11 Fascinating Facts About the Swahili Language
With an estimated 50 to 100 million Swahili speakers worldwide, it’s time to broaden the scope – there’s more to it than Hakuna Matata – and dive deeper into this relatively unknown East African language. Here are 11 interesting facts on Swahili.
It’s a rich mix of languages
Swahili is predominantly a mix of local Bantu languages and Arabic. Decades of intensive trade along the East African coast resulted in this mix of cultures. Besides Arabic and Bantu, Swahili also has English, Persian, Portuguese, German and French influences due to trade contact.
It has roots in Arabic
Around 35% of the Swahili vocabulary comes from Arabic, but Swahili has also quite literally adopted words from English, such as: polisi – police, televisheni – television, redio – radio, and baiskeli – bicycle.
It has millions of speakers
People whose mother tongue is Swahili, about five to 15 million worldwide, are often referred to as Waswahili.
It developed as a coastal trading language
The word for the Swahili language is Kiswahili. Sawahili is the plural for the Arabic word sahil, which means ‘coast’. Ki- at the beginning means coastal language. This is because Swahili arose as a trade language along the coastline, and is also best spoken along the coast. In 1928, the Zanzibar dialect called Kiunguja was chosen as the standard Swahili.
It is spoken in many countries
Swahili is the lingua franca (a common language adopted between two non-native speakers) of the East African Union and is the official language of Tanzania (official language), Kenya (official language next to English) and of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is also widely spoken in Uganda and, in smaller numbers, in Burundi, Rwanda, North Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique.
It’s international in reach
Several international media outlets have various Swahili programmes, such as BBC Swahili.
It’s easy to learn
Thinking about learning an African language? Give Swahili a try. It’s the easiest African language for English speakers to learn, as it’s one of the few Sub-Saharan African languages without lexical tone, similar to English.
It developed as a coastal trading language
The word for the Swahili language is Kiswahili. Sawahili is the plural for the Arabic word sahil, which means ‘coast’. Ki- at the beginning means coastal language. This is because Swahili arose as a trade language along the coastline, and is also best spoken along the coast. In 1928, the Zanzibar dialect called Kiunguja was chosen as the standard Swahili.
It is spoken in many countries
Swahili is the lingua franca (a common language adopted between two non-native speakers) of the East African Union and is the official language of Tanzania (official language), Kenya (official language next to English) and of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is also widely spoken in Uganda and, in smaller numbers, in Burundi, Rwanda, North Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique.
It’s international in reach
Several international media outlets have various Swahili programmes, such as BBC Swahili.
It’s easy to learn
Thinking about learning an African language? Give Swahili a try. It’s the easiest African language for English speakers to learn, as it’s one of the few Sub-Saharan African languages without lexical tone, similar to English.
It’s been around for centuries
The earliest known documents of the Swahili language are letters written in Arabic script, written in 1711 in the region of Kilwa, present-day Tanzania. They are now preserved in the Historical Archives of Goa, India.
https://theculturetrip.com/africa/kenya ... -language/
Languages
Making Arabic compulsory
Pervez Hoodbhoy Published February 13, 2021
The writer is an Islamabad-based physicist and writer.
IN every school of Islamabad every child shall henceforth be compelled to study the Arabic language from Grade 1 to Grade 5. Thereafter he or she shall learn Arabic grammar from Grade 6 to Grade 12. By unanimous vote, that’s what the Senate of Pakistan has decided. Introduced on Feb 1, 2021 as a private member’s bill by Senator Javed Abbasi of the PML-N, the Compulsory Teaching of Arabic Language Bill, 2020, will become an act of parliament once approved by the National Assembly. Thereafter it is likely to be applied across the country.
Should we citizens celebrate or be worried? That depends upon whether desired outcomes can be attained. Let’s therefore see what reasons were given by our lawmakers for the bill, one that will deeply impact many generations to come.
First, the bill states that proficiency in Arabic will “broaden the employment and business opportunities for the citizens of Pakistan” in rich Arab countries. While attraction to Arab oil wealth is understandable and has long been pursued, this reason is weak. Jobs and businesses go to persons with specific skills or those who have deliverables to offer.
Forcing students to learn Arabic won’t make them virtuous but setting good examples of moral behaviour might.
Just look at who gets invited to GCC countries. Westerners having zero familiarity with Arabic but high expertise are most sought after. Indians are a distant second, getting only about 10 per cent of high-level jobs with the rest performing menial and unskilled construction tasks. Pakistanis stand still further below with only 3pc at higher levels. This is because of low professional and life skills. With the Pakistani schoolchild now to be burdened with learning yet another language, achievement levels will further deteriorate.
If the Pakistani job seeker could use his school-learned Arabic to communicate with Arabs, would it improve matters? This is unlikely. Graduates from Pakistani madressahs seeking to understand the Holy Quran spend their lives trying to master classical Arabic. And yet they have zero job prospects in the Middle East. Present enrolment in Arabic language courses and university degree programmes is therefore very low. In fact, after starting such programmes over 20 to 30 years ago, some universities later closed them down.
