TONES in the YORUBA Language

#shorts
Full video: • YORUBA - A Language o...
In this clip I talk about tones in the Yoruba language and how they influence the meaning of words.

[@Langfocus]

I hope you like the clip! See the full video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/o2TKZ3SFhduohtU

[@saddasish]

You're one of the only people who provides the link to the full video in the shorts, thank you!

[@Langfocus]

It makes sense to add the link, because then main video might get more visitors. It's strange that most channels don't do that.

[@saddasish]

It's exactly how I feel. When I come across a short, I often want to check out the full video but the link to the longer video isn't available and the title isn't mentioned so that I can manually search for it. It's absurd how many big KZbinrs do this to their shorts.

[@jonralph8843]

Ogun - War Ògùn - A river in Yorùbá land. Ògún - God of War, Metallurgy and Technology. Ogún - Twenty Ogún - Inheritance (context) Ó gún - It aligns well Ó gùn - It's long O gùn - You're "long" 😅 Ó gun - He/She pounds/punctures/stabs it. O gun - You stabbed/punctured/pounded it. Òógùn - Sweat Óò gun - You didn't stab/pound/puncture it. 😅😅😅 Don't get me started on the word O-J-O 😂 or O-L-A Usually very good with rhymes and poetry. The Yoruba language is very highly poetic and musical to the ears. That's why Afrobeat is the rave at the moment. Listen to singers like Àṣàkẹ́ and tell me you don't enjoy their music. ❤

[@ibraheem_abdulmalik]

Thank you omoya mhi

[@der_vur]

Ololade mi Asake 🫶🏼

[@loluoresegun5844]

oògùn - medicine/herb

[@conscientiam_sui7385]

Tonal languages are scary

[@GreatCollapsingHrung]

Agreed

[@kurfdafolf]

true

[@qwerty-vp1sb]

And they usually sounds horrible.. like vietnamese thai.. i never heard a tonal language that sounds "PLEASANT"

[@kurfdafolf]

@@qwerty-vp1sb in my opinion, tonal languages are beautiful. it’s almost like music

[@lingux_yt]

the difference between though, thought e through is worse hahaha

[@danielbickford3458]

I understand that tonal languages have long and complex histories, and I get that they're connected to colorful and vibrant cultures. but I can never learn one. the tonal differentiation would just end up confusing me and I probably end up insulting someone accidentally.

[@prospektarty1513]

They are very difficult languages to learn unless you immerse yourself in the envieonment, you will never get the perfect tone. Even speakers of other tonal language such as Igbo also struggle speaking Yoruba and vicevsrsa

[@lycanrocmare2341]

You have to train your ears. Even if you don't understand the language, immerse yourself in it by constantly listening to the language. You'll pick it up eventually, it just takes practice.

[@frafraplanner9277]

Look up Japanese immersion and Japanese pitch accent. Even if you're not learning Japanese, the resources for these help *a lot* with learning tonal languages

[@brennansawyer8688]

Well not with that attitude haha, jk but im learning one right now and its funny sometimes when you say the wrong thing, im lucky i have a positive learning environment😂

[@grizzlycharizard0017]

Not as confusing as fucking European Languages.

[@floptaxie68]

There’s a theory that says that Yoruba influenced the Cuban Spanish because we change the L and R before a consonant for a double consonant, like double letters in Italian, “carbón” we pronounce it “cabbón”, puerta-puetta, also we have Yoruba gods, like Ochún, Yemaya, Changó, Elegguá…

[@b.f.skinner4383]

Yeah I remember Joey Diaz talking about the Santeria spirit Ogun, and he mentioned it developed in Cuba after the Atlantic slave trade, so this all makes sense

[@floptaxie68]

@@b.f.skinner4383 Oshun became a mulata in Cuba.

[@dolphin550]

Compared to Mandarin, I feel like Yoruba is much harder with its use of tones. Not only do Yoruba words have entirely different meanings when said differently, but those same Yoruba words have MULTIPLE INSTANCES of tones. Though admittedly, there are less tones than Mandarin and Vietnamese. (Oh yeah, one more thing. Yoruba also uses Ajami, a version of the Arabic script used in langauges like Swahili.)

