Slangora

imbongi

(chiefly, South Africa) A praise singer, a traditional bard in Zulu culture.

ɪmˈbɒŋɡiDocumented since 2010s2010sGen Alpha109 viewsLast reviewed Jun 29, 2026+ Add a definition
⚡ Tech, Dev & AI
1 definition
Community

Etymology timeline

Born ~2014 · no dated citations yet
2014BornToday, 2026

Definitions

#1·Apr 27, 2026

(chiefly, South Africa) A praise singer, a traditional bard in Zulu culture.

Let us consider the contemporary oral poetry of the Xhosa Bantu, and its highest form, the praise-poetry of male tradents, who were attached until recently to tribal chiefs. The tradents are imbongi ‘praise poets’ and the genre of their …
Origin: [[File:2014-11-26 traditional Zulu performance 01 anagoria.JPG|thumb|A traditional Zulu performance at Mfuli Game Ranch in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa]] Borrowed from and . The plural izimbongi is derived from Zulu, while iimbongi is from Xhosa. Origin information sourced from Wiktionary contributors (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Was this helpful?

Comments

Have a better definition?

Add your own interpretation of "imbongi".

Add definition

⚡About Tech, Dev & AI slang

The vocabulary of software engineers, AI researchers, and anyone living in a terminal or on GitHub — from LLM to MCP, CORS to vibe coding, agentic to enshittification.

See all Tech, Dev & AI slang on Slangora.

Tags

Other words near "imbongi" (I)

Browse all slang words starting with I.

Related terms

People also read

Semantically related