For the boy now in an Islamabad school compelled to learn classical Arabic, communication with Arabs in their Arabic will not be easy. In fact, the poor fellow will be quite at sea. Only modern versions of Arabic are spoken in various Arab countries, not classical Arabic. Imagine that a Pakistani lad trained in ye olde Englisch — the “proper English” of Shakespeare or the Canterbury Tales — was to land up in today’s England. He might be a source of merriment but getting a job would be tough.
Second, the bill claims that school-taught Arabic will enable students to understand the Holy Quran better and so become better Muslims. Are the bill’s sponsors not aware that, beginning with Persian in the 10th century, the Quran has undergone translation into all major languages? This was necessary because it is extremely difficult for non-Arabs to understand the Quran’s wonderfully rich and nuanced classical Arabic.
Many scholars have spent entire lives performing such monumental translations, knowing that words have meanings that subtly change with time. But even so, no two translations completely agree and sometimes different interpretations emerge. Given these difficulties, absorbing the contents of the Quran through an Urdu translation is surely much easier for a Pakistani school student.
Deeply puzzling, therefore, is the statement from the minister of state for parliamentary affairs: “You cannot understand the message of Allah, if you do not know Arabic.” If true, that massively downgrades most Muslims living on this planet. The entire Muslim population of Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Iran, or Turkey cannot be made to understand or speak Arabic. And what of those long dead Muslims who tried hard to follow the teachings of Islam but never learned — nor tried to learn — the Arabic language?
That knowing Arabic — any version — can make one a better person or create unity is a bizarre thought. If true, the Arab states would be standing together instead of several rushing to recognize Israel even as it gobbles up the last bits of Palestine. Has the Arabic language made Arab states beacons of moral integrity, parsimony, and high thinking? Are our senators claiming that today’s Arabs are paragons of virtue?
But truly, it would be wonderful if teaching Arabic to kids, and further jacking up the religious content of education, could change students for the better. Just imagine! Future Pakistani lawyers would not be rampaging goons who destroy court property and randomly attack patients in hospital emergency wards; our students would be reading books rather than noisily demonstrating for their “right to cheat”; our political leaders would not be looters and our generals would no longer have secret overseas business franchises.
While some chase such delusions, others nervously search for their civilizational roots in some faraway land — Saudi Arabia earlier and now Turkey. Thus quite a few are drawn to Arabic. But curiously, Arabs show no interest in reviving Arabic. Their new generations are hell-bent upon modernizing and moving towards English. Now for several decades, an energized Arab world has been luring American universities with large sums of money to open local campuses in GCC states.
Part of that investment is paying off. The success of Al-Amal, the UAE spacecraft that entered orbit around Mars some days ago, was officially celebrated as an Arab Muslim success. While one feels happy at this, it is really the triumph of Western technology harnessed by a few forward-looking Arabs who have learnt to speak the language of modern science. A thousand years ago that language was only Arabic. But in our epoch it is only English.
In forcing kids to learn Arabic, all those sitting in Pakistan’s Senate — with just a single exception — forgot that they are Pakistanis first and that Pakistan was made for Pakistanis. Rather than behave as snivelling cultural orphans seeking shelter in a rich uncle’s house, they need to take pride in the diversity and strength of the myriad local cultures and languages that make this land and its people.
The writer is an Islamabad-based physicist and writer.
Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2021
https://www.dawn.com/news/1607107/makin ... compulsory
Pervez Hoodbhoy Published February 13, 2021
The writer is an Islamabad-based physicist and writer.
IN every school of Islamabad every child shall henceforth be compelled to study the Arabic language from Grade 1 to Grade 5. Thereafter he or she shall learn Arabic grammar from Grade 6 to Grade 12. By unanimous vote, that’s what the Senate of Pakistan has decided. Introduced on Feb 1, 2021 as a private member’s bill by Senator Javed Abbasi of the PML-N, the Compulsory Teaching of Arabic Language Bill, 2020, will become an act of parliament once approved by the National Assembly. Thereafter it is likely to be applied across the country.
Should we citizens celebrate or be worried? That depends upon whether desired outcomes can be attained. Let’s therefore see what reasons were given by our lawmakers for the bill, one that will deeply impact many generations to come.
First, the bill states that proficiency in Arabic will “broaden the employment and business opportunities for the citizens of Pakistan” in rich Arab countries. While attraction to Arab oil wealth is understandable and has long been pursued, this reason is weak. Jobs and businesses go to persons with specific skills or those who have deliverables to offer.
Forcing students to learn Arabic won’t make them virtuous but setting good examples of moral behaviour might.
Just look at who gets invited to GCC countries. Westerners having zero familiarity with Arabic but high expertise are most sought after. Indians are a distant second, getting only about 10 per cent of high-level jobs with the rest performing menial and unskilled construction tasks. Pakistanis stand still further below with only 3pc at higher levels. This is because of low professional and life skills. With the Pakistani schoolchild now to be burdened with learning yet another language, achievement levels will further deteriorate.
