Spot the Language 23

Rules: Identify the language, that is, say something intelligent about it. Possibilities include where it is spoken, what race or ethnicity the speakers are, whether the language is extinct or extant and what shape the language is in, to what general or specific language families the language belongs, and anything else intelligent you can think of about the language etc. You’re not supposed to look it up; anyone can do that. You’re supposed to do it off the top of your head, ideally.

1. Abenaki 2. Afar 3. Akan 4. Alsatian 5. Amharic 6. Aramaic 7. Asturian 8. Assamese 9. Assiniboine 10. Aymara 11. Balinese 12. Baluchi 13. Bikol 14. Brahui 15. Buryat 16. Burushaski 17. Cahuilla 18. Chamorro 19. Chickasaw 20. Choctaw

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8 thoughts on “Spot the Language 23”

  1. 4 Alsatian is a German dialect spoken in North Eastern France

    5 Amharic is the official language of Ethiopia. It is a semitic language.

    6 Aramaic was the semitic language spoken by Jesus and is still used by some Christians in the Middle East

    11 Balinese is the language spoken on the Indonesian island Bali. I suppose that it is a Malay language.

    12 Baluchi is spoken in South Eastern Iran and South Western Pakistan. Probably Indo-European.

    Well, that’s the best that I can do.

  2. Asturian must be a dialect of Spanish from Asturia in Spain.

    Assamese from Assam, where Assam tea comes from – in India I think, or might be an old name for Ceylon (Sri Lanka), or maybe S.E Asia (might be the old name for Vietnam or Cambodia or both – I think that’s it, there used to be a big Assamese Empire more than a thousand years ago, left a lot of temples and statues)

    Chamorro is S.American I think

    Chicasaw and Choctaw are both native N. American tribes.

    1. Yes, Asturian is as you say, but it’s actually a separate language, with about 80% intelligibility with Castillian. Probably 500,000 speakers though.

      Assamese is from Assam in NE India. It’s Indo-European, Indic. Tamil and Sinhalese are spoken in Sri Lanka. The SE Asian empire and language you thinking of is Annamese, the old name for Vietnamese not used much anymore (though I like it). Assamese is the state language with 16 million speakers.

      Chamorro is actually the Malayo-Polynesian language spoken by the Micronesians of Guam. It’s the national language of Guam and it’s doing ok.

      Chicasaw and Choctaw are 2 Amerindian languages from the Gulf Coast of the US. Both are Muskogean. Choctaw has 11,000 speakers and Chicasaw has 1,000 speakers. Both are mostly spoken in Oklahoma these days. They are closely related.

  3. 10. Aymara
    One of the indigenous languages of Bolivia. I believe it’s the second or third most spoken indigenous languages in the Americans after Quechua and maybe Guarani.

    15. Buryat
    Siberian people, near lake baikal. Related to the mongols I believe. Buddhists. Yul Brenner was partially descended from buryats I believe.

  4. 14. Brahui

    Is this one of those Dravidian languages that’s left over in Afghanistan and Pakistan? It sounds familiar.

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