[@zeddeka]

Fewer

[@kwekuadedimeji6515]

You are right. Even the same word has multiple instances of tones. How it would sound at the beginning, middle and end will be different and you cannot mix it up. What a language! Èdè Yorùbá

[@oluwadamilola6233]

Without putting the tone markings . Ogun=war Ogun=20 Oogun(it's long) Oogun(sweat) Ogun(they stabs) Ogun(properties) Ogun(medicine) Ogun(God of war)

[@oluwadamilola6233]

@Бенедикт Баклажанов yes ,as long as you get the tones right, which seems to be hard for westerners

[@SetuwoKecik]

​​​@@oluwadamilola6233ustronesian group doesnt have tonal language except very few examples, so its also quite hard for me 😂

[@DonaldOYewande]

Oogun means medicine. As in @iyan l’ounje, oka l’oogun….”

[@hiyaoctaveproductions3150]

Thanks

[@majiknoah9161]

As someone learning Vietnamese this does not scare me (they have 6 tones 💀)

[@imagiFantasy]

Wowww vietnamese has 6 tones that's interesting! Chinese has 4 main tones and one with neutral or no tone

[@GuranPurin]

@@imagiFantasy Not Chinese, Mandarin. Cantonese, IIRC, has 6 tones. There are more than one Chinese language and they all have different tones.

[@maaduchvdaziachi9872]

Not really.

[@oluwadamilola6233]

Even though yoruba is tonal there some words that still shares the same tones. Like Ogun = major river and Ogun= medicine are both pronounced the same way, tones and all

[@musical_lolu4811]

They are not the same, those two words. You can still differentiate them: The Ogun river = _ògùn_ Medicine = _oògùn._ There is an extra vowel bearing a mid tone in _oògùn._

[@oluwadamilola6233]

I see ...but this is very minimal and most people don't know the difference.

[@Marewig]

​@@musical_lolu4811 Aahh, different lengths of phonemes! Yeah, they're not homonyms then.

[@Tolbens]

Ogun sounds like he tries to swallow a piece of bread...

[@daveo2431]

Wow, nice videos! Love your content, as a Nigerian I hope you'll be able to cover Igbo, my native language soon. We have similarities to Yoruba, though we sound totally different and we have so many dialects.

[@Mistimo123]

Ogun … also means medicine …. Then O gun means “you pierced something”. Yeah Yoruba is complicated like that

[@mercyleonard]

Asee aboru aboye

[@tyler2time]

Who else got anxiety from this

[@RiverWorksCo]

Go to your GP. Your problem must be a serious one. lol

[@yeattwizzyrichbitcointikok1120]

Interesting why?

[@seuny]

I was over here stressing Chinese is hard when this is my mother tongue 😅😂💃🏾🇳🇬 good luck to all the learners

[@diggernicks]

Anyone here care to share their experience learning a tonal language? Was it harder than learning a non tonal language? I know, this is a very subjective question, but I'm still wondering

[@Exkajer]

I'm conlanging a language based on chinese, and I simplified it to 3 tones. Its hard for me to understand tones, so this vid is very important for me, as I can finally understand, how the tones sound in the language I am creating. I was afraid that 2-3 different tones in a word sound unnatural, but now I can see that's okay.

[@Langfocus]

There are languages with a two tone pitch accent distinction as well. Japanese, and Norwegian and Swedish, for example.

[@AllanLimosin]

Same in the Sango language of the CAR. An example with the letter o: -High: ô -Middle: ö -Low: o The tone's written forms are different from Yoruba, yet as smart and understandable.

[@mauricebeyjr611]

Please do Sierra Leonan Krio, representation of mi people would be nice

[@xzx_808]

So it‘s basically Chinese but with Latin alphabet?

[@cooikemint]

and nearly none of the words are the same and the tones work different

[@gustavogiacomet4032]

The tonal system in Yoruba is way easier than in Chinese, they're in two different categories of tonal languages, but I don't remember what these categories are called tho

[@real_name_]

​@@gustavogiacomet4032 Contour (Chinese) and Level (Yoruba) tone systems.

[@lingux_yt]

apart from Yoruba, today I learned that "grave" is not like "grayve"

[@rothaeos]

Me too

[@Langfocus]

When referring to the accent marking, I think either pronunciation can be used. The way I said it (/ɡrɑːv/) is more like the French pronunciation.

[@lingux_yt]

@@Langfocus oh, great! thanks 😁

[@daveo2431]

Also I think you should include other tones like rising and falling tones. While the High Mid Low is the general premise, it's actually more nuanced than that. The third example is more like Ògù-ún (low, low, high) .

[@musical_lolu4811]

Yeah but we don't write it like that. It is generally understood in Yoruba orthography that the contour tones (or glides) - which are what you're describing - between adjacent high-low and low-high, are pronounced as such. Unlike a language like Mandarin which has tones 2, 4 and sometimes 3 inherently being glides.

