenya.

Swahili has a significant number of loanwords from other languages, mainly Arabic, as well as from Portuguese, English and German. Around 40% of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including the name of the language (سَوَاحِلي sawāḥilī, a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coasts'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab slave traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region.

The Sangage Sheikhdom was a coastal African sheikhdom (Portuguese: xeicado) in modern-day Mozambique, established in the mid-1600s and lasting until 1913. The people of Sangage retained a distinct culture but are related to the Swahili people; their language, Esangaji, is also similar to the Swahili language.

Swahilization or Swahilisation refers to one of two practices:

• the cultural assimilation of local peoples in Southeast Africa into the Swahili people and their culture.
• the post-independence promotion of the Swahili language by the governments of Southeast African former colonies as a national and official language, alongside a greater cultural assimilation policy of Africanization (see Julius Nyerere and Ujamaa).

Swahili was the language spoken throughout the coastal tribes of Eastern Tanzania before the arrival of the European settlers. During the 1800s, the slave trades led by Arab merchants led Swahili to become a 50% derivative from Arabic.

Pate (Paté) Island (Swahili pronunciation: [ˈpate]) is located in the Indian Ocean close to the northern coast of Kenya, to which it belongs. It is the largest island in the Lamu Archipelago, which lie between the towns of Lamu and Kiunga in the former Coast Province. The island is almost completely surrounded by mangroves.

Like much of the Swahili Coast, Pate's history was marked by a steady transition from agricultural communities in the early first millennium into a specialized, urban trading society around the 10th century, likely earlier. Islam spread down the coast from African Muslims in the Horn of Africa, helping to develop what would be known as the Swahili culture. Despite myths to the contrary, Pate was neither an Arab nor Persian colony, but an African town frequented by trading Arabs, Persians, Indians, and others. It was the centre of the Pate sultanate from the 13th–19th centuries. The Swahili port of Pate long vied with Lamu and Takwa (on Manda Island) for economic dominance of the area, and came into prominence around the 14th century. It was subjugated by Lamu, however, in the late 19th century.

Swahili culture is the culture of the Swahili people inhabiting the Swahili coast. This littoral area encompasses Tanzania, Kenya, and Mozambique, as well as the adjacent islands of Zanzibar and Comoros along with some parts of Malawi and the eastern part of Democratic Republic of Congo. Swahili people speak Swahili as their native language, which belongs to the Bantu language family. Graham Connah described Swahili culture as at least partially urban, mercantile, and literate.

Swahili culture is the product of the history of the coastal part of the African Great Lakes region. As with the Swahili language, Swahili culture has a Bantu core that has borrowed from foreign influences.

The Alagwa (Swahili: Waasi; Rangi: Vaasi; Iraqw: Alawa) are a Cushitic ethnic group mostly based in the Kondoa District (Alagwa: Ulàa) of the Dodoma Region in central Tanzania, an area well known for rock art. Smaller numbers of Alagwa reside in the Hanang district of the Manyara Region in Tanzania, as well. They speak the Alagwa language as a mother tongue, which belongs to the South Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family. In 2022, the Alagwa population was estimated to number 52,816 individuals, and Mous (2016) estimates the number of speakers to be slightly over 10,000.

Some of the Alagwa have mixed with communities of Gorowa, Sandawe, Datooga, and Rangi. Many Alagwa speak the Rangi language and the two groups have both influenced each other. Many of the Alagwa are Muslims, following from an extended period of interactions with Swahili traders in Kondoa in the 19th century.