If the Pakistani job seeker could use his school-learned Arabic to communicate with Arabs, would it improve matters? This is unlikely. Graduates from Pakistani madressahs seeking to understand the Holy Quran spend their lives trying to master classical Arabic. And yet they have zero job prospects in the Middle East. Present enrolment in Arabic language courses and university degree programmes is therefore very low. In fact, after starting such programmes over 20 to 30 years ago, some universities later closed them down.
For the boy now in an Islamabad school compelled to learn classical Arabic, communication with Arabs in their Arabic will not be easy. In fact, the poor fellow will be quite at sea. Only modern versions of Arabic are spoken in various Arab countries, not classical Arabic. Imagine that a Pakistani lad trained in ye olde Englisch — the “proper English” of Shakespeare or the Canterbury Tales — was to land up in today’s England. He might be a source of merriment but getting a job would be tough.
Second, the bill claims that school-taught Arabic will enable students to understand the Holy Quran better and so become better Muslims. Are the bill’s sponsors not aware that, beginning with Persian in the 10th century, the Quran has undergone translation into all major languages? This was necessary because it is extremely difficult for non-Arabs to understand the Quran’s wonderfully rich and nuanced classical Arabic.
Many scholars have spent entire lives performing such monumental translations, knowing that words have meanings that subtly change with time. But even so, no two translations completely agree and sometimes different interpretations emerge. Given these difficulties, absorbing the contents of the Quran through an Urdu translation is surely much easier for a Pakistani school student.
Deeply puzzling, therefore, is the statement from the minister of state for parliamentary affairs: “You cannot understand the message of Allah, if you do not know Arabic.” If true, that massively downgrades most Muslims living on this planet. The entire Muslim population of Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Iran, or Turkey cannot be made to understand or speak Arabic. And what of those long dead Muslims who tried hard to follow the teachings of Islam but never learned — nor tried to learn — the Arabic language?
That knowing Arabic — any version — can make one a better person or create unity is a bizarre thought. If true, the Arab states would be standing together instead of several rushing to recognize Israel even as it gobbles up the last bits of Palestine. Has the Arabic language made Arab states beacons of moral integrity, parsimony, and high thinking? Are our senators claiming that today’s Arabs are paragons of virtue?
But truly, it would be wonderful if teaching Arabic to kids, and further jacking up the religious content of education, could change students for the better. Just imagine! Future Pakistani lawyers would not be rampaging goons who destroy court property and randomly attack patients in hospital emergency wards; our students would be reading books rather than noisily demonstrating for their “right to cheat”; our political leaders would not be looters and our generals would no longer have secret overseas business franchises.
While some chase such delusions, others nervously search for their civilizational roots in some faraway land — Saudi Arabia earlier and now Turkey. Thus quite a few are drawn to Arabic. But curiously, Arabs show no interest in reviving Arabic. Their new generations are hell-bent upon modernizing and moving towards English. Now for several decades, an energized Arab world has been luring American universities with large sums of money to open local campuses in GCC states.
Part of that investment is paying off. The success of Al-Amal, the UAE spacecraft that entered orbit around Mars some days ago, was officially celebrated as an Arab Muslim success. While one feels happy at this, it is really the triumph of Western technology harnessed by a few forward-looking Arabs who have learnt to speak the language of modern science. A thousand years ago that language was only Arabic. But in our epoch it is only English.
In forcing kids to learn Arabic, all those sitting in Pakistan’s Senate — with just a single exception — forgot that they are Pakistanis first and that Pakistan was made for Pakistanis. Rather than behave as snivelling cultural orphans seeking shelter in a rich uncle’s house, they need to take pride in the diversity and strength of the myriad local cultures and languages that make this land and its people.
The writer is an Islamabad-based physicist and writer.
Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2021
https://www.dawn.com/news/1607107/makin ... compulsory
It might be appropriate to reflect on MSMS's speech: ARABIC UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE OF MUSLIM WORLDswamidada wrote:Making Arabic compulsory
Pervez Hoodbhoy Published February 13, 2021
An address by the late H.H.Sir Sultan Mohammed Shah Aga Khan at a session of Motamer al-Alam-al-Islamiyya
http://ismaili.net/sultan/5msms.html
kmaherali wrote:It might be appropriate to reflect on MSMS's speech: ARABIC UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE OF MUSLIM WORLDswamidada wrote:Making Arabic compulsory
Pervez Hoodbhoy Published February 13, 2021
An address by the late H.H.Sir Sultan Mohammed Shah Aga Khan at a session of Motamer al-Alam-al-Islamiyya
http://ismaili.net/sultan/5msms.html
When Muhammad Ali Jinnah declared Urdu should be the national language of Pakistan protests erupted in the provinces of west Pakistan as well in east Pakistan ( now Bangla Desh). Bengalis rejected Urdu as their national language, they demanded Bangla as their national language. In 1948, at Dhaka university, when Jinnah declared Urdu as national language, university students lead by Mujeebur Rahman (at that time a student leader) confronted Jinnah and there were violent protests. That was the first dangerous step towards the creation of Bangla Desh in my opinion. The language issue created mistrust among Pakistanis, and to overcome this and for the unity of Pakistan Imam Sultan Muhammad Shah delivered that speech at Moutammar Alam e Islamiyah presented by Mata Salamat. Imam Sultan Muhammad Shah was requested by then Prime minister Liaquat Ali Khan not to attend that session due to disturbance. That speech irritated the Urdu speaking class and they criticized Imam Sultan Muhammad Shah including Baba e Urdu Moulvi Abdul Haqq. At that time Arabic was the best solution for the stability and unity of Pakistan. All other main languages should have been adopted second languages including Urdu beside Arabic as national language. The misstep of early leadership caused secession of east Pakistan.