[@Leonardo-se4su]

Okò ọkọ̀ ọkọ òkò 😂😂😂

[@adeolugodwin4267]

Lol

[@HelloWorldGoodbye]

😭😭😭I got this 😭😭😭😭

[@Jenniechan7788]

Its easy for a Cantonese and Mandarin speaker. Cantonese we got 9 tones and mandarin got 4/5. I want to learn this language. Anyone want to exchange language?

[@kwekuadedimeji6515]

Yorùbá is my native language. I would like to learn Cantonese. Can we be friends?

[@adeolugodwin4267]

@@kwekuadedimeji6515 I want to learn Mandarin

[@NUSORCA]

DO NOT SYSTEMATICALLY STUDY TONES IN TONAL LANGUAGES IF YOUR GOAL IS TO MERELY LEARN A LANGUAGE. JUST FOLLOW AND READ EXACTLY ACCORDING TO HOW A WORD SHOULD SOUND LIKE. I myself a Cantonese native tried to linguistically study Cantonese tones and only had myself more confused over them

[@BreannaFields94]

Sooo if you're tone deaf,, you have no chance, right? Lol

[@felixb6]

People from places that speak tonal languages are less likely to be tone deaf. I imagine if you're forced to distinguish tones everyday, you just learn to get over it.

[@BGDMusic]

i like yoruba

[@kingclan007]

So is this consider a tonal language?

[@Akaykimuy]

yes, in fact most west African languages are tonal although they generally don't have as many variations in tone as what you find in, say, China and south-east Asia

[@oluwadamilola6233]

Yes

[@_Painted]

A question for someone who speaks a tonal language: Because some people naturally have very much higher or lower pitched voices, are the tones confusing when you first begin speaking to a new person until you figure out their base vocal pitch? Like if you’re speaking to a deep-pitched baritone man versus a squeaky high-pitched girl, won’t this change the tones a lot, especially if you’re speaking to someone outside of the normal tone ranges you’re used to? Would a very high-pitched voice or a gravelly low voice sound like a speech impediment when speaking a tonal language?

[@cooikemint]

its based off of your own natural vocal range

[@_Painted]

@@cooikemintIsn’t that confusing though when you’re hearing a new person with an unfamiliar vocal range? Also what if strain your voice to shout something over a longer distance? The strain will typically make the tone higher, so can’t that have confusing results? Imagine this: A bandit calls up a hill to a Yoruba cattle rancher and says: “give me your cattle or fight me!” The farmer shouts down the hill: “I’ll give you ogun!” Does ogun here mean he’ll give 20 cattle or he’ll give war (fight back)? If he meant 20 but the bandit misunderstands , the bandit might shoot him from the bottom of the hill.

[@tok1879]

​@@_Painted it's not confusing at all

[@martins3870]

@@_Painted lol.....context and environment make understanding it easier. And no yoruba person will say your example in real life cos it will not make much sense instead they will say "I will fight/kill you" or he/ she may dare you

[@daveo2431]

@@_Painted Actually I don't think that's much of an issue. The distances between the pitches in words are the same for every speaker, no matter whether you have a low or high voice. It's like when you speak English, everyone around you stresses the word America like "a-MER-ica", no matter your voice range. As long as you can classify the words in a "do-re-mi" order, you should be able to understand anyone just by tone. Hope this helps.

[@mrcolz9373]

Me trying it describe to my Nigerian friend how a want a river in my town and all the sudden soldiers start appearing

[@obeyalways5406]

With my language, you can play with words in a funny way with deep meaning. Oogun ati ogun lafi n ja ogun....sweat and charms are what we use to fight war!

[@ricktan168]

China copy from Yoruba? 🤔

[@cooikemint]

no

[@msk5581]

This is so difficult. I’m unable to distinguish those 4 prononciations.

[@kori228]

low-high sounded like rising and double sounded like a mid-low

[@ChiquitaSpeaks]

Understanding this really shows you how much this is likely a reflection of the internal state of the people who speak this… They are very internally based to commit to such level of nuance… I sometimes think about how great of a loss it was for the people who disconnected from their languages and potentially a core way for them to regulate their internal being from things such as slavery

[@ChiquitaSpeaks]

Understanding this really shows you how much this is likely a reflection of the internal state of the people who speak this, they are very internally based to commit to such level of nuance. I sometimes think about how great of a loss it was for the people who disconnected from their languages and potentially a core way for them to regulate their internal being from things such as slavery…many modern social undulations do not pander to such internal states…

[@RahmonOyindamola]

Wow ,i am so impressed with the way you speak my language

[@yuccalyptus]

English is a tonal language in some way. Try saying "I never said she stole my money". You have to place emphasis or 'tone' on one of these words to make sense of what you're saying, and so others would understand you.

