Can you identify the language and where it’s spoken?
17 thoughts on “Language quiz”
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:
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.
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.