Constitutional court in South Africa, said 11 ways. The country's 11 official languages are Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa and Zulu. (Photo/ Flickr/ ign11)

Language Diversity In Africa: Where Hills And Forests Shaped Our Tongues

Seven of the world’s top 10 most linguistically diverse countries in the world are African; indeed, African countries take up 29 of the 50 most diverse countries on the Language Diversity Index.


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View from the south coast, Mauritius. (Photo/ Flickr/ Brando.n)

Length Of Coastlines In Africa, By Country: Plus, How Climate Change May Spoil The View

Madagascar – an island – has the longest coastline of any country in Africa. On the mainland, the beach view is longest in Somalia, South Africa, Mozambique and Egypt.


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Victoria Falls on the Zambezi River, forming the boundary between Zambia and Zimbabwe. (Photo/ Ninara)

Ah, Those Sneaky Borders: Climate Change Shapes Africa In Unlikely Ways

Rivers and lakes make up many of Africa’s borders, which were drawn up by colonial powers in the late 19th century. Now, climate change is complicating matters, as rivers change course, and lakes recede – or surge.


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Lightning in the West Rand area of Johannesburg, South Africa. (Photo/ Flickr/ Werner Vermaak)

Eastern DR Congo Is The World’s Lightning Capital…Then There’s Tororo In Uganda…

Africa is the lightning capital of the world because it has more landmass at the equator than any other continent, and apart from eastern DR Congo, Tororo, Uganda is another special part of this story.


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A fish eagle descends on Lake Malawi, also known as Lake Nyasa. (Photo/ Flickr/ Joachim Huber)

African Rivers And Lakes; Some Surprising Numbers From The Waters

Africa has more rivers shared by three or more countries than any other continent; Lake Tanganyika is so deep that it holds 1% of the total volume of freshwater on the earth’s surface.