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Fiafia Samoan: Dabbling in Polynesian | ||
Tags: Dabbling | Rare Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| druckfehler Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4657 days ago 1181 posts - 1912 votes  Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean Studies: Persian | Message 1 of 17 24 February 2012 at 3:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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Talofa Lava!
In my teens I spent a year in New Zealand, surrounded by Pacific Islanders. To say that I came to appreciate their culture wouldn't quite be correct, because I can't say I understood much about it. But I admired their mentality and their music and loved their food. A friend tried to teach me some Fijian at the time but I failed miserably. The pronunciation seemed impossible to reproduce. Now I want to try again with Samoan. To me Samoan is a strong contender for the most beautiful language and it brings back happy memories (somehow that makes me sound ancient :D). That's why I called this log "fiafia", which means happy - among other things. If you're curious how Samoan sounds, try Tali Maia by Pati. I don't have time for much real study, but I think I will dabble a bit now and then when I want to relax from everything else. And as I go along I hope to tell everyone who's interested more about the language, the culture and how to find material to study it in this log. Edited by druckfehler on 25 February 2012 at 1:18am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| druckfehler Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4657 days ago 1181 posts - 1912 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean Studies: Persian | Message 2 of 17 24 February 2012 at 4:27pm | IP Logged | ||
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Resources
Here I'll list all the language resources for Samoan I come across online and offline. It's not easy to find adequate study material for Samoan, but it's definitely possible. Hopefully this list will keep growing. If you happen to know a resource for studying Samoan, please let me know. Coursebooks Gagana Samoa: A Samoan Language Coursebook lessons 1-3 available online; can be ordered on amazon Peace Corps Samoan Language Handbook Another Peace Corps Samoan Manual Samoan for Mormon Missionaries many examples, drills, grammar explanations but cumbersome to access. Jarvis1000 has combined all the pages and now the whole manual can be easily downloaded on want2speakthai.com Samoan Language Program Guide useful from page 75 onwards; adapted from Teach Yourself Samoan and others Samoan Language Booklet phonetics, useful words and phrases Learn Samoan Online Course words and expressions, grammar examples without explanation Samoan Flashcards for Gagana Samoa, the Samoan Word Book and some others Reference Books A Grammar and Dictionary of the Samoan language also includes some "colloquial sentences" and poetry Grammar and Vocabulary of the Samoan Language plus reading selection with glossary Samoan Dictionary: Samoan - English, English - Samoan by G.B. Milner (no longer available, but in the library of my university - another choice seems to be available from NZ publisher) Samoan Reference Grammar by Ulrike Mosel and Even Hovdhaugen (not available on amazon, but in the library of my university) Samoan Word Book (Picture Dictionary) partially available online; can be ordered on amazon Travel Dictionary some useful words and phrases Manuatele.net Introduction to Samoan Words, Phrases (some with audio), English-Samoan Dictionary Omniglot more useful phrases Some Proverbs Audio Audio for Gagana Samoa available online Peace Corps Course Audio not everything is spoken by a native speaker Samoa Chat - Audio Lessons basic expressions Tamaki Middle School Video Lessons cute kids teach simple words and phrases, bad site navigation Saoleilei Online Course only few samples are free, subscription costs 99.99$ per year Samoan Language Week Video with English subtitles Tofiga O Pili Aau Samoan Short Film with English subtitles Leaoa: A Samoan Story Samoan Short Film with English subtitles Malaga Short Film partly in Samoan with English subtitles, partly in English Samoa Capital Radio live stream, podcasts, website text in English and Samoan SBS Podcasts in Samoan news "TV SAMOA" Youtube lots of videos about Samoa, some in English South Sea Pictures on Youtube a couple of videos in Samoan For Me for Us - Video about Health no English Radio Samoana music, radio stations, lyrics Audio Bible Stories and Lessons in Samoan some with English text some Christian Hymns and Sermons Jesusfilm with Samoan speaker also available in English; might not be a close translation Listening - Reading Legend "Sina ma lana Tuna" (Sina and the Eel) with English translation and exercises Another version of "Sina ma le Tuna" with English translation Legend "O le uluai afi i Samoa" (How fire came to Samoa) with English translation Legend "O le atiga figata mamana" (The magic seashell) with English translation Legend "Fagogo i le laau o le Niu" (The legend of the Coconut) with English translation Home and Community Care Pamphlet with Audio audio version is different in some places Lecture about the Importance of the Samoan Language in English, but includes some Samoan with transcript on slides and English translation Parallel Texts O Le Talo Sione from International Children's Digital Library in English, Maori, Niuean, Samoan O Le Tala I Le 'Au Uso (The Story of Two Brothers) Tama Samoa - Le Fetuao Samoan Language School Student Production short video with text about Samoan boys Government of Samoa Site mostly in the "press secretariat"-pdf on the right side Human Rights Declaration National Anthem of Samoa Mental Health Inventory Questionnaire useful for learning emotion words Earthquake Brochures in Samoan Earthquake Brochures in Chinese, Korean, Arabic 1 Earthquake Brochure in English Bible Verses, Prayers, etc. Some Songs page 399 - 412 Monolingual Samoan Texts Tala Fa'a Samoa E Faitau Fa'atasi, Samoan Stories to Read Together by Fa'afetai Les and Peter Kobayashi preview on google books, available on amazon Samoa News Blog Anoafale O Le Gagana Ma Le Aganuu about language, culture and chief system, sample pages online O Samoa Anamua complete book online (from 1884) Le Tusi Paia the complete Bible in Samoan The New Testament with long vowel markings About Samoan Culture (in English) Articles about Samoa in the Encyclopedia of New Zealand Samoan Culture Blog about Everyday Life in Samoa Savage Symbols Documentary about Samoan tattoos Bizarre Foods Samoa Island Beats TV videos of and about Pacific music An Introduction to Samoan Custom Some Folk Songs and Myths from Samoa An Account of Samoan History up to 1918 with some geographical and culture specific Edited by druckfehler on 13 January 2013 at 2:11am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| mick33 Senior Member United States Joined 5713 days ago 1335 posts - 1632 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Finnish Studies: Thai, Polish, Afrikaans, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish | Message 3 of 17 25 February 2012 at 12:10am | IP Logged | ||
