‘The Colloquial Series Series Adviser: Gary King ‘tan Spun of Las COLLOQUIAL 25 series: The Next Step ln Language Lewring All these Colfoglas ate uve ia Hook & CD pack. oF separ Sly: You can order thm through our books o via our web souls com. Colloquial Bengali The Complete Course for Beginners Mithun B. Nasrin and WAM. van der Wurffoack Sew, Mitton Park, Abingon, Oxon OXI4 4RN ee gin of Tao & Ps Keeton eps — Eoghan ” Contents Introduction The sounds of Bengali ‘The Bengali script 1 onset a fr apnar nam ki? What's your name? ‘Are these your cousins? 3 enim itt are cer onar kOeTa baRi ache? How many houses does he have? 4 oeitatieadl cae fire kalimondirTa kon dike? In what direction is the temple of Kali 8 nih fe Fe ores? ‘apni ki ki dekhechen? What have you seen? 6 sa fe arcane apni ki khaben? ‘What would you like to eat? 7 sory fe arg ae? apni ki ranna korchen? What are you cooking? 50 6 73 87 78 crema? 108 daokhabo? Shall I show it to you? 9 ak coat Fe een rim ee Few ee 120 ‘ei cokTa ki ekhane kaosh kore nite pari? Can I cash this cheque here? 10 eH eS cH IP 131 ‘ekhane keu thake na? Doesn't anyone live here? 11 wares fe ee 148 tarpOre ki holo? ‘What happened next? 12 staan em Fe ang 156 apnara skule ki ki poRten? What did you study at school? 13 oi am crea oop fe eae wT? 168 jomi hal dewar jonno ki basbohar kOren? What do you use for ploughing the land? 14 BRS TE IGEN wT Kao AE KR? 180 flaiT dOshTae chaRle kOTae riporT korte hObe? If the flight leaves at ten, at what time should I'check in? 15 saat ora A at UP 191 ObobOrshe ar ki ki kOra hOe? What else is done on New Year's Day? ‘Transliterations of Bengali-script texts 203 Bengali script - summary 22 Numbers 216 Bengali grammar — summary 221 Translation of reading texts 231 Key to exercises 234 Bengali-English glossary 257 Index 279 Introduction The Bengali language () (cor; 1-5) This book provides you with an introduction to Bengal, the lan- fungsof Bangladesh and the se of Went engl indi. may Exc cue that you want to earn this language for prey praca ftusons, beats you need fo communicate with outne speakers of Bong in Bonga or chewhere: Or perhaps you have become ite {sca Bengel language, culture and irae trough seng hms Sy Seas ay qnonourcedshOwot rein Benga), the erctor ‘tho wav warded Littime Achievement Oscar in 1992, oF through Tearing abou the poors and stores of Tagore, winner of the 1913 Nobel Prize for erate Tagore Bengt name st actaly Rabindranath Phaker, pronounced sobiedromtty Thaker). ‘waver your motivation for kang Boga we obouly ned to bein wi the bis, ere therefore start wath spl sentence {the earphones symbol (9) indice that this material sppears on the CD accompanying this book; listen to it to hear how this sen- tenes is pronounced) fami bangla fant na "Bengali Know nor [As you can sce, where English puts the verb or verbs don't know’) immediately after the subject (1), Bengali usually puts the verb towards or at the end of the sentence. Aso note that the word tna “not” immediately follows the word to which ic refers, Le. Jam This is diferent from English, but once you know it, there is noth~ {ng difficult about i In fact, ir we tell you that the Bengal word for “am learing’ is shikhel, you may also be able to say the fllowing useful sentence in Bengali fe. I don’t know Bengali) 1m learning BengalListen to the CD to check whether you have got it right. "You may also have guessed the sentence that you willbe able to uter truthfully ence you have worked Sour way through this book: fami bangla jani Bengali Know From these examples, you will have gathered that, in Heng itself (and nowadays also. sometimes in English), the language is calle bangla. The word of course also crops up in the name for the region where itis spoken, ie. Bengal, and in the name Bangladesh, ‘which very appropriately means “Bangla Country’ (hence its variant spelling, Bangla Desh), “This brings us to the matter of words or voesbulary. It cannot be lenied that mastering Bengali vocabulary, lke learning the vocab lary of any language, wil take areal effort on your part. However there are two facts about Bengal that will go some way towar casing the task of vocabulary acquisition, ie. 1 know Bengali) Two helpful facts about Bengal ‘The fist elpful Tact i that English snd Bengali belong tothe same linguistic g0up, called the Indo-European family of languages. This Introduction ‘means that both English and Bengali (and! many other languages Spoken in Europe and the southstn and western parts of Asia) ae descendants of one and the same