Beosweyne learns more Zulu in 2023

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dEhiN
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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jan 16, 2022 8:20 pm

Beosweyne wrote:Oops I just realised what I posted was not a harmless story but an ancient curse :oops: Please check your immediate surroundings for any adult Nile crocodiles that might have materialised (but the little ones are cute and you can pet them.)

@księżycowy shared this on a Discord group I'm in with him: https://soranews24.com/2022/01/16/japanese-company-engineers-soft-toys-that-will-nibble-your-finger-for-folks-who-are-into-that/amp/. They need to now make one as a baby Nile crocodile. After all, a baby croc chomping on your finger can't hurt.
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Beosweyne
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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby Beosweyne » Thu Sep 15, 2022 12:05 pm

IsiZulu is what I am actively studying at present. In mid-July I picked up Say It In Zulu from where I left off last year. Since then I have been spending an hour or more each day, reading the lessons and doing the audio drills. I reached lesson 36 (of 52), but as of Thursday last week I have been unable to progress further due to events in far-away London: you see the course book which is hosted at SOAS became inaccessible when their network went down. The person I contacted yesterday said that they were still working on it. Still not a great loss for me, as there is much to revise from the earlier lessons.

My Arabic and French are hibernating this year. I do maintain my other languages to various degrees:

Afrikaans: Intensively reading Nuwe Geskiedenis van Suid-Afrika, looking up every unknown word. Yesterday it took me half an hour to read ~700 words, 9 of which I hadn't seen before (e.g. 'prysgee' - abandon, 'saai en maai' - sow & reap, 'wingerd' - vineyard), and a comparable number I had seen but forgotten (e.g. 'aantyging' - allegation, 'strooptog' - invasion).

Ancient Greek: Translating the Odyssey, now at line II.82. Reading a translation of Saint-Exupéry's Little Prince, also passages from the anthology in Greek Beyond GCSE.

Latin: I finally exhumedtook out of a dusty drawer my NaNoWriMo 2018 manuscript. Thanks to the long interval I am now able to look at it with greater detachment and not feel embarrassed to death. My Imperium Cornicum (Empire of Crows) is a teen adventure story with some supernatural elements, set in ancient Roman times. I am not sure what to do for NaNoWriMo this year, but one option is to write a second draft of Imperium. Of course prior to that I would need to go over the first draft carefully.

Middle Egyptian: Re-reading Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, now at line 14.



And unrelated to all that... I found this 'Multilingual Soccer Terminology List' from a South African government department in which all its official languages are represented. Some of these circumlocutions for 'indirect free kick' strike me as a little impractical :mrgreen:

Afrikaans: indirekte vryskop
IsiZulu: ukususa ibhola elikhululekile ngaphambi kokuthi lingene emapalini
IsiXhosa: ibhola yesohlwayo emayingadlalwa ngumntu omnye
Siswati: makhahlelwa lokungenani ngulababili
IsiNdebele: umrarhosimahla ongakanqophi
Setswana: thago e e sa tlhamalalang
Sepedi: thagothwi ya go kgongwa ke dibapadi tše pedi goba go feta pele e leba dinong
Sesotho: thaho e sa tobang
Tshivenḓa: thaho i sa tendelwi u livha mapalani thwii
Xitsonga: ndzahonkankongomo
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Learn More Zulu: 28 / 468 (p. 28/468)

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Beosweyne
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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby Beosweyne » Tue Sep 27, 2022 9:42 pm

Zulu

Joy of joys! Today the School of Oriental & African Studies has restored connectivity to its digital archives, and that means I can finally progress to lesson 36 of Say It In Zulu.

Over the last 2 and a half weeks I made good use of the unexpected network downtime by reviewing lessons 1-35, some of them more than once. All of that repetition has helped me to see a bigger picture of isiZulu grammar, something I found hard to do previously because of the way topics are scattered across lessons. My active vocabulary is still miniscule, 50 words at best. The audio drills in S.I.I.Z. use and re-use words from a fairly small lexicon. So vocabulary is not the course's strong point, but the grammar is presented clearly enough, if a bit disorganised.

