#rare languages

So you want to learn a minority language with little resources? No probl...

Salut tot lo monde! Qu’es l’òra d’aprendre de l’occitan!

Cette semaine, on va garder les choses simples avec les salutations en occitan! Si vous avez de l'expérience avec le français (donc oui si vous pouvez lire ça), c’est pas très différent. On y va!

(This week, we’re gonna keep it simple with greetings in Occitan! If you have some experience with French, it’s not too different! Let’s get started!)

VA= Vivares | LD= Lengadocian | FR= Francais | EN= English

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Per commancar una conversacion | To start a conversation

(VA / LD) Bonjourn - Bòn ser!/Bòn vespre [bunʤur] - [b’un s’e]/[b’un v’ɛspɾe]

(FR) Bonjour - Bonsoir | (EN) Hello / Good morning/evening

(VA / LD) Salut [sal’yt]

(FR) Salut | (EN) Hey

C’est simple, oui? Continuons.

(It’s easy, right? Let’s keep going.)

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Per demandar la condicion de quauqu’un | To ask someone’s condition

(VA) Coma vas? [k’umo va] | (LD) Cossí  va? [kus’i va]

(FR) Comment vas-tu? | (EN) How are you?

(VA) Coma anètz? [k’umo anɛ] | Cossí anatz [kus’i ana]

(FR) Comment allez-vous? | (EN) How are you?

En occitan, a l’instar de français, il y a une différence de conjugaison du deuxième personne, soit tutoyer soit vouvoyer. Mais c’est pas obligatoire d’utiliser les pronoms, que les bonnes conjugaisons. Le verbe qu’on utilise ici est ANAR, un mot apparenté du verbe ALLER.

(In Occitan, like in French, there is a difference in conjugation of the second person, either informal singular [friends, family, casual social equals] or formal singular [strangers, professional colleagues, formal social equals]/ plural. But it is not necessary to use pronouns in occitan, just the right conjugations. The verb we’re using here is ANAR, which means “to go”)

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Deuxième partie du leçon sortira la semaine prochaine!

(Second part of the lesson will be posted next week!)

Josca mai!

The Oksapmin people of New Guinea have a base-27 counting system. The words for numbers are the words for the 27 body parts they use for counting, starting at the thumb of one hand, going up to the nose, then down the other side of the body to the pinky of the other hand, as shown in the drawing. 'One' is tip^na (thumb), 6 is dopa (wrist), 12 is nata (ear), 16 is tan-nata (ear on the other side), all the way to 27, or tan-h^th^ta (pinky on the other side).