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Most accessible African Language? | ||
Tags: African languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| drp9341 Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 4914 days ago 115 posts - 217 votes  Speaks: Italian, English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French Studies: Japanese | Message 1 of 12 12 December 2012 at 8:48am | IP Logged | ||
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Hello HTLAL!
I don't have any intentions right now to learn an African language, but I am actually growing very interested in the possibility of potentially learning an African Language. By African Language I mean a language spoken in Sub-Saharan Africa. I was considering Swahili, but the fact that it has so few true native speakers turns me off to it. Secondly I was considering Zulu, but I am not sure about how wide spread it's use, despite the large amount of native speakers (relatively speaking.) In terms of accessibility I'm referring to the availability of learning materials (either from a French or English base.)Whether or not the language is used in at lease some media, and most importantly, if that's the primary language of use for all things in the region where it's spoken. I have some other ones in mind, (Hausa, Somali,and maybe Amharic, but seeing as it's a Semitic language, It's of significantly less interest to me.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| viedums Hexaglot Senior Member Thailand Joined 4668 days ago 327 posts - 528 votes Speaks: Latvian, English*, German, Mandarin, Thai, French Studies: Vietnamese | Message 2 of 12 12 December 2012 at 10:03am | IP Logged | ||
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I've had a similar idea myself recently. I've ordered Bernd Heine's "African Languages" to get a general picture of the language situation there. That said, if I get around to this, I think I would start with Swahili. The fact that it's a Bantu language means that it should give you insight into that very large family. And it doesn't seem to have the significant pronunciation issues that you might find with tonal languages (most other Bantu langs, I believe), or click languages (Zulu?). There are even some interesting logs here by people who've studied it (striking/shootingstar?). In short, Swahili seems like a good place to start. I don't see how the number of "true native speakers" makes any difference.
Edited by viedums on 12 December 2012 at 4:45pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| mikonai Diglot Senior Member United States weirdnamewriting.bloRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4931 days ago 178 posts - 281 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Swahili, German | Message 3 of 12 12 December 2012 at 4:38pm | IP Logged | ||
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Although Swahili may have few "native" speakers, it has a huge number of highly
proficient speakers. The situation in Tanzania especially is unique, and skews the number of native vs. non-native speakers. Most children in Tanzania grow up first learning their tribe's language, and there are tons of them around. But Swahili is the lingua franca of the area, so many, when they go to school (if they get to) or to work with anyone from a different tribe, they learn Swahili, and they learn it to very high proficiency, as if they had grown up bilingual. As a result, though, the statistics show that Swahili has few native speakers and tons of L2 speakers, but those aren't people who stumble around in the language to get by: they speak this language everywhere but their home village. There's nothing against any of those other languages, but I would say that Swahili is both the most accessible and most useful out of the sub-Saharan Africa group. And as Viedums said, it is a Bantu-based language, and has a lot of Arabic influence as well (although that was more of a place they stole vocabulary from, less of the grammar, definitely not the script), so it gives you a foot into many other African languages, though I wouldn't count on it to help you with something involving a lot of clicks, because those might be a different language family (I can't remember right now for sure though). Then again, there are a lot of other really fun and interesting languages in Africa, so if Swahili doesn't appeal to you, no need to bother with it. Swahili is generally considered easier to learn than many other languages of the area, because it started out as sort of a trade language between Arabic-speaking traders and Bantu-based speakers (I'm not sure right this moment if it started as a pidgin or not. I need to look that up...). The biggest bonus is that there are a lot of materials available in Swahili compared to other languages. Oh, one last (maybe slightly humorous) note: If you go looking for someone to teach you Swahili, try and get someone from Tanzania, rather than Kenya, if you can. Tanzania is a poorer country in general than Kenya, but one thing they pride themselves on is the relative "correctness" and beauty of their Swahili. Even the Kenyans will admit it! 15 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| vonPeterhof Tetraglot Senior Member Russian FederationRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4774 days ago 715 posts - 1527 votes Speaks: Russian*, EnglishC2, Japanese, German Studies: Kazakh, Korean, Norwegian, Turkish | Message 4 of 12 13 December 2012 at 5:32am | IP Logged | ||
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| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4446 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 5 of 12 13 December 2012 at 8:56am | IP Logged | ||