The main reason I have become so attached to S.I.I.Z is because of its focus on phonology and especially the tone system. In the textbook every occurrence of every word is marked for tone, and even syllabic length and stress are marked in cases where those deviate from their usual pattern. The authors have come up with an elaborate model of Zulu tones but their presentation of it was too technical for me to grasp during the first read-through. Now I am starting to find some of the rules less intimidating, such as this one from lesson 23 regarding the negative past tense (expressions like 'I did not do' and similar):
past-negative.png

That's interesting because one of my favourite songs in isiZulu (actually Zu/En bilingual) is Asimbonanga, meaning 'we have not seen him', by Johnny Clegg & Savuka. The title contains the verb stem -bona ('see') joined with the negative past tense suffix -anga. Well, since the textbook says -bona is a type C verb, the 2nd line of the above rule must apply, and so I'd expect to hear all syllables pitched evenly except for a higher tone on the penultimate. I should give it another listen to make sure:



Afrikaans

Still intensively reading a page a day of Nuwe Geskiedenis van Suid-Afrika. I read ~6800 words in the last 10 days. I needed to look up 76 new words including 'verraad' - treason, 'betreur' - regret, 'namate' - in proportion to, 'verskaffer' - supplier.

I've reached the midpoint of Chapter 2, which is about the Cape colony set up by the Dutch East India Company in the middle of the 17th century. At first it was only intended to be a resupply station for the company's ships en route to Asia. But as more and more Dutch settlers arrived, and slaves were brought in from the surrounding areas and from Asia, the total population grew to 1000 within 50 years. The first non-Dutch settlers were Huguenot refugees from France, whom the administrators ordered to learn Dutch and assimilate, so eventually 'teen 1750 kon niemand jonger as 40 nog Frans praat nie.'


Ancient Greek

Just reading various things at a leisurely pace. Odyssey: now at II.123 where Antinous is going full chutzpah and pointing the finger of blame at poor Penelope for Telemachus' woes. Little Prince: reached p. 38 where the rose's continual demands and attention-seeking are getting tiresome for the kid. Miscellaneous: Thucydides, Peloponnesian War I.126 on the sacrilege committed by some forefathers of Pericles.


Middle Egyptian

In low level maintenance mode. Re-reading The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, now at line 115 where our terrified hero is reassured by the giant snake that he has nothing to fear.
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Learn More Zulu: 28 / 468 (p. 28/468)

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Beosweyne
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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby Beosweyne » Fri Oct 07, 2022 7:48 pm

Studying isiZulu

Say It In Zulu lesson 40 is unusual in that it is mostly just one long conversation. Two men meet and one of them tells the other about his kids' progress at school and the problems he faces on his farm. The recording is 10 minutes long and they speak at natural speed.

I found out some colourful ways of asking someone where they live. 1) Nakhephi?, literally 'Where did you (-plural) build?', as if meaning to ask 'Where has your family built its house?' 2) Uphuza muphi umfula?, lit. 'Which river do you drink?', implying 'At which river bank do you draw water for your house?'. Because no one sensible would choose to live far from a river :mrgreen:

On Twitter I found a Zulu translation of one of Sappho's poems. Granted the poem itself is far beyond my current level, but to my credit I managed to understand the title line :mrgreen:

Reading Afrikaans, Ancient Greek & Middle Egyptian

1. Nuwe Geskiedenis van Suid-Afrika (af): in the last 10 days I read another 7 pages. As usual I kept count of known vs unknown words, and this time my comprehension turned out to be a tiny fraction short of 99%.

It seems that when the Dutch first arrived they were reliant on the Khoi-Khoi (indigenous people of the western regions) for their food supply, so in order to communicate and trade they recruited individual Khoi-Khoi who could learn Dutch and act as interpreters and go-betweens. I found no mention of the reverse, i.e. Dutch colonists learning any Khoi-Khoi language. Anyway, when the colony began to expand there was conflict over grazing land, and a war ensued in which the Khoi-Khoi were led by Doman, one of those very same interpreters.

2. Odyssey (anc. gr): now translating line II.161. Finally, some divine intervention comes in the form of a pair of eagles, birds of omen from Zeus. Prior to this the gods had kept away for a while, from the time Athena took to the skies around line I.320.

3. Little Prince (anc. gr): I'm about halfway through. The βασιλείδιον touches down on the fourth planet of his tour, where he finds a businessman tallying up some obscenely large number.

Not long ago I read the Latin translation, so although many words here are new to me, I can still make a good guess at their meaning. This Greek translation provides monolingual definitions for the rarer words, but my general vocabulary must be poor because I have trouble even understanding the definitions.

