Q_9QfBSbw8g.txt

Speaker 1:          00:08          Welcome to the channel and my name is Paul. Today I'm going to talk about the Swahili language or Kiswahili as it's called in Swahili, and by the way, Keith is a prefix that means language. Swahili is one of the most widely spoken languages in Africa, and if we only consider languages that are native to Africa, then it is the most widely spoken. It is widely spoken over a wide area of east Africa. The number of native speakers of Swahili is actually rather small, somewhere between five and 15 million, but it is widely spoken as a Lingua Franca that unites the linguistically diverse population. Estimates vary, but the total number of proficient speakers, if we include second language and third language speakers, could be as high as $150 million or even more Swahili, is an official language in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo, and it's spoken in other countries like Rwanda and Burundi. The closely related Korean language spoken in Comoros. There's also sometimes considered a dialect of Swahili. Chances are that you know a little bit of Swahili already, whether you know it or not. If you've seen the Disney movie lion king, then you know the name Simba. Simba means lion in Swahili, and maybe you remember Nala, Nala means gift in Swahili. Then there's roughly d, Rafiki means friend in Swahili, and of course there's Puma. Puma means stupid in Swahili, and of course there's Hakuna Matata. Tata means no worries in Swahili,

Speaker 2:          01:28          Simba, Nala, Rafiki, Aquanaut, my dad,

Speaker 1:          01:34          Swahili is one of the two languages that's a traditional branch of the Nigeria Congo language family, throw around $250 into languages depending on what we consider our language versus a dialect. The history of Swahili is somewhat unclear, but it originally developed as a language of coastal areas of Kenya and Tanzania. Fishermen spread the language to nearby islands. Then over the following centuries, traders from these islands spread the language to a larger area of the coast. Today, this coastal region stretching from southern Somalia all the way down to northern Mozambique is where most of Swahili native speakers are. Found. The areas where Swahili is spoken had a lot of interaction with foreign traders, particularly those from the Middle East, throughout the Middle Ages. One of the main commodities the traders were seeking was close, so person in Arab traders established cloves, farms in Zanzibar archipelago, and they also established trading settlements along the mainland coast with both foreign traders and local African Swahili speaking trader, settling along the new trade route, Swahili absorbed many foreign loan words, especially from Arabic.

Speaker 1:          02:35          In fact, the name of the language itself while he lead, comes from Arabic. The Arabic word for Kostas side and the plural form is so, uh, so with the prefix key key Swahili means the language of the coasts. In large part, this interaction between foreign Muslim traders and local Africans is what made the Swahili language what it is today, a Bantu language with a large number of loan words from other languages, especially Arabic, but also Persian, Malaya and other languages to contact with European colonial powers also influenced Swahili. Portugal began establishing colonies in East Africa and 15, oh, five ce, including in Zanzibar and along the Kenyan intensity and coasts. And as you might predict, this led to the adoption of some Portuguese vocabulary, but by about 1730 ce Omani, Arabs have retaken that region from the Portuguese and reestablished control over it. Around that time in the early 18th century, Swahili spread further inland with Arab, ivory and slave trade caravans.

Speaker 1:          03:32          This brought Swahili to more inland areas of Kenya and Tanzania to the eastern part of Congo, northern Uganda, and Rwanda and Burundi in the mid 18th century. The British and the Germans began colonizing the area. Germany took Tanganyika or modern day Tanzania as a colony in 18, 86. And the British took control of Kenya then called the East Africa protectorate in 1895. And they both encouraged the use of Swahili as a national language to unite the population which spoke dozens of different languages. Germany made Swahili, the official end administrative language and Tanganyika. While the British made English. The official language at the highest levels in Kenya. English was the language for National Administration and for higher education, but Swahili was made the language for local administration and for primary education in order to help spread the Swahili language. It needed to be standardized, so in 1928, a conference was called for this purpose and the dialect of Zanzibar was chosen as the basis for the standard language, its status as an official language or national language as well as the language of education has made Swahili widely spoken as a second language or third language in Kenya and Tanzania and in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Speaker 1:          04:40          In Tanzania. Around 80 percent of the people can speak it and amongst the younger generations it is becoming more widely spoken as a native language, especially in the urban areas and the situation is similar. In Kenya, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, it's most widely spoken in the eastern part of the country, but in total around 50 percent of the population are proficient in the language. It is also fairly widely spoken in Rwanda and Burundi and to some extent in Uganda as well. But even though Swahili has been made an official language in Uganda and it is compulsory to learn in schools. A lot of people are not interested in learning it and a lot of schools have actually been teaching it. At least that's what I hear. So what is Swahili like orthography? Well, it used to be written in the Arabic script, but because of European colonial influence, it is now written in the Latin script and it's written phonetically so that each letter represents just one sound in the language.

Speaker 1:          05:28          Phonology, Swahili has five vowel sounds which are always fully pronounced and not reduced. There are no diphthongs. That means that there are no combination of vowels pronounced as a single syllable like I or owl, or if you see two vowels side by side, they have to be pronounced as separate syllables. This makes the phonology generally quite easy to learn, and all Swahili consonants have English equivalents, but there are some things to be careful of to nasal consonants can come before other consonants with no vowel in, for example, means child boy means dog means banana. Learning how to pronounce these sounds together, maybe a challenge at first. If you've never spoken the language with that feature before. Grammar articles, there are no articles in Swahili, there is no equivalent to awkward that in the language nouns. Swahili has a system of now in classes now in classes or categories of different types of nouns that are represented by specific prefixes, in most cases, one singular and plural for each type of note. First the walk. Last nouns in this class represents people or animate beings, words with the prefix or singular and those with the wall prefix or plural. For example, baby babies, insect insects.

