- For the Site, see Ling: Learn Urdu.
- Available both on the browser and as an iPhone App.
- I've found the initial page-load to be a bit slow in the browser (at least using Chrome), so anyone clicking the above link may need to be somewhat patient.
- Ling Introduction:
- As the official language of Pakistan and being spoken in the surrounding region, learning Urdu makes for a great experience. The beautiful buildings and landscapes of the area make it a jaw-dropping destination. You can expect to see tall mountains with picturesque meadows and forests. With that said, what should you expect with the Urdu language?
- Urdu comes from the Indo-European family of languages with very strong links to the Hindi language, to the point that they are largely mutually intelligible. In fact, Urdu and Hindi together form the ‘Hindustani’ language group. It is spoken by over 68 million people natively, with an additional 101 million second language speakers, with the vast majority located in Pakistan, India and the neighboring regions. It is written from right to left using the Urdu Alphabet.
- The language draws heavily from Persian, with vocabulary and grammatical structures that are very similar. It has two grammatical genders for nouns, masculine and feminine, together with two noun types and numbers. Verbs are inflectional and so changes based largely on aspect and mood. Sentence structure takes the form of SOV, with the verb coming at the end of the sentence.
- With a large base of speakers, learning Urdu makes a lot of sense. The South Asia region as a whole is a great place to explore and indulge in a unique culture and way of life. In Pakistan and India, people will be more than happy to speak with you and help you with some pointers. Anyone looking to get a deeper insight into the culture of the country will greatly benefit if they learn Urdu.
Text Colour Conventions (see disclaimer)
- Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2023
- Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)