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I have a few friends from Kenya and Nigeria. Most people understand the geography & history of the
land as having many tribes. Unlike China where over 80% of the population is ethnic Han Chinese, in Africa you have half-dozen tribes within 1 country. During the European colonial period, countries were divided among themselves with no regard for traditional boundaries. So there are languages spoken in several countries and countries with more than a few languages spoken. Over the years, many Africans emigrated to Europe and N. America. Europe you find people ended up in mother-countries of former colonies like Kenyans and Nigerians in England. Met 1 man who came from Eritrea by way of Italy (once colonized Ethiopia before the country split into 2). Learned to speak fluent Italian and picked up English later. And more importantly, a number of African countries still rely on European languages to communicate among themselves, besides N. Africa where Arabic is common. The French-speaking countries in the West like Senegal, Mali, etc. people speak French quite fluently. In the English-speaking East like Kenya, Uganda & Tanzania, people speak English well but with their local accents. In a country like Kenya it is common to find someone who is fluent in his/her native Kikuyu on top of Swahili & English. Like the autobiography of the New York best-selling author Ishmael Beah: "A Long Way Gone" from Sierra Leon, On his way out of the country he spoke several languages including Krio & English. Many tend to be bi or multilingual. Edited by shk00design on 13 December 2012 at 9:03am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| strikingstar Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5175 days ago 292 posts - 444 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin*, Cantonese, Swahili Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 6 of 12 13 December 2012 at 5:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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What some of the posters above me have said is correct. Swahili may not be very many
people's first language but I'll guarantee that the people who speak it as a "second language" speak it as well as you do English. Swahili is the language of instruction in Tz schools. I'm not aware of mother tongues being taught in schools. In Kenya, English and Swahili are the languages of instruction. Again, no mother tongue. Swahili's profile is rising too. Uganda switched to Swahili as an official first language in 2005. Does anyone speak Swahili in Uganda natively? Heck, no. But they're teaching it in schools now. Luganda isn't even recognized as a first language. And there are also people who speak Swahili in Rwanda, Burundi and Eastern DRC. Without a doubt, sub-Saharan language with the most number of proficient speakers: Swahili. No contest. Besides, the countries where Swahili is spoken are beautiful and have some of the most amazing attractions in the world. I should know. Tanz: Mt. Kilimanjaro, Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti, Zanzibar, Lake Victoria (shared with Kenya & Ug) Kenya: Mt. Kenya, Rift Valley, Maasai Mara, Lake Turkana, Lamu Ug: Jinja, the Nile, Murchsion Falls, Bwindi Gorillas, Lake Bunyonyi, Rwenzori Mountains Rwanda: Virunga Mountains, hills and more hills. Learn Swahili, visit East Africa, fall in love with this amazing place. @mikonai I hadn't noticed your last paragraph before but that is so true. Kenyans themselves will admit that their Swahili isn't as good as the Tanzanians'. In Kenya, it's basically interior Swahili (Kiswahili cha bara, i.e. inferior) vs. coastal Swahili (Kiswahili cha pwani, i.e. superior). Swahili is good on the Kenyan Coast like Mombasa, comparable to Tanzanian Swahili. Away from the coast, there is a lot of sheng (Swahili slang) which differs according to region. In Western Kenyan where I live right now, they like their "Iko chonjo"s and "Mambo iko snack"s. In Nairobi, you might hear a "Habari ya mtu wa ta oh", whatever that means. Kenyans in general have been quite impressed by the 'correctness' of my Swahili. (I learnt Swahili in Tanzania first but my Swahili professor in college was Kenyan, Kikuyu to be precise.) On my part, I'm sometimes annoyed by their grammar. But it's not my place to correct them. They own the language far more than I ever will. Maybe if I were Tanzanian though... heheh. Now the Ugandans... Baby steps... I use Swahili to get annoying boda drivers off my back in Kampala because half the time, they wouldn't understand me. But I took a trip to Sipi Falls recently and was rather pleasantly surprised that the people from the area spoke really good Swahili. They were Sebei - related to the Kalenjins from Kenya. I ended up speaking more Swahili than English that weekend, which is rare when I'm in Uganda. You seem pretty well-informed about Kenyans and Tanzanians. You ever lived in E. Africa? Edited by strikingstar on 14 December 2012 at 5:31pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| zooplah Diglot Senior Member United States zooplah.farvista.net Joined 6370 days ago 100 posts - 116 votes Speaks: English*, Esperanto Studies: German | Message 7 of 12 16 December 2012 at 9:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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Afrikaans, quite obviously. :)
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4670 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 8 of 12 17 December 2012 at 6:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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I vote for Zulu
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