4. Greek Beyond GCSE (anc. gr): finished Peloponnesian Wars I.126-7. I failed to recognise a 'οὐ τοσοῦτον ... ὅσον ...' construction (not so much ... as much as ...), and only realised what I missed after checking a translation. The next passage in the anthology will be from Demosthenes.

5. Shipwrecked Sailor (mid. eg): up to line 149. The reason for the serpent-lord's initial paranoia becomes clear: his entire family was once vapourised in a meteor strike. Now he foretells that a ship will come to rescue the stranded sailor, and out of gratitude the sailor promises to send him the finest presents Egypt has to offer.
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Learn More Zulu: 28 / 468 (p. 28/468)

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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby Beosweyne » Sat Oct 29, 2022 9:57 am

I have completed Say It In Zulu ! While it's true I can't say much in Zulu, I think I have gained a good foundation to build on in the coming months. SIIZ held my interest well enough that I was willing to put in 100 hours to reach the end. Looking back I seem to have covered the material in 3 phases:

1. Lessons 1-6: 18 hours of study in 11 weeks (Dec. 2020 to Feb. 2021)
2. Lessons 7-11: 15 hours of study in 17 weeks (Jun. 2021 to Sep. 2021)
3. Lessons 12-52: 65 hours of study in 14 weeks (Jul. to Oct. 2022)

My slow start was mainly due to Zulu being a low priority interest in 2021. I also remember feeling overwhelmed by the detailed presentation of the tone system that they somehow squeezed into the early lessons. I gave it up for a year. I returned to it recently with renewed interest and willingness to spend more time, and that seemed to do the trick.


Missing audio

It appears likely that the audio tapes for lessons 43 to 52 were never digitised. It's a pity because the final chapters of the book contain transcripts of lengthy conversations, interviews and folktales, but I could only guess at how native speakers would read them.

Some of the missing recordings seem to be available online at the British Library's sound archive, as part of the David Rycroft collection (he's the main author of SIIZ). E.g. the title of this recording matches a folk song in lesson 46; and possibly this interview is the one covered in lessons 51 and 52. None of which would do me any good, sadly, because the BL just shows me this notice: 'Sorry, this item is accessible for UK Higher Education and Further Education institutions only.' :(


The best language manuals

It's often said that the best course is the one you go on to finish. Following my latest achievement, I can update this ranking of books I've finished:

1. Desessard. Assimil - Le Latin sans peine
2. Orberg. Familia Romana & Exercitia
3. Guglielmi. Assimil - Le Grec ancien
4. Rycroft & Ngcobo. Say It In Zulu
5. Hoch. Middle Egyptian Grammar
6. Taylor. Greek to GCSE 1 & 2
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Learn More Zulu: 28 / 468 (p. 28/468)

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Re: Beosweyne's assorted A1s and A2s

Postby Beosweyne » Mon Oct 31, 2022 6:47 am

As usual I am going to enter NaNoWriMo in November and treat it as a Latin output challenge. I have been searching for story ideas that could potentially inspire me to write 50,000 words. I considered making a second draft of an earlier NaNoWriMo entry, but having read the first draft I felt there was too much work left to do. Finally I settled on a very different plan: translation! Strictly speaking NaNoWriMo is for writing original fiction, but the event also encourages non-fiction, translations, poetry, etc. from 'rebels' like me.

I will translate a novel I read long ago, Abraham Merritt's Moon Pool. Merritt was a pioneering author of fantasy and science fiction from the pulp era. This particular work is an escapist, all-action story set in a high-tech subterranean civilisation.

My translation need only be a very condensed one, since The Moon Pool is almost 100,000 words long. In theory the task of writing 50k doesn't sound all that difficult when broken down this way:
1. Find 100 hours in which to write in November.
2. Start each hour by reading 1000 words of the novel. In Latin, express in 500 words whatever is easiest to translate.

I did some trial runs in which I took 200-word excerpts and translated the main narrative and/or dialogue into 100 words. The time taken ranged from 10 to 15 minutes. Also I have extracted all capitalised proper names from the text and made a list with reasonable Latin equivalents, to save time thinking up names during the actual event. I even designed this gorgeous cover:

Cover2022.png

Kalendæ Novembres impendent! Mox incipiet festus mensis dicatus ad Romanicas fabulas scribendas, seu NaNoWriMo, ubi quotannis laus tribuitur cujcumque scribat quinquaginta milia verborum intra XXX dies. Quater ego in prioribus annis metam attingere conatus sum, sed toties defeci. Etsi, non sum qui tam facile dissuadeatur! Hac vice impetum aliá viá faciam sic: quoddam vetus scriptum Anglico sermone editum versurus sum, cum autem mea consuetudo erat fabulas ex nihilo concipere. Nescio an illo modó labor levior fiat.