Google translation of the original article in Portuguese: https://the.ismaili/portugal/import%C3% ... ngl%C3%AAs
The importance of learning English
In an increasingly connected world and, taking our global Jamat as an example, we are pressured to learn new languages so that we can participate in global events or develop relationships and friendships that cross borders. Don't hesitate, accept the challenge!
english
Without learning a global language like English, we can feel separate from the world in the most literal sense. So why - despite our innate desire and need to expand our linguistic horizons - are we so hesitant to take up the challenge?
It is common to hear adults, or even young people, say that they are simply too old to learn a new language and that it is simply too difficult. And many - despite not wanting to admit it - hesitate because they don't feel comfortable making mistakes in front of other people. But is learning a language, as we get older, that hard?
The truth is that everyone can - and should - learn a new language, regardless of their age. Learning never really ends and, in many ways, our motivation to expand our linguistic horizons only grows with age.
Mawlana Hazar Imam has been reiterating the importance of learning new languages and, above all, knowing how to speak and read English, so that we have the best access to global knowledge.
Learning a new language is always a challenge, whatever the person's age. But for a senior it becomes something attractive because, in addition to occupying time well, it exercises the mind.
Engaging in a new language has several advantages, including:
Exercise the mind;
Feeling useful;
Occupying the time and making new friends - meeting people with the same interests;
Being able to travel to different places, where the language you have learned is spoken, which allows you not to be dependent on excursions or family members, giving you a feeling of fullness;
Allows you to get more active and excited.
If you're still not completely convinced, check out the testimonies of some students in Basic English and Intermediate English classes, by clicking on the following videos:
Testimony 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yBclevQEDg
Testimony 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOkGB1qH4LU
Testimony 3 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mA-eK46FRc
Testimony 4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPaHo7zLGFo
To access English classes, contact Elderly Care members:
Shelina Amad (Lisbon) - 968 385 002
Mehrunissa Bhanji (Seixal) - 933 146 764
The importance of learning English
In an increasingly connected world and, taking our global Jamat as an example, we are pressured to learn new languages so that we can participate in global events or develop relationships and friendships that cross borders. Don't hesitate, accept the challenge!
english
Without learning a global language like English, we can feel separate from the world in the most literal sense. So why - despite our innate desire and need to expand our linguistic horizons - are we so hesitant to take up the challenge?
It is common to hear adults, or even young people, say that they are simply too old to learn a new language and that it is simply too difficult. And many - despite not wanting to admit it - hesitate because they don't feel comfortable making mistakes in front of other people. But is learning a language, as we get older, that hard?
The truth is that everyone can - and should - learn a new language, regardless of their age. Learning never really ends and, in many ways, our motivation to expand our linguistic horizons only grows with age.
Mawlana Hazar Imam has been reiterating the importance of learning new languages and, above all, knowing how to speak and read English, so that we have the best access to global knowledge.
Learning a new language is always a challenge, whatever the person's age. But for a senior it becomes something attractive because, in addition to occupying time well, it exercises the mind.
Engaging in a new language has several advantages, including:
Exercise the mind;
Feeling useful;
Occupying the time and making new friends - meeting people with the same interests;
Being able to travel to different places, where the language you have learned is spoken, which allows you not to be dependent on excursions or family members, giving you a feeling of fullness;
Allows you to get more active and excited.
If you're still not completely convinced, check out the testimonies of some students in Basic English and Intermediate English classes, by clicking on the following videos:
Testimony 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yBclevQEDg
Testimony 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOkGB1qH4LU
Testimony 3 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mA-eK46FRc
Testimony 4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPaHo7zLGFo
To access English classes, contact Elderly Care members:
Shelina Amad (Lisbon) - 968 385 002
Mehrunissa Bhanji (Seixal) - 933 146 764
Google translation of the original article in Portuguese: https://the.ismaili/portugal/english4al ... m-connosco
English4All - Embark on this trip with us
Are you between 12 and 16 years old and would like to be fluent in the English language? Then this program is for you!
The Aga Khan Education Board (AKEB), in partnership with the Butterflies Learning Center, is launching the English4All program - English classes, taught at Cambridge, for young students aged between 12 and 16 years old. We will provide three levels of education:
- Young Learners - Starters, Movers and Flyers - introductory level to English - speaking, writing and everyday communication.
- Preliminary level (PET) - to develop fundamental language skills - general culture.
- First Certificate Level (FCE) - development of effective communication on various topics, with an emphasis on writing and analytical skills.
When?
