When the Somali Youth think about filling that pesky foreign language requirement, what comes to their mind? Spanish? French? Italian? German? May be Arabic?Whatever it is, it’s probably not Somali — the language of millions of people in the East African country and the Somali diaspora around the globe.
SAYPA is putting together a proposal to Boston Public Schools to teach the Somali American youth the Somali Language.
The Somali language belongs to the Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family. Despite several regional dialects, it is understood throughout the country and is an official language. The second official language is Arabic, which is spoken chiefly in northern Somalia and in the coastal towns. Owing to Somalia’s colonial past, many people have a good command of English and Italian, which, in addition to Somali, are used at the country’s colleges and universities. Swahili also is spoken in the south. In 1973 Somalia adopted an official orthography based on the Latin alphabet. Until then, Somali had been an unwritten language.
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