Opus selegi quod indicem 'The Moon Pool' fert. Abraham Merritt centum plus ante annis hoc edidit. Textus Anglicus centum fere milia verborum continet. Debeo igitur 'tantum' circiter dimidiam partem libri vertere ut demum maximum laudem merear.

Puto me post NaNoWriMo reliquam partem libri non translaturum. Ceterum, etiam si librum omnem transferre vellem, id perficere nequeam quia mihi deest cum otium tum firmior scientia Latinitatis, qua sententias difficiles accurate vertere possim.
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Beosweyne learns more Zulu in 2023

Postby Beosweyne » Sat Dec 31, 2022 2:47 pm

Latin

daily-word-count-2022.png

I didn't get very far with my planned NaNoWriMo project. I made good progress early on, but then my excitement for December's Advent of Code became a huge distraction: so much so that from mid-November I spent nearly all my free time on preparations for that challenge. Even so, I forced myself to keep writing at least 100 words per day, and at the end of November I managed to push Stagnum Lunæ past the 14,000 word mark.

Then this month I wrote a few hundred more words, but haven't otherwise done anything related to languages, again due to Advent of Code. (At which I was a little less successful this year: solving 80% of the puzzles compared to 90% last year).

Zulu

In 2023 I would like to concentrate on improving my very basic Zulu, and so I've changed the title of this log accordingly. My main resource will be the textbook Learn More Zulu (Nyembezi, 1970). But first, I am going use the coming days to do a final, quick review of Say It In Zulu.
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Re: Beosweyne learns more Zulu in 2023

Postby Beosweyne » Sat May 20, 2023 8:26 pm

I made a new year's resolution to work throughout the year on improving my Zulu, then inexplicably lost interest right at the start of January. Nothing much happened after that, but when the current 6WC began 3 weeks ago, I saw it as a chance to get the project back on track. An encouraging sign so far is that I have been motivated enough to study for around 30 minutes each day. Now halfway through the challenge I have completed my first goal, i.e. do all the lessons from Say It In Zulu once again to review the basics forgotten though lack of practice.

I don't have any fixed goals for the second half of this 6WC beyond starting Learn More Zulu and seeing how far I can get. I noted in the previous post that LMZ would be my primary study resource going forward. I chose this book as it was the only one I could find with lessons leading post-beginners to an intermediate level. I may have overlooked some alternative course with similar scope, but I want to work through this one first.
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Beosweyne
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Re: Beosweyne learns more Zulu in 2023

Postby Beosweyne » Mon May 29, 2023 5:48 am

Learn More Zulu, Izifundo 1-3

This week I did the first three lessons. They mainly deal with kinds of sentences where the subjects or objects belong to a plurality of noun classes. An example would be uJane namadada uyagijima (Jane and the ducks are running) where both human and non-human nouns are subjects, in which case, we are told, it is the human that determines the verb's subject concord.

The 80 or so example sentences in this section included a mixture of constructions and so were good for revision. There were also a few interesting proverbs, some idioms and a short conversation transcript. It was a relief to be able to understand all this after earlier worrying that the book might be too advanced for me. Rycroft & Ngcobo's book turned out to be adequate preparation after all.

Umsebenzi 1

I did the first exercise, quite a long one containing 40 sentences for translation. Eng-to-Zu translation in particular was something I'd never tried before and although just a few of my answers were error free, I found writing Zulu to be great fun. It is going to become easier too, if this bit from the introduction is to be believed: Sifunda futhi nokusibhala isiZulu. Kulula ukubhala isiZulu. Akufani nokubhala isiNgisi. Ukubhala isiNgisi kulukhuni. (We learn also to write Zulu. It is easy to write Zulu. It is not like writing English. Writing English is difficult.) :mrgreen:

6 Week Challenge

The online leaderboard stopped functioning a few days ago so I have to keep track of my score manually. As of today, the end of week 4, I have studied Zulu for 1054 mins (17:34 hrs).
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Learn More Zulu: 28 / 468 (p. 28/468)


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