Questions about Learning Afrikaans?
In a couple of months I will be going to South Africa, Cape Town mainly. I am starting to teach myself Afrikaans in preparation. I know that I won't be fluent by the time I get there, but will at least have a good grasp on things. Any suggestions to make the learning process easier. I already bought a book and CDS and stream Afrikaans-language radio stations on the internet. How helpful will this be on my trip? Is it really worth my effort? Well, I shouldn't say that because learning the language is fun for me so that makes it worth it, but will knowing it enhance the trip in any way?
What are the best sources to learn Afrikaans?
I can primarily recommend Bruce Donaldson’s Colloquial Afrikaans with free online audio material (Routledge). This is used in university courses, as far as I know. It explains also advanced topics of Afrikaans grammar. To complement this you can also use Teach Yourself Afrikaans by Helena van Schalkwyk (available in print and as an ebook) or Complete Afrikaans (Lydia McDermott, audio available). These are the only three English based textbooks I am aware of.The free pagesLearn Afrikaans for freehttps://ielanguages.com/afrikaan...may give you a good starting point to learn some basic vocabulary and grammar. This may also make it easier to start with Colloquial Afrikaans by Donaldson.In contrast,Home : Afrikaansis a complete free online language course.UnfortunatelyWikibooks, open books for an open worldis not developed very far yet.After using the aforementioned materials you might listen to the radio, read the magazine Huisgenoot, watch Afrikaans youtube videos, …
When does the grammatical gender disappear in Afrikaans? Is this process influenced by English?
Afrikaans is a descendant of Dutch, and Dutch (in contrast to German) has minimal grammatical gender.And Afrikaans is much simpler than Dutch naturally. The verb "to be" is simpler to conjugate in Afrikaans.It is safe to assume that the loss is less influenced by English and more influenced by the simplifications.
Afrikaans translation?
Can someone please help me out and give me this in AFrikaans?! "Hi baby, just wanted to write something in Afrikaans so that all of your English friends think i've already learnt your language! Impressive!"
What does the Afrikaans word vir mean?
May I [ ?] for you Besluit geneem means --decision taken.Except for the one word that is what it means.
Does anyone here speak Afrikaans?
I speak Afrikaans 1. Yes, Afrikaans has been called kitchen Dutch. I can understand Netherlands almost perfectly. Although my father was born in the Nederlands so I am still of direct linage from there. We have never spoken it at home though and I never really learned to speak it but my cousins from Nederlands just came to visit for a week and I had no problem understanding them. 2. For me spoken Dutch is the easiest only if talked slowly. I can read it aswell but even then it is better if someone reads it aloud. If someone types on the internet in Nederlands I can recognize it and understand it pretty well. 3. No, Afrikaans is not limited to European descend. Actually if you want to be certain someone can speak afrikaans I think it is most likely to be a coloured person. The cape flats is the most Afrikaans area and mostly coloured people. Although not very common that black people speak Afrikaans it is not unfounded. More and more black people are speaking Afrikaans. Most people in South Africa speak two or more languages and Afrikaans is one of the languages tought and most schools. hope that answers your questions
How do you say "I miss him" in Afrikaans?
Goylanda Goodi, Dambala ungawa...
What are some good books for learning Afrikaans?
I'm afraid it's very difficult to recommend anything as there's really not much available. I'm an Afrikaans teacher, and I'm developing my own material and full courses for people who want to study or develop Afrikaans skills.Obviously you can read some nice Afrikaans books, as Brigitte Cave suggested. However, without knowing your present ability in using the language, it's hard to suggest anything.You can get a Teach yourself Afrikaans book, but I'm afraid the ones I've seen, assume too much. They are outdated, and that's not how Afrikaans is being used today. Remember, Afrikaans is a young language, and it develops daily. So, reading books could surely teach you some Afrikaans. The question is: are you up to the level to face modern Afrikaans as it is spoken and written?
Is it easy for an Afrikaans speaker to learn German?
With some practice, you will recognize a lot of the vocabulary. Check out some German Wikipedia articles to see how much you can understand right away: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare I've just had a look at the Shakespeare article in Afrikaans, and I can understand large parts of it without ever having learnt Afrikaans (I'm German).* Important differences between Afrikaans and German vocabulary include: s/z (German) - t (Afrikaans/English); e.g. German: Wasser (English: water) f/pf (German) - p (Afrikaans/English), e.g. German: Apfel (English: apple) ch (German) - k (Afrikaans/English), e.g. German: Koch (English: cook) The question of learning German grammar might be a bit more complicated. * Just to give you an idea of how much Afrikaans or Dutch a German can understand without having learnt either language :) , I've retranslated the first two paragraphs of the Shakespeare article in Afrikaans into English (without a dictionary or "Google Translate", obviously): William Shakespeare (baptised April 26, 1564 – died April 23, 1616)[1] was an English poet and dramatist and is regarded as the most important writer in the English language and the most ... dramatist of the world. [2] He wrote approximately 38 plays and 54 sonnets ... poems.[3] Shakespeare was already a ... writer during his lifetime, but after his death he became more and more popular and his work .. increasingly ... prominent cultural figure.[4] He is regarded .. as the national poet of England [5], and is sometimes called the "Bard of Avon" there (the love poet of Avon), or simply the "Bard",[6] or the "Swan of Avon".[7] Othodox scholars believe that Shakespeare penned most of his works between 1586 and 1612, although the precise dates and the chronology of the plays that are attributed to him have been the subject of much debate, as has the authorship of some of his works. He is held to be one of the ... dramatists who excelled both in comedy and in tragedy and his plays combine entertainment [?] with complex characterication, poetic splendour [?] and deep philosophy.