"Mimi"
Translation:Me
103 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
It would be awesome if anyone could create a youtube pronunciation guide to go alongside the Duolingo lessons. I did some searching and I can find some words within the Duolingo lessons being pronounced, but not all of them. This is asking a lot, but it would be a wonderful/charitable contribution to the Swahili lessons on here.
https://incubator.duolingo.com/courses/sw/en/status
Apparently, a year has passed without any updates. I appreciate everyone's hard work and I really hope that the team will be able to create audio in the near future.
Well, it is the first African language to be added, so I think it's pretty fair in that sense. It's true that there were more people clamoring for Japanese and Mandarin Chinese, though. But of course, there were technical difficulties for those, which now seem to have been resolved :)
But for the moment I'm just excited about Swahili!
The most spoken language (except Arabic, French, English, Afrikaans, and Portuguese)
Number 1: Hausa =34M speakers
Yoruba= 28M
Oromo =26M
Fulani=25M
Amharic=22M
Igbo=18M
Malagasy=18M
Somali=16M
Luo=15M
Swahili = same than Luo, 9th rank.
official in Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, national language of Democratic Republic of Congo
Shona 14M
Shilha 14M
Chewa 11,5M
Akan 11M
Zulu 10M
Kinyarwanda 10M
Kirundi 9M
Mossi 8M
Xhosa 7M
Tigrinya 7M
Gikuyu 7M
Tshiluba 6M
Umbundu 6M
Kongo 5M
Lingala 5M
Tswana 5M
Northern Sotho 4M
Créole mauritien 1M
Ndebele 1M
Source: Wikipedia (I don't know if they have good source, since I can't see in their list languages like Wolof for instance, almost 5M speakers)
So nice to see these languages! Wolof and Bambara (between others) are the languages used by many musicians from West Africa. I also listen a lot of Malagasy music and trying to learn a little from this beautiful language (and some dialects).
Here some words with audio:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:Malagasy_terms_with_audio_links
Malagasy vocabulary (Swadesh list):
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Malagasy_Swadesh_list
I have seen this video about the particle or passive extension "wa":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewhyWxIhh0M
Now, there are these sentences:
"Mwalimu anafundisha Kiswahili." = The teacher is teaching Swahili.
"Kiswahili kinafundishwa na mwalimu." = Swahili is taught by the teacher.
I am guessing if the verb is also according to the noun class "ki-vi" in that case.
(I think this is also very advanced but I am in love with the Swahili affixes and agglutinative languages.) ;)
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Actually, if the subject is kijapani (class VII), the verb should be kinakuja. However, I'm not sure whether it actually might be more appropriate to say something like Somo la kijapani linakuja (where somo la kijapani would mean "subject of Japanese language")
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Ki- and li- (as well as a- and i-) are subject prefixes, indicating the noun class of the subject. -Na- is the present tense infix. If you wanted to use future tense, you'd have to replace -na- with -ta-.
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And now Chinese and Japanese are up and going with audio, but still no audio for Swahili.
Hakuna matata literally means "there are no problems".
Other Swahili words you probably know include jenga (to build), mamba (a type of snake), and of course safari (journey).
Half of the Lion King characters have Swahili names, too. Simba means lion, Nala means gift, Pumbaa means foolish or stupid, Sarabi (Simba's mother) means mirage, Shenzi (the female hyena) means barbaric or uncivilized, and Rafiki (the wise monkey) means friend.
You might also remember Rafiki singing "Asante sana, squash banana, wewe nugu, mimi hapana," which means "thank you very much, squash banana, you're a baboon, and I'm not." ("Squash banana" is not Swahili, by the way. Banana is ndizi.)
They're working on it. According to their latest update, they are hoping to have it available by the end of this month (so, very soon!).
TUJUE KISWAHILI The Kiswahili lesson you missed.
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password- Nywila.
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juice - sharubati.
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chips - vibanzi.
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PhD - uzamifu.
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Masters - uzamili.
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Degree - shahada.
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Diploma - stashahada.
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Certificate - Astashahada.
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keyboard - kicharazio.
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scanner - mdaki.
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Flash disk - diski mweko.
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Mouse - kiteuzi.
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Floppy disk - diski tepetevu.
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Computer virus - mtaliga.
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Distillation- ukenekaji.
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Evaporation - mvukizo.
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Synthesis- uoanishaji.
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Oesphagus- umio.
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Green house - kivungulio.
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Femur - fupaja.
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Germ cell - selizazi.
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Humus - mboji.
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Nector - mbochi.
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Nector - Ntwe.
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Nutrients - virutubisho.
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Appetizers - vihamuzi.
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ATM - Kiotomotela.
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Bussiness card - kadikazi.
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scratch card - kadihela.
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simcard - kadiwia/mkamimo.
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memory card - kadi sakima.
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micro wave - Tanuri ya miale.
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Laptop - kipakatarishi.
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power saw - msumeno oto.
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Duplicating machine - kirudufu.
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photocopier- kinukuzi.
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cocktail party - Tafrija mchapulo.
38.Air conditioner- Kiyoyozi.
- lift- kambarau
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What a nice surprise! Asante sana, Duo! I've been wishing for a Swahili course since 1994 ;)
Is it just my computer not working, or do they not have audio for the words? It'd be great to have that.