language, which, was spoken some six thousand years ago. In the course of time, the dialects of this language have grown apart to such an extent that they are mow completely diferent languages. Nevertheless, the distant kinship ‘means that, here and there, recognisable similarities still exist between English and Bengal “Thus, the Bengali word jamin the sentences given above is related to the English word ‘know’: in spelling, you can see the consonants Jen corresponding to "K-a’(ia English, of course, the "kin know” fo ‘ot pronounced any more, making the relatedness of the to words somewhat hard to detect). And as you probably relied, the Bengal word ma is the sume as English "no(®). Other exampies are mam (Caame), aT eight) dt Ctooth), Ora (door) and gOrom (wasn) eis true that the umber of similar-sounding words like this t not large, yet they are very useful inthe early sages of learning the language: they wil help you realise that you are not groping your ‘way around in completely unknown territory there are some Objects that you can already recognise So can you guess which of the following Bengali words corres: ponds to which English one? naked Uptpen) bing mouth third long path ‘mukh two A second fact about Bengal is even more helpful: dozens if not hundreds of Bengali words wil look very falar to you because they are loanwords adopted from English into Bengal. This happened ‘uring the long period of close contact between the two languages ‘when nearly the whole ofthe South Asian subcontinent was under British rule: As a result iti not too diielt to guess the meanings ‘of the following words, all of whieh are part and parcel of everyday Bengali ‘cer, Teil, kap, ple, gelash,ofih/opis/aisIntroduction ‘Again, you should listen to the CD to hear how these English words sound when pronounced ia Bengal As the last example shows, there fre sometimes various pronunciations in use Tor such loanword. “The borrowing of words from English into Bengali is stil aking place today. English is spoken as a second or third language bs Imany Bengalis and some of them like to pepper their Bengals with English swords, pirases or even complete sentences. Although perhaps ‘we shouldn't be saying this if at any point you're searching for a Bengali word but don't know or remember i, you could ty simply using the English word. As fong as you embed it properly into the Bengali grammatical structure, chances are vou will be understood. You might, for example, try the following sentence whenever You {ct tired of saying "T don't Know Bengali a ings jan ‘OF course, i is better still 10 use the Bengali word, ingref (actus this Is just a more thoroughly Bengalified version ofthe same word) ands: ami ing jan Varieties of Bengal Before we describe the set-up and aims ofthis book and plunge right Into the Bengali language, there are a couple of other things that you should know about the different types of Bengali that you may Encounter. First, ike all other languages, Bengal has various re- Bional dialects, which diverge to a greater or lesser degree from each ‘ther and from whit is considered by speakers of Bengali them- Selves to be “proper” Bengali. As a learner of the language, you are probably best off steering clear of regional dialects and aiming for ‘proper’ Bengali i. the Bengal that is spoken by educated speakers and that doss not evoke negative reactions {rom other speakers. ‘This isthe Bengali that you will ind in this book However, ‘proper’ Bengali ise comes in two types, since there js a standard Bengali in the West (ie. in the Indian state of West Bengal, where the majority of the c.70 milion speakers of the lan- guage are Hindu) and a different standard Bengal inthe Fast (hen Bangladesh, where most of theo. 130 milion speakers are Musi). Each of these two standards evokes mildly nepaive reactions from the other group, with the Western standard sounding over-refined 10 Introduction Bongal-Gangladesh and the Indian state of West Seng: some Eastern ears, and the Eastern standard sounding rural or back- ward to some Western cars (we hope we are offending nobody by there characterisstions ~ as you will discover, all types of Bengali actually sound extremely pleasing and melliluous), The differences between the two varieties are not enormous, but they can be found in ‘reas of the language: pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar (in particular, word endings). We will in al eases note such differences, Using the labels “Easter and "Wester’ (or simply "E° and ‘W"). Note thatthe W-forms are also