The Challenges and Beauty of Learning My Igbo Language
I stay in a country where you will get to hear people speaking different languages. Sometimes, you might not even have the slightest idea of what someone is saying because of the language barrier. Interestingly , I feel that is one of the things that makes life beautiful. You can Imagine a world where everyone speaks exactly the same language, I feel like life will be somehow boring. Like there is something fascinating about hearing people communicate in languages you don’t understand, and learning that what you know can have a complete different name when you hear it in another language.
Understanding your native language is really a beautiful thing to me. Honestly, I feel that everyone should be able to understand and speak their native language and I also believe parents and guardians have a big role to play in making this happen. I love seeing people who speak their languages confidently without having to hide them or switch to another language just to look sophisticated. There is absolutely nothing embarrassing about speaking your language, because that part of who we are.
I come from the eastern part of Nigeria, which makes me an Igbo girl. For me, speaking Igbo has never really been a problem. It’s not something I have to struggle with, especially when it comes to my own dialect. My parents always communicated with us in Igbo, so my siblings and I naturally picked it up while growing up. It was not something that we have to sit down and study before we could communicate. We simply grew up hearing and speaking it every day, and that makes my language feel like a normal part of my life.
Of course, Igbo has plenty dialects, and that’s one of the interesting aspects of my language. Like the way someone from one part of Igboland speaks can sound quite different from someone from another part. Sometimes, you might even wonder whether you’re listening to the same language! 😂 But despite those differences,they are still the same Igbo and also mean the same thing. Even me as an Igbo girl, I find it difficult to understand some dialect in Igbo, I have to use my brain to understand what they meant in some cases.
When it comes to reading and writing, I can actually read Igbo, but I wouldn’t say I’m particularly good at writing it. But for simple words and sentences, I think I still can manage to do that, but writing a lengthy passage with the correct spelling and expressions is another matter entirely. But speaking comes naturally to me because of how I grew up, but that you that aspect of writing ? It requires a different level of knowledge and practice. I don’t think I will find it entirely easy if I had to learn the written form all over again. 😁 Now, you can imagine someone who wants to learn Igbo from scratch. Honestly, I don’t think the person will find very easy to learn. The different dialects can be somehow confusing.
But if the person doesn’t mind about forgetting other dialects, there’s something to consider. Another sweetest part about Igbo is that, it also has a general form of the language that everyone from different dialects can understand, and makes communication easier. So it’s not really necessary to master every dialect before communicating with other Igbo speakers, so one can just learn the general Igbo. But Still, getting familiar with the language will take patience and consistent practice. I know people who aren’t originally Igbo but have learned to speak it fluently, and this shows that learning it is possible.
Thanks for taking the time to read through:)
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