From September 2021 to June 2022 - with the possibility of taking the Cambridge Exam at the end of the school year.
At where?
At the Ismaili Center, Lisbon*
Like?
You will take a scouting test at the beginning of September and then you will be integrated into the class that corresponds to your level of knowledge.
Tuition
English4All is the result of a partnership with the Butterflies Learning Centre, which allows these English classes to be made available at more affordable prices than those found in the market:
- Young Learners - Starters, Movers and Flyers: 47€/month/student
Preliminary Level (PET): 86€/month/student
- First Certificate Level (FCE): €140/month/student
- At the same time, you can also have access to a scholarship funded up to 50% by the Aga Khan Education Board (subject to the assessment of each student's financial situation and merit).
We want to help you develop functional English in an accessible way and also so that you can achieve a high degree of excellence both academically and professionally, as well as on a personal level.
Ready to sign up? Fill out this form with your parents: https://bit.ly/Formul árioEnglish4All
For more information, we are available at: akeb@cism.com.pt(link sends email)
*If the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic does not allow, these classes will be held online.
English4All - Embark on this trip with us
Are you between 12 and 16 years old and would like to be fluent in the English language? Then this program is for you!
The Aga Khan Education Board (AKEB), in partnership with the Butterflies Learning Center, is launching the English4All program - English classes, taught at Cambridge, for young students aged between 12 and 16 years old. We will provide three levels of education:
- Young Learners - Starters, Movers and Flyers - introductory level to English - speaking, writing and everyday communication.
- Preliminary level (PET) - to develop fundamental language skills - general culture.
- First Certificate Level (FCE) - development of effective communication on various topics, with an emphasis on writing and analytical skills.
When?
From September 2021 to June 2022 - with the possibility of taking the Cambridge Exam at the end of the school year.
At where?
At the Ismaili Center, Lisbon*
Like?
You will take a scouting test at the beginning of September and then you will be integrated into the class that corresponds to your level of knowledge.
Tuition
English4All is the result of a partnership with the Butterflies Learning Centre, which allows these English classes to be made available at more affordable prices than those found in the market:
- Young Learners - Starters, Movers and Flyers: 47€/month/student
Preliminary Level (PET): 86€/month/student
- First Certificate Level (FCE): €140/month/student
- At the same time, you can also have access to a scholarship funded up to 50% by the Aga Khan Education Board (subject to the assessment of each student's financial situation and merit).
We want to help you develop functional English in an accessible way and also so that you can achieve a high degree of excellence both academically and professionally, as well as on a personal level.
Ready to sign up? Fill out this form with your parents: https://bit.ly/Formul árioEnglish4All
For more information, we are available at: akeb@cism.com.pt(link sends email)
*If the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic does not allow, these classes will be held online.
Tut, a Language Used by Enslaved Africans, Is Resurfacing on Social Media
Rachel Pilgrim
Tue, August 17, 2021, 2:00 PM
For many of us who grew up reading I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou for our 9th grade English class, we remember Angelou trying to learn Tut, a complicated language used by enslaved Africans, with her friend Louise while the other kids were learning Pig Latin.
However, Tut has been the latest to enter the why-didn’t-we-learn-about-this-in-history-class forum as Black Americans have been rediscovering the lost dialect used amongst our enslaved ancestors.
According to NBC News, Tut was used in the 18th century to communicate covertly in front of slave masters. The words sound distinctively English, but require each letter of the English alphabet to have its own unique sound. For example, according to author Gloria McIlwain in the American Speech Journal, the letter i becomes “ay” and the letter h becomes “hash.” She says it’s how enslaved people in the South taught one another to read and write during a time when literacy was illegal.
African Americans are learning Tut and sharing videos, guides, and notes for speaking the language across different platforms, but some want to keep the language under wraps. Social media pages dedicated to teaching Tutnese have surfaced asking for the learning space to be exclusive to descendants of slavery, and the fear that Black people will have another cultural or social identifier coopted is a justified fear.
Tut isn’t the only language that Black Americans in the U.S. speak. Creole, in Louisiana, and Gullah, in South Carolina, are languages that have been culturally preserved amongst descendants of enslaved Africans and are still spoken today.
It is unsurprising that Tut or Tutnese was lost over the centuries; it’s unfortunately the fate that many contact languages meet over time. In a story for BBC, Nala H. Lee, a linguist at the National University of Singapore, says that when people judge contact languages, “People think of them as being less good or not real languages.” But in the last few months, Black Americans are ready to reclaim the voices of their ancestors one syllable at a time.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/lifesty ... 00776.html
Rachel Pilgrim
Tue, August 17, 2021, 2:00 PM
For many of us who grew up reading I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou for our 9th grade English class, we remember Angelou trying to learn Tut, a complicated language used by enslaved Africans, with her friend Louise while the other kids were learning Pig Latin.
However, Tut has been the latest to enter the why-didn’t-we-learn-about-this-in-history-class forum as Black Americans have been rediscovering the lost dialect used amongst our enslaved ancestors.