often used by Hindus ving in Bangladesh. “Another division is that between written and spoken Bengali. You will have noted that the Bengali words and sentences given so farIntroduction Introduction have all bee inthe Roman alphabet. But we can assure you: Bengali has a script all its own, developed from the same source as the devanagart writing system of Sanskrit, the ancient language of North ‘Ge India As you will ind out Turther on in this book, the Bengal ‘Script requires some effort to master but (like Bengali pronunciation ‘and grammat) itis not shockingly dificult, and it does a good job at Fepresenting cloatly and unambiguously most of the sounds of the language. To elve you a litle taste of what is ahead, we give here the sentence "Tam learning Bengali’ ie Bengali script (The script reads from left co right) Do you femember how itis pronounced? ‘aft reer Pree Finally, when you know enough Bengali co tackle literary texts written roughly before the middie of the lst century, you will en counter there type of Bengall that shows many’ old-fashioned word forms and heavy use of Sanskeit words, This elevated and slightly iii varity of the language is called shadb bhasha, ic. pare language. Tis important because itis used in some of the writings by Rabindranath Fhakur and other great authors of 19th- and early 2inhecentury Bengal literature In the same period, texts were also ‘written in a less stylised variety of Bengali this is often called colt {or calto) Basha, Le. “current language, since it was closer to the ‘ordinary spoken language. Present-day writing in Bengalis mostly inveither the Western or Easter standard, depending on where the ‘author comes from. It not unusual, however, to ind Bangladeshi texts that include some Western forms Learning colloquial Bengali with this book So you want to lear Bengali, You have just discovered that you can alroady recognise some Benga words. You have also learned to 3 ‘mi bangla Janina nd ami bangla jan, How will this book help you ta'move from the first sentence t the second one? Teil do so by offering you & large amount of colloquial Bengali sit would be used by ordinary speakers and writers of various types find in various situations, ‘The material has beon carefully graded, So that what is simplest and most useful for a learner comes fist find what is more dificult or specialised comes later. In the fist four Units, all the material i immediately followed by an English transla- tion and in the later unit, lists of vocabulary are given, so that the feuning of any dialogue or text will always be clear. The CD. which forms an essential part of the book, allows you to hear what the material in this book woul! actually sound like, enabling you 10 Alovelop afer for the spoken language and its pronunciation, {in addition, the CD contains various types of exercises. Care has ben taken fo present all this material in a context that as natural fs posible, so that it provider you with moda of the colloquial Bengali that you will encounter (and that you are aiming to pro- ‘uce) serons& range of everyday settings and situations. ‘Besides the Bengai-language material, together with translations, this book also contains explanations of the rules (and exceptions) fof Bengali grammar. However, the focus is always on grammar in Use: particular points are explained in the context of the Bengali dlisiogues or written texts and the emphasis ies on what you can do ‘with the various grammatical forms. This is also reflected in the ‘nature ofthe exereses in the book, which invite you to understand ‘or do things in Bengal rather than produce isolated forms. Key the exercises is provided atthe back of the book, as isa summary of the main grammatical patterns and a glossary Practice makes perfect Since only practice makes perfect, we would! advise you to regularly peat the material that 90u have leamed. anyone should ry 0 Tend thi book ffom cover to cover in one go, in order to be done {ith i quickly, we see ile prospect of them earning much Chioying the lesring experience, ATangsage guide simply cannot be fend lke detective nove. So to prevent this book from ending uP Sn your bookshelf with you none the wiser fori, you will need to {ake your tine over each unit and to regulany Bo theough earlier Units auain. This doce not have to take th form of doing the same things inthe sume way again sod again. Instead, you could carn to An caver text and linen to it with the book closed: you could try {© imemorise parts of texts f you have a microphone you could toad out