I’m at a loss here. I hear words similar to Spanish, but that’s all.

At first I thought it was an indigenous Amerindian language from Latin America, but now I think it might be Chavacano, from Zamboanga Phillipines.

Just a guess.

Quechua? (though what I hear doesn’t quite match what I read about its phonology on wikipedia)

I have no idea what the language is, and another interesting question is what is going on in this clip. Sounds to me perhaps like a teacher disciplining some students, or perhaps some religious ceremony or motivational speech.

Any ideas?

hmmm something Asian… apparently it is a lesson in the language and phonology.

It’s not Quechua. Once again, I managed to Google up the actual clip Simon included here … I guess since I found the original source, it would not be fair to give it away now …

Hint: The speaker is teaching a script, and saying its name several times. If you google that, then the first hit is the actual recording.

(It’s always a bit disappointing to find the original recordings :( it’s a lot more fun to find a different recording in the same language, compare it, and still have a little doubt if my guess is correct.)

I think it’s any American Indian language sounds Spanish because there is it spoken too. But it’s possible that it’s Romance language because I heard the word “saber” (saver?) what means “know”.

I think the script is Varang Kshiti since the speaker mentions it several times. Therefore the language must be Ho which is written in the Varang Kshiti script

I hear many words related to Hindi that have to do with writing (lipi, likha) so it might be an Indo-Aryan language? The phonology is also similar. However, it also sounds almost Dravidian in phonology.

I heard “Maithili”? No clue.

And yup! Varang Kshiti it is, confirming my Indian / loanword idea and agreeing with the repetition of the script name.

er, so the language is Ho.

Ha! I woke up too late out here in Canada! I detected him talking about “Varang Kshiti lipi” on my second run through, before getting to the comments.

I checked Varang Kshiti on the main site and wow! It seems whoever invented it based it directly on Brahmi from 2300 years ago, with a few modifications.

Apparently it was invented in the 1950s, a time when literature about Brahmi script was readily available:

http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/langhotspots/Ho/alphabet.html

The answer is Ho, a Munda language spoken mainly in the Indian States of Jharkhand, Orissa, and West Bengal, and also in Bangladesh.

The recording comes from a video which introduces the Warang Chiti / Varang Kshiti alphabet. A transcript and translation (PDF) is also available [source].

Definitely a romance language, similar to Spanish but not Spanish. I’ll go with Catalan.