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I've thought about dabbling with Samoan before, but never did. One of the main reasons was I didn't think there were enough resources for doing learning Samoan, but you've just solved that problem. I'll just have to stick to my excuse that the Samoan speakers in Washington fall into two categories: Those that speak no English and those that speak excellent English. Well, there is one minor issue, I'm already supposedly learning other languages. Edited by mick33 on 25 February 2012 at 2:38am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ellsworth Senior Member United States Joined 4746 days ago 345 posts - 528 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Swedish, Finnish, Icelandic, Irish | Message 4 of 17 25 February 2012 at 12:47am | IP Logged | ||
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Wow that song is awesome! Thanks for the link.
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| druckfehler Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4657 days ago 1181 posts - 1912 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean Studies: Persian | Message 5 of 17 25 February 2012 at 9:08pm | IP Logged | ||
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It's great to read that I'm not the only forum member with an interest in Samoan! How did you get the idea to study it? I hope you eventually give in to Samoan and join me on this journey ;)
There are lots of talented Samoan/Polynesian singers and musicians, lots of music can be found on youtube, usually sung in harmony. I hope to learn some vocabulary by translating lyrics. I'll post another song I really like: E le galo oe by Vaniah Toloa 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| druckfehler Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4657 days ago 1181 posts - 1912 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean Studies: Persian | Message 6 of 17 29 February 2012 at 3:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Phonology of Samoan
A couple of things about Samoan phonology are pretty fascinating. Native Samoan words only use 10 consonants and one of them is a glottal stop marked as '. The other consonants are F, G (pronounced "ng"), L, M, N, P, S, T and V. Add to that the fact that Samoan syllables may only start, but not end with a consonant (thereby ruling out consonant clusters), this naturally makes it a rather vowel-heavy language. There seem to be many minimal pairs that are only distinguished by vowel length. Vowel length determines meaning, so I'd argue that Samoan has 10 vowels, both long and short versions of A, E, I, O, U. The long versions are formally denoted as Ā, Ē, Ī, Ō, Ū, but in practice the lengthening signs are often omitted. Loan words come largely from Greek, Latin (thanks to the missionaries) and English. For these loan words the consonants H, K and R were added to the Samoan alphabet. All other letters are assimilated by turning B into P, D into T and so on. This rule combined with the impossibility of consonant clusters makes for some interesting conversions: "club" becomes "kalapu", "stocking" becomes "se totoni", "herring" becomes "elegi" (spoken elengi) and - my absolute favourite - "wire" becomes "uaea". Finally, it's absolutely stunning that there are two registers of speech which are most of all distinguished by the replacement of certain consonants. In one register T is replaced by K and N is replaced by G (and the R in loanwords is replaced by L). I'll quote from the Phonology section of The Digital Polyglot, because it does a good job of explaining this phenomenon:
I also read somewhere that Samoans may dislike it when palagi (non-Samoans, especially European westerners/Caucasians) use the K-style or tautala leanga. It seems then that Samoan has different phonological registers for traditional and western contexts, which is something I've never yet come across in another language (maybe the closest would be the former use of a completely different language for science and religion?) and I wonder how it came into being. Edited by druckfehler on 29 February 2012 at 3:53am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| druckfehler Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4657 days ago 1181 posts - 1912 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean Studies: Persian | Message 7 of 17 05 October 2012 at 11:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks to New Zealand being the guest of honor at this year's Frankfurt Book Fair there will be several events with Samoan artists! It's really rare to see anything about Pacific island culture around here, so I want to go to as many events as I can. What a pity that I didn't learn any Samoan yet... - except for learning the lyrics of two songs by heart with no idea what they mean :D
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| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 4955 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 8 of 17 07 October 2012 at 11:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for all the tips, I'd really like to learn a Polynesian language and Samoan seems
to have a few resources. i'm particularly interested in its grammar, is it all based in topics like Maori? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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