Speaker 1:          06:51          Another class is the class. Nouns in this class represent trees or plants. Words with them or move prefix are singular. While those with the prefix are plural tree, two trees need another. Glass is the glass. This class includes a wide variety of nouns, including some animals, loan words and miscellaneous other words. This is the biggest of the mountain glasses because of all the loan words in Swahili, and for this class, the prefix denotes both singular and plural bird birds, but this class it gets quite complicated and sometimes the prefix changes. It changes to an sounds like an m before a b or a v wine. And being new wines, new and other words in this class, lose their prefix altogether. So it's interesting to note that an English, the plural form, is indicated by the s suffix at the end of the word, but in Swahili, it's indicated by a prefix at the beginning of the word.

Speaker 1:          07:48          Now, in the classes are known to be one of the biggest challenges facing learners of Swahili. Adjectives now in class prefixes are also applied to adjectives that modify those nouns. So the word for good that base form is Zuni, but we add a prefix means a good person who act was judy means good people. So the prefix changes not only on the now but also on the adjective adverbs. Adverbs can be formed from the base form of the adjective by adding the prefix. V Good Zuni. Well, they got bad badly back. Here's an example, sentence it Soma. He read badly. Adverbs can also be formed from nouns by adding the word clock before the theory means. Secret. Quite theory mean secretly. Verbs aside from now in the classes. The other main thing about Swahili that requires some adjustment from learners is the verbal system. In Swahili, a basic verb consists of a subject prefix, a tense marker, and object in fix.

Speaker 1:          08:54          If the object is a separate word and the verb stem. Here are some examples, a taboo. This means he gave me the book is the subject, pronouns, meaning he is the tense marker indicating past tense Ne is the object marker for me, and pop is the verb. Stem meaning give and get taboo. It means book, and that's a lone word. From Arabic. We can change the tense of the sentence by changing the tense marker I can eat that could dabble, so this means he will give me the book in the future tense. So we changed the past tense marker to talk the future tense marker. Now let's change the subject of the sentence or could dabble. That means you will give me the book. So we changed the subject prefix from which means he to uber, which means you. One interesting thing is that there are negative subject prefixes.

Speaker 1:          09:42          That means we can make the sentence negative by using a different subject. Pronouns. Here's an example hat. Any becky tab that means he will not give me the book, so remember, the positive form was taboo. That meant he will give me the book, but we changed the AAP to hop and that is the negative equivalent of the subject prefix. So every subject prefix has a negative equivalent and you have to remember both and you have to think about which one to use when you're speaking. The basic syntax of Swahili is Svo when there is no object in fix Tambo. When they're cooler, this means elephants eat grass in the sentence. Ten Bolt means elephant y equals they. That's the subject prefix, not equals present tense marker. Kula equals eat and use equals grasp. So you can see that when we use a specific known as the subject, we still use the subject prefix attached to the verb.

Speaker 1:          10:33          Another example mean that that cooler, this means I love eating meat is the subject. Margaret meaning I not is the present tense marker. Pen De Equals love and cooler equals eating. And of course, that's s v O is Swahili, easy to learn. Well, the pronunciation is known for being very straightforward and the grammar is very logical, but it's also very different unless you've studied a Bantu language before, but now in class system and the verbal system with all of its affixes require some extra attention to learn. And for English speakers, the lack of immediately recognizable vocabulary might be a challenge, but if you happen to speak Arabic, then you will immediately recognize lots of Swahili. Vocabulary. Here are some examples at daddy comes from Arabic hot daughter, which means danger. Chat comes from Arabic Sephardic, which means travel, comes from Arabic Mahal, which means place. Taboo comes from the Arabic Kitab, which means book Buddy ed comes from the Arabic boded, which means cold and that's just a small sample.

Speaker 1:          11:31          There are lots of Arabic words in Swahili, although the pronunciation has adapted to fit into the Swahili phonological system. Swahili is a unique product of the history of the east African coast and the interaction of the local Bantu people with foreign traders from the Middle East and elsewhere. It is becoming more widely spoken and continues to grow as a Lingua Franca in east Africa. If you're planning on living or traveling in the region or if you just want to learn about Africa and some of its cultures than Swahili would be a great language to learn. So the question of the day, for people who have studied Swahili, what did you find challenging about it, and what did you find straightforward or simple about it and for proficient speakers of Swahili, how widely spoken is Swahili in your area? Is it mostly spoken as a second or third language or are there lots of native speakers as well?

Speaker 1:          12:18          Let us know in the comments down below. Now, for anyone who doesn't follow Lang, focus on twitter or on facebook or on Instagram, why not? My name is Lang. Focus on all of those different social media channels so you can have a look for me there and be sure to follow Lang Focus. I'd like to say thank you to all of my patrion supporters. Thank you for your continued support. You are very much appreciated. Even the people who just pledged $1 a month, that's all very helpful. So thank you for watching and have a nice day.