[@立風tachikaz]

I can't pronounce "gb"😢

[@Pedant_Patrol]

Very interesting

[@chinafish]

Love it like my language Cantonese. We got 9 tones 😂 Think i can learn some😊 thank you for thr video

[@prospektarty1513]

Ogun can also mean medicine and ‘it is long’ depending on how you stretch the initial vowel

[@musical_lolu4811]

oògùn

[@ndubuisiezeoye2099]

Yoruba language and her sister Igbo are just the same thing. A word can have multiple meaning depending on the pronounciation.

[@baum7des7lebens7]

I don't think the two languages have any vocabulary in common. I can understand a lot of Igbo, but no Yoruba at all beside the casual "omo" and "kilode!" 😅

[@ndubuisiezeoye2099]

@@baum7des7lebens7 although Yoruba and Igbo languages are very different from each other,they have many things in common,both of them belong to the same family,both of them are tonal languages. They have many words in common, the Igbo word for box is"Akpati",while in Yoruba it's Akpọti,and many others. They are also atleast 40 percent mutually intelligible.

[@ndubuisiezeoye2099]

@@fanqa9765 in Igbo language some words that have the same spelling and pronounciation can have two or more different meanings depending on the verb or object in the sentence. For instance, the word"Nsọ́" ,can mean both"Holy"and"Menstruation".

[@oluwadamilola6233]

@@baum7des7lebens7 they do, but it's like English and German comparison or even more so, i will say English and German are closer to eachother in Numbers of cognates than Yoruba and Igbo, so i will even go even farther and say English and maybe Norwegian language

[@oluwadamilola6233]

@@ndubuisiezeoye2099 they're not still sister Languages, a sister language to yoruba would be itsekiri and maybe igala,Igbo is a completely different languages, they're related but not something you will call a sister language.

[@smileok3723]

Who else didn't hear the difference in pronunciation? 😢

[@aeiou0123]

Lolol thats my language.

[@BlimeyVR]

Cat

[@abdiyusuf8561]

Can we focus on European and east Asian languages thanks love from Africa

[@resourceress7]

Are questions and statements differentiated by intonation? Or is a different process at work?

[@psychiatrefou89]

Wow. I thought only Asian languages had tones. Thanks Paul

[@DarthFurie]

My hearing is straight up not good enough to understand the differences in tones. Tonal languages scare the crap outta me

[@adolfoformoso5445]

In Brazil we speak Yoruba.

[@pia_mater]

Not true

[@adrien1623]

@@pia_materit’s true although it’s spoken as a ritual language. The word Candomblé means "ritual dancing or gather in honor of gods" and Ketu is the name of the Ketu region of Benin. Its liturgical language, known as yorubá or Nagô, is a dialect of Yoruba. Candomblé Ketu developed in the early 19th century and gained great importance to Brazilian heritage in the 20th century. It’s a dialect of Yoruba so quite indistinguishable from Nigerian Yoruba. Yoruba was the main ethnic group taken into Brazil and they continued their culture there w/ different religions and music/dance.

[@pia_mater]

@@adrien1623 I'm Brazilian and I know that people in the Candomble religion use a lot of Yoruba words but they don't actually speak Yoruba so it's very misleading to say "in Brazil we speak Yoruba". It's like saying that Americans can speak Greek just because English has lots of words borrowed from Greek

[@adrien1623]

@@pia_mater yea true. But they do practice the Yoruba religion which as a Yoruba man sad to say they are practicing withcraft. Those things are what we learned in Egypt from the Cushites

[@harrywijnfoord]

Am I the only one, who can't hear any differences?

[@zoch9797]

Yes.

[@lingux_yt]

pay attention to the "note". some notes are higher and some are lower, like music. the syllables are the same

[@harrywijnfoord]

I know it. I just wanted to clarify, how hard it is for me, The same problem I had with french at the beginning. I think it is just practice.

[@harrywijnfoord]

A classical example for different pronunciation of a "same" word is the "Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den" in Mandarin.

[@Langfocus]

For me personally, if I don't consciously think about the tones, I perceive a higher tone as a stress accent, rather than as a higher tone, because in English the stressed syllable usually has higher pitch. If I pay attention to the written markings while hearing the word, the tones are easier to perceive.

[@Lusanri]

Mandarin on better way for reading lol

[@jorgitoroman]

All these words sound the same for me.

[@geordilaforge2387]

Requires igbo lang

[@daveo2431]

I'm waiting for that one too

[@geordilaforge2387]

@@daveo2431 kedu

[@daveo2431]

@@geordilaforge2387 O di mma nwannem. Kee kwanu?

