Language quiz
Here’s a recording of part of a news report in a mystery language. Can you guess or do you know which language it is?
May 10th, 2008 in
Language, Quiz questions
Here’s a recording of part of a news report in a mystery language. Can you guess or do you know which language it is?
Mongolian.
slovak spoken in slovakia?
As a native speaker of Slovak — it is most definitely not Slovak, Czech, Polish, Slovenian, Serbo-Croatian or Russian.
I’m still leaning towards Mongolian or maybe Kazakh.
Wait a minute – Mongolian was the subject of a language quiz only six weeks ago.
Today’s language seems to have some sort of Turkic vowel harmony and considering the frequency of the vowel “a” I shouldn’t be surprised, if it was Kazakh or even Karakalpak.
I’ve no idea what the language is but I’m struck by the contrast between the calmness of the voice and the astonishing speed.
I’ll second the guess for Kazakh.
(And the amazement at the speaker’s rate!)
Kazakh… I think… definitely turkic, but beyond that i haven’t the foggiest. I wish I could speak so quickly!
aaa …… whats that?
from the “im” endings I think it is turkic.
Uyghur?
It’s turkic. Probably – Kyrgyz.
Definitely Turkic, but that’s as precise as I can get without doing more.
I’m thinking Central Asia (rather than Turkish or Azerbaijan) and probably not Kazakh (which sounds more gutteral) or Turkmen (which has dental fricatives IIRC). So off the top of my head my guesses would center on Kirgiz or Uzbek (possibly Uighur)
Definitely a turkic language- One that actually has some words borrowed from Mongolian, it sounds to me here– Tuvan.
d.m.f.
turkic – azeri?
Makes me think of Turkish, but probably isn’t. So I suppose it will be turkic too, but I don’t know which language :)
I am revising my claim to Mongolia and Kazakhstan, and will agree with d.m.falk – Tuvan.
Definitely turkic, and I would agree that it’s most likely Kazakh.
The answer is Kyrgyz/Kirghiz (Кыргыз), which is spoken mainly in Kyrgyzstan and China. Well done to those who guessed correctly.
The recording comes from this site.
Just reporting that the first link in the previous comment doesn’t work.
Giovanni – the first link in that comment is working now.
It’s Uzbek! Probably from BBC World News. I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Uzbekistan. Wonderful people and what a great language with so many suffixes!