According to NBC News, Tut was used in the 18th century to communicate covertly in front of slave masters. The words sound distinctively English, but require each letter of the English alphabet to have its own unique sound. For example, according to author Gloria McIlwain in the American Speech Journal, the letter i becomes “ay” and the letter h becomes “hash.” She says it’s how enslaved people in the South taught one another to read and write during a time when literacy was illegal.
African Americans are learning Tut and sharing videos, guides, and notes for speaking the language across different platforms, but some want to keep the language under wraps. Social media pages dedicated to teaching Tutnese have surfaced asking for the learning space to be exclusive to descendants of slavery, and the fear that Black people will have another cultural or social identifier coopted is a justified fear.
Tut isn’t the only language that Black Americans in the U.S. speak. Creole, in Louisiana, and Gullah, in South Carolina, are languages that have been culturally preserved amongst descendants of enslaved Africans and are still spoken today.
It is unsurprising that Tut or Tutnese was lost over the centuries; it’s unfortunately the fate that many contact languages meet over time. In a story for BBC, Nala H. Lee, a linguist at the National University of Singapore, says that when people judge contact languages, “People think of them as being less good or not real languages.” But in the last few months, Black Americans are ready to reclaim the voices of their ancestors one syllable at a time.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/lifesty ... 00776.html
Re: Languages
They’re exquisite. They’re divine. They’re incomprehensible. Why?
Opera sounds better when you can understand the words
Author Headshot
By John McWhorter
I recently had the privilege to receive an honorary degree. The diploma is in Latin. I like that. My Latin is approximate, but even when I can’t read the words, the fact that diplomas are written in a different and antique language gives them an air of distinction, distance, gravitas.
Pondering that effect reminded me that some people feel the same way about how we encounter opera. I couldn’t agree less.
The debate over translation in opera is lively and ongoing, but it’s more relevant than ever today, when opera companies struggle to attract new audiences and digital distractions lure away even some devoted fans. Like the qwerty keyboard, sitting through a three-or-more-hour performance in a language we don’t understand is a peculiar cultural phenomenon we accept only because it’s often the only option we’re given. It’s happenstance. And it’s a big part of what keeps opera from reaching more people.
In the 1800s and well into the 1900s, it was routine in many countries to present operas in the language of the audience. The music critic Anthony Tommasini wrote, “Verdi would have found it absurd for a French audience to hear ‘Il Trovatore’ in Italian. Even in Salzburg and Vienna, Mozart’s operas were typically performed in German until World War II.” Wagner expected his works to be translated into French when they were performed in France.
I wish I regularly had the chance to experience them in my native language. In Act II of “Die Walküre” (“The Valkyrie”) the god Wotan solemnly recounts the “Ring” story and reflects on his fate for what can be 20 minutes of rumination. It is a pitiless challenge to theatrical momentum that wears me to a nubbin. (I once watched it sitting next to a very famous singer I will refrain from naming, who was so underwhelmed that he spent the whole section canoodling with the woman he had brought.) If the performance had been in English, at least the audience members would have been able to comprehend what they were struggling through.
America used to cherish opera in translation. An English version of Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” was a big hit in New York for season after season between 1819 and 1824 and played in French in New Orleans in 1823. But in the Gilded Age, opera caught on with the wealthy as a symbol of European sophistication, conditioning an idea that to really count, it had to be performed in the original language.
In 1961 the classical music critic Harold Schonberg sniffed, “The fact that the Paris Opera does Verdi in French, or the Berlin Staatsoper does Puccini in German, does not necessarily mean the procedure is right.” The arguments for these translations have “immoral aspects,” he wrote. “Instead of wanting to bring people up to the level of music, they are demanding that music be brought down to the level of the people. Their idea is to get people into the opera houses by offering inducements and bribery.”
Nevertheless, in the mid-20th century, European opera in English experienced a certain fashion on these shores. Especially cherished were the fresh and singable lyrics of Ruth and Thomas Martin. In their version of Mozart’s “Così Fan Tutte,” instead of the early passage that begins with “La mia Dorabella capace non è,” we got “To doubt Dorabella is simply absurd. Completely absurd. She’ll always be faithful and true to her word.’” That may not be identical to what its Italian librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte, wrote, but it’s exquisite.
To the extent that opera in translation acquired real traction here, the advent of supertitles, the simultaneous translations projected above the stage or on the backs of seats, wiped it out in the 1980s. They did spare singers from having to learn the same opera in more than one language. But with supertitles, you’re always peeking away from the action, reading when you’re supposed to be hearing and never — at least in my experience — feeling truly satisfied. Puccini didn’t write “Madama Butterfly” to be read.
Many opera fans object to translation on the grounds that composers set the music to the words carefully, according to the accent patterns and vowel colors of the language in question, in a way that translation can’t hope to reproduce. Others note, in particular, how ideally suited Italian, with its open vowels and buttery consonant clusters, happens to be for singing.
But the composers of yore had their works translated, despite both of these concerns, because they wanted audiences to understand what they were hearing.
