A bit of Afrikaans study through "Groet" by Chris Chameleon
Friday, February 13, 2009
There's precious little on the internet for people that want to study Afrikaans. There's enough for the determined student but Afrikaans certainly doesn't have anything to compare with something like Deutsche Welle's German courses, and this makes everything you can find quite valuable including music. I saw an article today here on a musician called Chris Chameleon who is apparently quite good, and more than that his songs are really good for learning the language too (slow, clear, some repetition).
Edit: Ha! I was going to ask somebody to do the translation for me but then I noticed that the video itself has English on the bottom. I'll add the English in a sec....
done! Here it is:
| Afrikaans | English |
| Wie weet waar liefde leef as dit nie in jou hart kan wees en wie kan raai wie's die man wat die rots wat jou hart is kan beweeg | Who knows where love lives If it can't be in your heart? And who can guess who's the man That can move the rock that is your heart? |
| En ek groet met die wete dat ek jou agterlaat in jou liefdelose bestaan en ek skaam my om my rug te draai want dis weer ek wat die liefde verraai | So I say goodbye... In the knowledge that I leave you behind And I'm ashamed to turn my back, Because, yet again, it is me that has betrayed love |
| Lief en leed koester ek steeds sal ek jou ooit kan vergeet en tyd sal leer maar tyd verteer die hart binne my wat steeds aan jou kleef | Love and pain, I still crave... Will I ever be able to forget you? And time will teach, but time will devour This heart in me that still clings to you |
By the way, Droomverlore is also a pretty good song. Too bad the video kind of gets in the way of a good tune.
2 comments:
Hi Dave!
This time the video worked perfectly!
The song is good, the guitar beautiful.
Personnally, when I wanted to hear som afrikaans, I simply googled for some south-african radio.
Afrikaans sounds very like Netherlandic (with the loss of verbal endings).
But is it to say that Afrikaans is really easier than Netherlandic?
OK, there are no conjugations, but the Netherlandic is very simple. Afrikaans has lost almost all of its irregular verbs, while Netherlandic has as many strong verbs as the other Germanic languages.
But when you learn Afrikaans, you have often to remember two forms for adjectives and subtantives. In Afrikaans, many adjectives (but not all!)change when they are used as epithets.
Ex: goed = goeie, lank = lange, vriendelik = vriendelike but mooi and skoon remain the same!
In Netherlandic, all adjectives are added "e" according to regular rules.
Likewise, many plurals are irregular: nag = nagte, brug = brûe....
Those rules are often due to the loss of a final consonant. They are easier when you know.... the original Netherlandic word!
So, the easiness of Afrikaans should be relativized; and it retains the cumbersome syntactic rules of Netherlandic, which are roughly the same as in German!
A few weeks ago, you propsed me to invent a pan-germanic language. Your wish is fulfilled... by David Parke, the creator of Frenkish, who has released his draft on a Yahoo group. (it even shows a few similarities with Sambahsa)!
Koebaai duur Dave!
Oliver van Lotharingen
Hi Dave!
This time the video worked perfectly!
The song is good, the guitar beautiful.
Personnally, when I wanted to hear som afrikaans, I simply googled for some south-african radio.
Afrikaans sounds very like Netherlandic (with the loss of verbal endings).
But is it to say that Afrikaans is really easier than Netherlandic?
OK, there are no conjugations, but the Netherlandic is very simple. Afrikaans has lost almost all of its irregular verbs, while Netherlandic has as many strong verbs as the other Germanic languages.
But when you learn Afrikaans, you have often to remember two forms for adjectives and subtantives. In Afrikaans, many adjectives (but not all!)change when they are used as epithets.
Ex: goed = goeie, lank = lange, vriendelik = vriendelike but mooi and skoon remain the same!
In Netherlandic, all adjectives are added "e" according to regular rules.
Likewise, many plurals are irregular: nag = nagte, brug = brûe....
Those rules are often due to the loss of a final consonant. They are easier when you know.... the original Netherlandic word!
So, the easiness of Afrikaans should be relativized; and it retains the cumbersome syntactic rules of Netherlandic, which are roughly the same as in German!
A few weeks ago, you propsed me to invent a pan-germanic language. Your wish is fulfilled... by David Parke, the creator of Frenkish, who has released his draft on a Yahoo group. (it even shows a few similarities with Sambahsa)!
Koebaai duur Dave!
Oliver van Lotharingen
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