[@ZAZUtakiyaho]

Why is it anything with Yoruba Igbo must insert themselves

[@Shaggydadogg]

What a simple language for simple small brain people

[@bukunmio2338]

Jealousy is a curse

[@Danpungip]

You have the brain of a 5 year old

[@nehcooahnait7827]

Sounds like neutral, second and fourth tones in Mandarin.

[@glendajohnson6444]

Thank You for your intel and training.❤

[@Swaceierad]

The first one is like Mercedes

[@amedina.mobile]

Excellent one Paul, and will definitely check the full video; thank you very much!

[@kheprineteru4990]

Yooo! Dope video! African language 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

[@believeinpeace]

Oh my, tonal languages are interesting

[@yuluoxianjun]

sounds like Chinese

[@maaduchvdaziachi9872]

More than 3, also has contour tones

[@rudynathan8852]

Cousin of Chinese

[@AA-ux6gg]

I can’t understand different 😅

[@RiverWorksCo]

I don't think I want to learn yoruba now

[@rah164]

i just wonder how these tonal language have to pronounce with the same word but different meaning while screaming?

[@cooikemint]

its the pitch, not volume

[@luiscoll2903]

There are several tonal languages in the world, being thus Yoruba and Chinese just two of them, and I would say it is mandatory for all of us to study their different kinds of tones thoroughly, so we can handle an effective communication at the moment of speaking them.

[@hahaha6553]

viet thai tibetan burmese punjabi all tonal

[@natasfresas]

Om bom goo

[@ft20_arizkiwibowo58]

cat : alugalug

[@ブラ-g8x]

Why is this language so nasal? It sounds like french

[@jayfizz545]

As a Nigerian hailing from a different ethnic group when I first heard my multilingual mother speaking this language I asked how she knows French😂 they do sound very similar to an untrained ear. Many languages of western Nigeria, Togo and Benin are highly nasally

[@prince223681]

Tonal African language?! How have i never heard of this

[@Langfocus]

There’s a huge number of tonal African languages. :)

[@musical_lolu4811]

Seriously??

[@ZAZUtakiyaho]

I mean the world overlooks africa so yeah

[@003mohamud]

the majority of Sub-Saharan African languages are tonal

[@ClaymanH20]

Can you do igbo next?

[@Langfocus]

Hopefully someday!

[@dalubwikaan161]

Tonal languages are not for me, but i'll try anyway

[@mhdfrb9971]

To greet in yoruba, you can say 'Ode oshi' or 'Oloriburuku'

[@ayobamikale]

🤭Ọ̀dẹ̀ òṣì, olóríburúkú😭Nígbà wo la bẹ̀rẹ̀ láti lo àwọn ọ̀rọ̀ yìí fún ìkíni 😭Ẹ má ṣe èké ooo

[@ndubuisiezeoye2099]

Those words are not correct,in Yoruba language," Oloriburuku" mean "bad person".

[@GiandomenicoDeMola]

You are cheating, as it looks like. Why?

[@musical_lolu4811]

lol noooo

[@oyinlolaadetola1293]

Don't mind him, they are insults😅

[@tethys151]

sounds like orc language

[@oluwadamilola6233]

Do orcs even exist? What's their language 🤔

[@tethys151]

@@oluwadamilola6233 yoruba would perfectly fit as a language for orc race. It's so easily to imagine an orc speaking yoruba. Well, you know someone says german is a language for military, french is a language for love, russian is a language for swearing and curse words, so that yoruba is a language for orc race. "Ogun mbumba wmembe guuhgu arghh lusu boolubu"

[@leavemeal0ne378]

this comment makes no sense. it's quite dense. and ignorant. Not every Yoruba person has a deep voice

[@003mohamud]

0/10 bait

[@shadykid5939]

whoops accidently started a war

[@roberttelarket4934]

Tara boom boom yeh!

[@Lostin.1940s]

I love this channel wow❤

[@boldjawad]

You might be pronouncing Yoruba correctly but it sounds annoying when you are saying it again and again.

[@Langfocus]

Uh-oh

[@gustavogiacomet4032]

He literally said Yoruba only twice on this short

[@boldjawad]

@@gustavogiacomet4032 in video it's many times. No offense but for some reason, I couldn't hear him saying that and couldn't continue watching the video.

[@DodoDodo-pi1ev]

@@boldjawad sounds like you should explore yourself a bit and work on that you-problem

[@tok1879]

Well, seems like you need to fix yourself. If a good pronunciation bothers you this much.