I’m with them. It’s hard to imagine any English translation of “La Bohème” that would allow Mimi to introduce herself — on the seven opening notes of “Sì, mi chiamano Mimi” — as perfectly as she does in the Italian original. Yet to know what Mimi is saying line by line (and she says a good deal; she is deep) is a richer experience than hearing her singing mere syllables, no matter how pretty. As the conductor Mark Wigglesworth wrote in response to this question, “Few artistic experiences are more complete than understanding singers’ words at exactly the moment they are sung.”
Of course, operatic diction can make it difficult to understand even in your native language — but not harder than it is to understand a language you don’t speak. Plus I find that Anglophone singers can be quite good at getting English across in an operatic voice. My first opera was the Houston Grand Opera’s production of “Porgy and Bess” when it came to Philadelphia when I was 10. I’m sure I missed the occasional word or sentence, but the singers did their job with the diction, and I had no trouble overall. (I will never forget Clamma Dale’s fierce and eternal Bess and Wilma Shakesnider’s Serena, who made me realize in one song that life is complicated.)
Singing in a language that you speak as a native and that the audience understands also makes for better acting. In Vienna in the 1950s, performances of Mozart’s operas shifted from German to the original Italian, largely because of the influence of the maestro Herbert von Karajan. The famed soprano Phyllis Curtin recounted the effect on two seasoned German-speaking actors: “After we switched to Italian, all of a sudden, because the Viennese audience didn’t understand them in the same way, these two consummate artists started acting like the Marx Brothers.”
As they used to say, I’m hip. A quarter-century ago, I flirted with becoming an opera singer, and in a summer program I played Antonio the gardener in “The Marriage of Figaro.” A friend who had seen me doing my yeomanly thing in some local productions of musicals and plays said that as Antonio, I hadn’t really connected. I said, “Yeah, he speaks Italian.” Around the same time, I used “O Isis und Osiris” from “The Magic Flute” as an audition and performance song, alternating between the English (by Andrew Porter) and the German. The German version was in no way superior.
After a while, I let go of singing opera. The main reason was that despite my exposure to foreign languages, I never could truly understand why we were singing in Italian, French and German. It seemed like something we wouldn’t do if we could roll the tape back and start again.
The lyricist and librettist Oscar Hammerstein II said he wrote a Black English version of Georges Bizet’s “Carmen,” “Carmen Jones,” because “listening to people sing words you didn’t understand wasn’t much fun.” I highly recommend “Carmen Jones” as a starter. Try the film and then the EMI recording with Wilhelmenia Fernandez for a more complete version of the score.
The Metropolitan Opera is seriously ailing financially, and its attempts to shift to more contemporary programming do not seem to be solving the problem. A suggestion: It should try having all foreign-language operas performed in English and advertising the change. This season “Aida,” “Fidelio,” “Tosca,” “La Bohème,” “The Barber of Seville,” “Tales of Hoffmann,” “Rigoletto” and “Salome” all should have been in the language that the greatest portion of the audience in New York speaks and understands.
The Opera Theater of St. Louis and the English National Opera are among the companies that saw the light on this long ago. If the Met gets on board, it will surely encounter Schonberg-type naysayers. But a little controversy would only stir up curiosity — and ticket sales. Tradition is fine but should never be an end in its own right. And even the greatest composers agreed: Opera is better when you can understand it.
NYTimes
Opera sounds better when you can understand the words
Author Headshot
By John McWhorter
I recently had the privilege to receive an honorary degree. The diploma is in Latin. I like that. My Latin is approximate, but even when I can’t read the words, the fact that diplomas are written in a different and antique language gives them an air of distinction, distance, gravitas.
Pondering that effect reminded me that some people feel the same way about how we encounter opera. I couldn’t agree less.
The debate over translation in opera is lively and ongoing, but it’s more relevant than ever today, when opera companies struggle to attract new audiences and digital distractions lure away even some devoted fans. Like the qwerty keyboard, sitting through a three-or-more-hour performance in a language we don’t understand is a peculiar cultural phenomenon we accept only because it’s often the only option we’re given. It’s happenstance. And it’s a big part of what keeps opera from reaching more people.
In the 1800s and well into the 1900s, it was routine in many countries to present operas in the language of the audience. The music critic Anthony Tommasini wrote, “Verdi would have found it absurd for a French audience to hear ‘Il Trovatore’ in Italian. Even in Salzburg and Vienna, Mozart’s operas were typically performed in German until World War II.” Wagner expected his works to be translated into French when they were performed in France.
I wish I regularly had the chance to experience them in my native language. In Act II of “Die Walküre” (“The Valkyrie”) the god Wotan solemnly recounts the “Ring” story and reflects on his fate for what can be 20 minutes of rumination. It is a pitiless challenge to theatrical momentum that wears me to a nubbin. (I once watched it sitting next to a very famous singer I will refrain from naming, who was so underwhelmed that he spent the whole section canoodling with the woman he had brought.) If the performance had been in English, at least the audience members would have been able to comprehend what they were struggling through.
America used to cherish opera in translation. An English version of Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” was a big hit in New York for season after season between 1819 and 1824 and played in French in New Orleans in 1823. But in the Gilded Age, opera caught on with the wealthy as a symbol of European sophistication, conditioning an idea that to really count, it had to be performed in the original language.
