"Ahéheeʼ shí nalí asdzaan"

Translation: Thank you, paternal grandmother

[CodyPlanke]

How the heck do you pronounce asdzaan

[JeremiahB.11]

The phonemes bend, asd would become similar to "odd" so a--d.

Dzaan sound would be similar to English sounding "son" with a zz sound attached. Try "zon".

So "a-od, zon"

Hope that helps.

[Stephen898348]

When I hear the audio, the woman pronounced it more like asaan.

[Will40427]

Pretty sure you can just say "nalì" for paternal grandmother.

[QuanMarcus]

Can u put a voice thing so they can pronounce the words? That would be very helpful.

[JeyCas2]

Can't wait for them to do that! Although it might be a bit difficult when compared with even Guaraní the other Native-American language, which has many more speakers. I mean not everyone can be a good voice actor, some people just have a good radio voice but I do know that there are Navajo radio stations wonder if they'll go there to get their voice samples?

[JeyCas2]

Weird construction. I mean it may make sense in Navajo, but in English no one would care whether one's grandma or grandpa is their maternal or paternal grandparent.

[Will40427]

It makes a big difference in Navajo. You have a completely different relationship with your mom’s family than with your dad’s.

You’re not really going to be able to learn the language without learning the culture.

[JeyCas2]

Oh I understand that, is just that the English construction is very clunky! That's my main complain, I understand that all languages have different kinship systems, but it shows that English and Navajo don't really match here because although possible to say it, it just doesn't seem right to say “that's my paternal grandmother and that's my maternal grandfather”, unless someone really needs to know the difference!

Hey, do you know where I could find the place to suggest language for Duolingo to do next? Or do they decide that themselves?

[Rewm]

This is for learning purposes mostly. If you do a "proper" translation, it could be just "Thank you, grandmother."

But you need to learn that Navajo has two different expressions. Many other languages do as well, Serbian for example makes a difference between brother's wife and husband's sister - in English they're both sisters-in-law.

[744Yd73m]

This is similar to Mandarin where characters for your family members can be very different depending on whether the person is related to you by marriage, which side of the family, or whether they have children. In comparison, this is not as complicated.

[Ramona106110]

I wish I could learn just for speaking and listening. The writing exercises seem so arbitrary. I really don't care about the spelling and punctuation.

[GPx9t4]

Que veulent dire séparément
"Shi", "Nali" et "asdzaan"?

[MariannaT.1]

Navajoan "Shi" doit montrer "de moi" (par exemple, "ni" sera "de toi"), et "nalí" doit être "grand maman".
J'ai trouvé quelques vidéos sur Navajo en YouTube, et on peut trouver des explications de grammaire et de la construction de mots là aussi.
Malheureusement ils son en Anglais (et Navajo), pour ceux qui viven en États-Unis.

[copperhead1802]

Everyone remember:
Paternal grandmother: shí nali asdzaan

Maternal grandmother: shimasaní