Bemba
Americannoun
plural
Bembas,plural
Bemba-
a member of a numerous agricultural people of Zambia.
-
the Bantu language spoken by the Bemba, widely used as a lingua franca in Zambia.
noun
-
a member of a Negroid people of Africa, living chiefly in Zambia on a high infertile plateau
-
the language of this people, belonging to the Bantu group of the Niger-Congo family
Etymology
Origin of Bemba
First recorded in 1935–40
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Though I don’t speak Bemba, I could clap in Bemba.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 27, 2025
During that visit Ms Kaumba had not worn all her carefully curated outfits, so she asked her grandmother - or "Mbuya" in the Bemba language - if she wanted to try them on.
From BBC • Nov. 15, 2024
Defence Minister Jean-Pierre Bemba said the allegations were being investigated.
From Reuters • May 20, 2023
We don’t have an official Bemba dictionary — and the orthography of Zambian languages is also pretty inconsistent.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 23, 2019
He heard through Radio Bemba, which is how people are referring to gossip, Radio Big Mouth, that the compound is now a SIM interrogation center.
From "Before We Were Free" by Julia Alvarez
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
