Spot the Language 26

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. Ladin 2. Ladino 3. Ladakhi 4. Lezgian 5. Lingala 6. Livonian 7. Luganda 8. Lycian 9. Maithili 10. Manchu 11. Mandinga 12. Manipuri 13. Manx 14. Mapuche 15. Marathi 16. Mbala 17. Mende 18. Micmac 19. Milanese 20. Mojave

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16 thoughts on “Spot the Language 26”

  1. 2 Ladino is a language derived from Spanish spoken by some Jews in the Muslims world. Those Jews are the descendants of the unconverted Jews expelled by Spain in 1492.

    10 Manchu is spoken in North Eastern China.

    16 Micmac is spoken by Amerindians in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia.

    19 Milanese must be the dialect of Milan.

    I guess I’m not a professional linguist

    1. Good job!

      Your description of Ladino is excellent.

      Manchu is a Tungusic language spoken in NE China that is critically endangered and down to 70 speakers or so.

      Micmac is an Algonquian language spoken in Canada, yes. It is also spoken in New Brunswick and Quebec.

      Milanese is indeed the dialect of Milan. It is actually a dialect of the Lombard language.

      You have done quite well actually!

  2. 4. Lezgian – one of the languages of Dagestan in southern Russia. A member of the Northeast Caucasian language family. It is spoken by Lezgins, one of the major ethnic groups in Dagestan (there are more than 30 ethnic/linguistic groups in Dagestan). It probably has somewhere between 20,000 and 250,000 speakers, and is therefore one of the largest languages of Dagestan in terms of number of speakers.

    6. Livonian – a Uralic/Finnic language spoken somewhere in Russia near St. Petersburg and near the SE Finnish border. It is probably spoken by less than 1,000 people and may be near extinction if not already extinct.

    13. Manx – spoken on the Isle of Man. One of the Celtic languages, in the group with Scottish Gaelic and Irish Gaelic. Manx went extinct in the 20th century although it is trying to be revived. Probably spoken by less than 100 people.

    1. Great description of Lezgian. It has 800,000 speakers, 400,000 each in Dagestan and Azerbaijan.

      Liv, or Livonian, is spoken in Latvia, yes, and it is Finnic. It is nearly extinct, yes, as it has only 15-35 speakers. There are revival efforts underway though.

      Good description of Manx. I believe there are now up 1,700 speakers of varying proficiency, all second language learners. But some people are raising their kids with Manx. There are about 100 competent speakers.

  3. 3. Indian or Himalayan state

    4. lesbian ventriloquist

    5. Africa somewhere

    6. East Europe somewhere?

    7. as 5

    8. Werewolf

    9. as 5

    11. Definitely African, maybe Caribbean too

    12. guess Indonesia or some othe S.E Asian

    13. Isle of Man

    16. as 5

    20. That’s hard. Native American – Arizona, New Mexico.

    1. Yes, Ladakhi is spoken in India in Ladakh.

      Lingala, Luganda and Mbala are spoken in Africa, yes. Mandinga is spoken in Africa only.

      Liv is spoken in Latvia.

      Maithili and Manipuri are actually spoken in India, Manipuri in the state of Manipur.

      Yes, Mojave is an Amerindian language spoken in California and Arizona. It has 75 speakers left.

      Not bad!

  4. Mapuche — the language of the american indians of Central and Southern Chile. It’s still somewhat spoken on the island of Chiloe.

    1. Yes, correct!

      However, what is spoken on Chiloe I believe is some sort of Spanish-Mapuche creole that is going extinct. The actual Mapuche language is doing quite well and has about 240,000-700,000 speakers yet.

  5. OK, let’s try.

    1. Ladin
    I don’t know
    2. Ladino
    Spoken by Spanish Jews.
    3. Ladakhi
    I don’t know.
    4. Lezgian
    I dunno.
    5. Lingala
    Some African language.
    6. Livonian
    Some former baltic language
    7. Luganda
    spoken in Uganda
    8. Lycian
    I don’t know
    9. Maithili
    I don’t know
    10. Manchu
    Spoken in Manchuria (currenty no speakers)
    11. Mandinga
    Maybe some African
    12. Manipuri
    I don’t know
    13. Manx
    Spoken on the manx Island, In Great Britian.
    14. Mapuche
    I don’t know
    15. Marathi
    Some Indian language
    16. Mbala
    Sound like African one
    17. Mende
    Also African
    18. Micmac
    I don’t know
    19. Milanese
    Maybe language of Milano?
    20. Mojave
    Must be Indian (Native American) language, There is dessert having such a name in USA.

  6. 1. Ladin
    Is this from Guatemala or are their people their called Ladins? I thought I read about Ladin in a book by rigoberta menchu.

    Lycian
    Ancient Anatolian language – Now Extinct. I believe it was IE.

    1. Ladin is a Romance language like Romansch spoken in northern Italy.

      Ladinos are Indians in Guatemala who take off Indian clothes, quit speaking Indian and put on Spanish clothes and start speaking Spanish and automagically become mestizos.

  7. 1.Ladin is a romance languegae spoken in Switzerland.
    4.Lezgian sounds like a caucasian language, either north-western or north-eastern.
    5.Lingala df. sounds like an african language (central african?)
    6.I think Livonian might be a slavic or baltic language spoken around poland.
    7.Luganda= Spoken in or around Uganda?
    10.Manchu is an altaic (tungusic?) language spoken in north-eastern asia.
    11.Def. sounds african (west africa?)
    12.Manipuri sounds like something from south/south-east asia.
    13.Manx is a celtic language from the isle of man.
    14.Mapuche is a chilean native-american language.
    15.Sounds indian.
    16.Sounds african.
    17.Sounds african too.
    18.Def. sounds like a native american language from north america.
    19.Probably a romance language from Milan.
    20.Probably a native american language from California.

  8. Out of the 20 I only know Manchu is spoken by the Manchurians in Northeast China. I also heard about an unorthodox (to us, anyways) practice that mothers would perform fellatio on their baby sons as affection.

  9. 1. Ladin, a Romance language spoken in the mountain valleys of the dolomites, is actually composed of several separate, but somewhat similar dialects.
    2. Ladino, not to be confused with the above, is a Jewish language derived from an archaic form of Spanish. It conserves archaic phonetic forms, most notably pronouncing j as [Z] rather than as [x] in modern Spanish.
    4. Lezgian is a language of the Northern Caucasus infamous for its large consonant inventory.
    5.Lingala is a Bantu language official in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
    6. Livonian is a Finnic language which, although extinct, is currently undergoing revival attempts.
    10. Manchu, formerly important in Medieval China, is now almost extinct. It is a Tungusic language related to Turkic and Mongolic, and probably also Korean and Japanese.
    13. Manx is a revived Celtic language which is currently being used to some degree on the Isle of Man.
    14. Mapuche is the language of the Mapuche Indians of the Andes.
    15. Marathi, unlike the other Indo-Aryan languages, preserves all three genders of Sanskrit.
    19. Milanese is the literary dialect of the much larger Lombard dialect continuum, though it is almost extinct.

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