shikamoo
interjection
a respectful greeting to an older person or someone of higher status.
The younger or lower-status person says Shikamoo first, and the older person answers Marahaba. You will hear it among native Swahili speakers on the Kenyan coast and in Tanzania; elsewhere in Kenya it may sound highly formal or mainly classroom-taught.
Forms
- shikamooni
- used when greeting several older or higher-status people
Origins
Shikamoo is commonly linked with shika miguu ya, an older phrase for showing honour or submission by grasping someone’s feet. Some scholarship connects that history with slavery and colonial rule, and also records the word’s life today as a respectful greeting from a younger person to an older one.
Sources5
Beata Wójtowicz and Lionel Posthumus, Greeting and saying farewell in two Bantu languages: Swahili and Zulu (Studies in African Languages and Cultures, 2021), 13.
Documents age and status, turn order, and the plural form Shikamooni.
Issaya Lupogo, Khamis Mataka, David Kyeu, and Martin Mutabazi Mugisha, Asili, Matumizi, na Mtazamo wa Salamu ya “Shikamoo” katika Jamii ya Watumiaji wa Lugha ya Kiswahili (Dar es Salaam: Mulika, 2021), article abstract; 40(1).
Connects the greeting with nashika miguu and presents the attributed slavery and colonial-history account alongside current respectful use.
Chege Githiora, Sheng as Kenyan Swahili (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2018), 13–38.
Describes the regional and formal register of the Shikamoo–Marahaba exchange.
A. C. Madan, Swahili-English Dictionary (1903), 366.
Records shika miguu ya as showing honour or submission.
- Kaikki machine-readable Swahili dictionary (Kaikki.org)
Records the phrase-level shika miguu ya link, corroborated independently by Madan.
Examples
Shikamooni.
A respectful greeting to several older or higher-status people.
Shikamoo, mwalimu.
Respectful greetings, teacher.
Asha alisema, “Shikamoo.”
Asha said, “Shikamoo.”
Mwanafunzi alisema, “Shikamoo,” kwa mwalimu.
The student said, “Shikamoo,” to the teacher.
Alianza salamu kwa kusema, “Shikamoo.”
They began the greeting by saying, “Shikamoo.”
Shikamoo ni salamu ya heshima.
Shikamoo is a respectful greeting.
Alisema “Shikamoo” kwa heshima.
They said “Shikamoo” respectfully.
Tulimsikia akisema, “Shikamoo.”
We heard them saying, “Shikamoo.”
Shikamoo. — Marahaba.
A respectful greeting, followed by its accepted reply.
