Language/Somali/Pronunciation/Alphabet-and-Pronunciation

Somali Language Alphabet and Pronunciation

Hello Polyglots 😀

In today's lesson, you will learn how to write the different letters of the Somali alphabet, how to pronounce these letters whether it is through the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), or through a video with the pronunciation of the letters by a native speaker.

You will also find at the end of this lesson a virtual keyboard to be able to type each special character of this language.

Somali is a Cushitic language spoken by around 20 million people in Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia, and Kenya. If you want to learn Somali, one of the first things you'll need to do is to become familiar with its alphabet and pronunciation. In this lesson, we'll go over the Somali alphabet and provide some tips on how to correctly pronounce Somali letters.

Somali has been written using several different writing systems throughout history. These have included the Arabic-based abjad known as Wadaad's writing, as well as the Borama, Osmanya, and Kaddare alphabets, all of which were based on the Arabic script. In more recent times, Somali has also been written using a Latin-based alphabet.

Wadaad's writing, which was introduced in the 13th century by Sheikh Yusuf al-Kowneyn to aid in the teaching of the Quran, was further developed in the 19th century by Sheikh Uways al-Barawi. He based the Somali writing system on the Maay dialect spoken in Southern Somalia. Later, in the 1950s, a Somali linguist named Muuse Xaaji Ismaaciil Galaal introduced new symbols for the vowels and radically changed the spelling conventions for Somali written with the Arabic script.

Despite these developments, the current official script for Somali is the Latin alphabet, which was introduced in the mid-20th century and is now widely used in both Somalia and Somali-speaking communities around the world.

Latin Alphabet

Letters

The Somali alphabet consists of 28 letters, which are represented, in its latin version, by the following symbols:

A, B, T, J, X, KH, D, R, S, SH, DH, C, G, F, Q, K, L, M, N, W, H, Y, E, and O.

Note that the Somali alphabet does not contain the letters P, Z, or V . However, some loanwords from Arabic, English, and other languages may contain these letters.

Pronunciation (English Approximant)

Now that we've gone over the Somali alphabet, let's talk about how to pronounce its letters.

• A - pronounced like "ah" as in "father"
• B - pronounced like "b" as in "boy"
• T - pronounced like "t" as in "tea"
• J - pronounced like the "j" in "jazz"
• X - pronounced like the "ch" in the Scottish word "loch"
• KH - pronounced like the "ch" in the German word "Bach"
• D - pronounced like "d" as in "dog"
• R - pronounced like a rolled "r" as in Spanish or Italian
• S - pronounced like "s" as in "snake"
• SH - pronounced like "sh" as in "shoe"
• DH - pronounced like the "th" in "that"
• C - pronounced like the arabic letter Ain
• G - pronounced like "g" as in "girl"
• F - pronounced like "f" as in "father"
• Q - pronounced like the arabic letter Qaaf.
• K - pronounced like "k" as in "king"
• L - pronounced like "l" as in "love"
• M - pronounced like "m" as in "mother"
• N - pronounced like "n" as in "nice"
• W - pronounced like "w" as in "water"
• H - pronounced like "h" as in "house"
• Y - pronounced like "y" as in "yellow"
• E - pronounced like "e" as in "bet"
• O - pronounced like "o" as in "boat"

As you can see, many Somali letters are pronounced in a similar way to English letters. However, there are some unique sounds in the Somali language, such as the "kh","c", "dh" sounds, that may take some practice to master.

Other Alphabets

Latin	Osmanya	Arabic	IPA
'		ء	[ʔ]
B b	𐒁	ب	[b]
T t	𐒂	ت	[t]
J j	𐒃	ج	[d͡ʒ]
X x	𐒄	ح	[ħ]
KH kh	𐒅	خ	[χ]
D d	𐒆	د	[d]
R r	𐒇	ر	[r]
S s	𐒈	س	[s]
SH sh	𐒉	ش	[ʃ]
DH dh	𐒊	ط	[ɖ]
C c	𐒋	ع	[ʕ]
G g	𐒌	غ	[g]
F f	𐒍	ف	[f]
Q q	𐒎	ق	[q]
K k	𐒏	ك	[k]
L l	𐒐	ل	[l]
M m	𐒑	م	[m]
N n	𐒒	ن	[n]
W w	𐒓	و	[w, ʉː, uː]
H h	𐒔	ه	[h]
Y y	𐒕	ي	[j, iː, ɪː]
A a	𐒖	ا	[æ, ɑ]
E e	𐒗	ئ	[e, ɛ]
I i	𐒘	ى	[i, ɪ]
O o	𐒙	ؤ	[ɞ, ɔ]
U u	𐒚	و	[ʉ, u]
aa	𐒛	آ	[æː, ɑː]
ee	𐒜	أى	[eː, ɛː]
oo	𐒝	أو	[ɞː, ɔː]
ii		ىٓ
uu		وٓ

Somali Osmanya Online Virtual Keyboard