In 1961 the classical music critic Harold Schonberg sniffed, “The fact that the Paris Opera does Verdi in French, or the Berlin Staatsoper does Puccini in German, does not necessarily mean the procedure is right.” The arguments for these translations have “immoral aspects,” he wrote. “Instead of wanting to bring people up to the level of music, they are demanding that music be brought down to the level of the people. Their idea is to get people into the opera houses by offering inducements and bribery.”
Nevertheless, in the mid-20th century, European opera in English experienced a certain fashion on these shores. Especially cherished were the fresh and singable lyrics of Ruth and Thomas Martin. In their version of Mozart’s “Così Fan Tutte,” instead of the early passage that begins with “La mia Dorabella capace non è,” we got “To doubt Dorabella is simply absurd. Completely absurd. She’ll always be faithful and true to her word.’” That may not be identical to what its Italian librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte, wrote, but it’s exquisite.
To the extent that opera in translation acquired real traction here, the advent of supertitles, the simultaneous translations projected above the stage or on the backs of seats, wiped it out in the 1980s. They did spare singers from having to learn the same opera in more than one language. But with supertitles, you’re always peeking away from the action, reading when you’re supposed to be hearing and never — at least in my experience — feeling truly satisfied. Puccini didn’t write “Madama Butterfly” to be read.
Many opera fans object to translation on the grounds that composers set the music to the words carefully, according to the accent patterns and vowel colors of the language in question, in a way that translation can’t hope to reproduce. Others note, in particular, how ideally suited Italian, with its open vowels and buttery consonant clusters, happens to be for singing.
But the composers of yore had their works translated, despite both of these concerns, because they wanted audiences to understand what they were hearing.
I’m with them. It’s hard to imagine any English translation of “La Bohème” that would allow Mimi to introduce herself — on the seven opening notes of “Sì, mi chiamano Mimi” — as perfectly as she does in the Italian original. Yet to know what Mimi is saying line by line (and she says a good deal; she is deep) is a richer experience than hearing her singing mere syllables, no matter how pretty. As the conductor Mark Wigglesworth wrote in response to this question, “Few artistic experiences are more complete than understanding singers’ words at exactly the moment they are sung.”
Of course, operatic diction can make it difficult to understand even in your native language — but not harder than it is to understand a language you don’t speak. Plus I find that Anglophone singers can be quite good at getting English across in an operatic voice. My first opera was the Houston Grand Opera’s production of “Porgy and Bess” when it came to Philadelphia when I was 10. I’m sure I missed the occasional word or sentence, but the singers did their job with the diction, and I had no trouble overall. (I will never forget Clamma Dale’s fierce and eternal Bess and Wilma Shakesnider’s Serena, who made me realize in one song that life is complicated.)
Singing in a language that you speak as a native and that the audience understands also makes for better acting. In Vienna in the 1950s, performances of Mozart’s operas shifted from German to the original Italian, largely because of the influence of the maestro Herbert von Karajan. The famed soprano Phyllis Curtin recounted the effect on two seasoned German-speaking actors: “After we switched to Italian, all of a sudden, because the Viennese audience didn’t understand them in the same way, these two consummate artists started acting like the Marx Brothers.”
As they used to say, I’m hip. A quarter-century ago, I flirted with becoming an opera singer, and in a summer program I played Antonio the gardener in “The Marriage of Figaro.” A friend who had seen me doing my yeomanly thing in some local productions of musicals and plays said that as Antonio, I hadn’t really connected. I said, “Yeah, he speaks Italian.” Around the same time, I used “O Isis und Osiris” from “The Magic Flute” as an audition and performance song, alternating between the English (by Andrew Porter) and the German. The German version was in no way superior.
After a while, I let go of singing opera. The main reason was that despite my exposure to foreign languages, I never could truly understand why we were singing in Italian, French and German. It seemed like something we wouldn’t do if we could roll the tape back and start again.
The lyricist and librettist Oscar Hammerstein II said he wrote a Black English version of Georges Bizet’s “Carmen,” “Carmen Jones,” because “listening to people sing words you didn’t understand wasn’t much fun.” I highly recommend “Carmen Jones” as a starter. Try the film and then the EMI recording with Wilhelmenia Fernandez for a more complete version of the score.
The Metropolitan Opera is seriously ailing financially, and its attempts to shift to more contemporary programming do not seem to be solving the problem. A suggestion: It should try having all foreign-language operas performed in English and advertising the change. This season “Aida,” “Fidelio,” “Tosca,” “La Bohème,” “The Barber of Seville,” “Tales of Hoffmann,” “Rigoletto” and “Salome” all should have been in the language that the greatest portion of the audience in New York speaks and understands.
The Opera Theater of St. Louis and the English National Opera are among the companies that saw the light on this long ago. If the Met gets on board, it will surely encounter Schonberg-type naysayers. But a little controversy would only stir up curiosity — and ticket sales. Tradition is fine but should never be an end in its own right. And even the greatest composers agreed: Opera is better when you can understand it.
NYTimes