Bambara: A Niger-Congo language

As many of you know, France and West African countries have decided to invade Mali and push out Islamic militants responsible for the coup d’ état. Now is a good enough time to discuss Bambara, one of the largest indigenous languages of Mali.

As Mali was once a French colony, the official language of Mali is French. However about eighty percent of the population, 13 million people, speak Bambara.

The Bambara language is the mother tongue of the Bambara ethnic group, numbering about 2,700,000 people, but serves also as a lingua franca in Mali (it is estimated that about 80% of the population speaks it as a first or second language).

Linguistic Classification

Bambara is a Niger-Congo language. It is closely related to the languages Jula and Marka. Bambara belongs to a group of closely-related languages called Manding, within the larger Mandé group.

Bomara is an SOV language. This means: subject, object, verb usually appear in that order. If English were SOV, then "Sam oranges ate" would be an ordinary sentence, as opposed to the actual Standard English "Sam ate oranges".

Mandarin Chinese Progress January 2013

I have been following the input based learning system for Mandarin Chinese, and it is going along smoothly. All this time, not once have I picked up a single pen or piece of paper. Everything I have been learning in Chinese has been one hundred percent audio lessons.

Yesterday I listened to Chinese on the bus, the subway, and walking. When I started getting bored, I switched over to Spanish vocabulary. On my way home, I went back to Mandarin. Living Language lessons are different in that they go over sentences, nuts and bolts, then the sentences again with English translation. I have been slowly moving up in my Chinese abilities. I am understanding basic sentences, basic greetings, and able to recognize Chinese words in new sentences.

As I listen over and over to the tones of the language, they are slowly growing on me. I read that Chinese tones are one of the more difficult things for anglophones to acquire. I do not know how I have acquired them yet because I am still in the listening phase.

So the progress is going along slowly, but consistently. I am wondering when I should start practicing the writing system?

What alphabet is this?

Let the game begin with this image. It contains several alphabets, most of them ancient. You are looking at their numerical system only. (1-10, 1-200 etc.) This is a test to see if you can identify which ancient language it is by only their numbers. 

Leave your answers in the comment section. 

Skype Me Maybe

Many of my friends got together and made a great YouTube video, Skype Me Maybe. Benny did a fantastic job!.I really love how us language learners share our passion for something, connect, and enjoy what we do. I hope you enjoy the video as much as I did.

Dawdling along in Mandarin Playlists

Hello Amigos,

The Winter Holidays are here, and I wish I was shopping on fifty-seventh street in New York City.

I have been spending a lot more time indoors, and less time walking with the kids whilst listening to Chinese on my Ipod. This evening I thought it would be a good time to make a quick playlist for myself. I can watch the playlist on my television screen and on my notebook. It is a simple playlist of videos from my favorite linguist, Glossika.

I decided to embed the playlist below so that if you are also learning basic Chinese you can enjoy the videos as well.

Enjoy!

Six Ways to Chat with a Native Speaker

If you live in any metropolitan area, chances are you will be lucky enough to meet native speakers of your target language. Take advantage of this opportunity. I tend to be shy when I am speaking another language. It can be difficult breaking through that barrier, but trust me it will be worth the effort.

Start with the right attitude. If you have the right attitude the experience will be pleasurable. Native speakers tend to be happy that you are trying to speak their language. They can be very encouraging.

1. Be flexible about their correction of your pronunciation or grammar. I stopped worrying about making mistakes a long time ago. Enjoy yourself, and be grateful for their corrections. Smile and show that you are happy they corrected you.

中语 Many Languages of China

Chinese Language Map

Did you know that China has fifty six recognized ethnic groups? In order of population, this is the list of the 56 ethnic groups in China that are officially recognized by the government of the People's Republic of China. Members of several ethnic groups reside in Hong Kong and Macau, but due to the long separation from China, many of these ethnic groups are generally unknown to the Special Administrative Regions (of People's Republic of China) of Hong Kong and of Macau.

Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication containing statistics for 6,909 languages in the 16th edition, released in 2009. It gives the number of speakers, location, dialects, linguistic affiliations, availability of the Bible in the language, and so forth. According to Ethnologue, China has 292 living languages and 1 extinct language (Jurchen).

漢語（英语：the Chinese language(s)），又称中文（單指文字）、汉文、华文，其他名稱有唐文、中國語，唐話、中國話等^[1]，是属汉藏语系的分析语，具有声调。汉语的文字系统——汉字是一种意音文字，表意的同時也具一定的表音功能。漢語包含書面語以及口語兩部分，古代書面汉语称为文言文，现代书面汉语一般指使用現代標準漢語語法，詞彙的中文通行文体。目前全球有五分一人口使用漢語作為母語。現代漢語書面語高度統一，口語則有官話、粵語、吳語、湘語、贛語、客家語、閩語等七種主要漢語言。