eran portions and make «recording of sure speaking Bengal you could devine your own questions or exercises to SUPP mont thow in the book, you sould copy texa and pn them on the ‘Sal neat to pour bod and you could change dialogues by making {pear older or younger, or byshiting certain event fom the past, Jo the preseat or future and vie versa, or by ropiaing the mention Dr single objects or poopie by several objects or people (all oF these ‘hangs will aoc the prammatial forms to be ted).Introduction For further practice, ty to enlist the help of a native speaker fof Bengali, Or go online: the Internet makes available a certain amount of spoken Bengal, with endless possibilities for repetition. For instance, at the lime of writing this book, news broadcasts in Bengali are available a + and + hupuhvww bbe co.uk/bengaliadio/aod bengal_promo shtml. In the carly stages of learning, such material could be wed for the ppurpore of becoming familiar withthe sound of the language, while At later stages, it should be possible to idenify specie words oF phrases and eventually work out the meaning of complete sentenocs. ‘When it comos to writien Bengali on the Internet, there is 4 much sroatee Wealth of material, Whichever way you choose to uke (and Wwe provide some concrete suggestions in later unity of this BOO), i will reinforce the central message of this book: colloquial Bengal is Something to be explored and enjoyed. We hope we have whetted your appetite fori What you can do when you have worked through this book \Whea you have worked through the material in this book, you will know enough Bengal to do the following things: + describe and talk about present situations and activities + scribe and talk about Situations and events in the past + scribe and talk about wishes, commands, expectations and pos: Sibilties relating to the future + describe relations of various kinds between things, people and events + express and ask about a wide range of feslings and opinion + report what other people have said or thought ‘The topics about which you will be able to communicate in Bengali include matters as diverse as family relationships, jobs, travel, food, money, the seasons, agriulture, schools and air travel. Tn addition, {you wil be able to read simple texts on these topics, You will al have gained some experience in reading more difcut texts, and be ready to continue improving your knowledge and understanding of Bengali on your own The sounds of Bengali [Although the pronunciation and seript of Bengali are not extremely Gifficult, they are both new to you, s0 we wil arti this section by just decribine the pronunciation of Bengali, To represent the sounds ‘the language, we will use &aystem of transhteration which (with fone exception) employs the ordinary letters of the Roman alphabet. [But in the following section, we will also introduce the Bengali ‘writing system and will start using i in selected texts from Unit 2 ‘awards, The amount of Bengal script will gradually increase as You move further on, However, a transliteration ofall Bengaliseript {ents is given at the back of the book, which also has a Bengal English glossary with each Bengali word given in transliteration But le’ first consider the sounds of Bengali beginning with the ‘vowels. In each case, we give a description ofthe sound quality, with Teference to an identical or very similar sound in English or another European language, followed by some example words. Since describ ing sound quality on paper is notoriously dificult, is essential that You should listen to the CD, on which each of the following sounds and words containing them ean be heard Vowel sounds (1) «01:7 Transliteration Quality Example words 2 sin French of! i [av or ma mother Talia mama mir ‘baba father i asin French peti similar to Ki what English ‘se’ but without dil elder sister finaly" glide « fs in Erench coup; similar 0 mul root English shoe’ bot without due far final W" glide‘The sounds of Bengali Transtieration Quality Example words © ‘asin French chez; similar © ke who English "pay", but without desh country fina y' glide * ‘sin English ‘back’, ‘mat’ bala time period kone ° 4s in French beau; similar to tomar your English ‘go’ but without bon sister final“ glide ° asin English “pot KOI watertap KOra to do Now uy to pronounce all seven vowels in sequence. a i we m0 O You can also pronounce seven meaningful words in this way but to ddo'so, you must first learn to pronounce the Bengali consononant Kh. Ie similar to the initial sound heard in English ‘cool, “coat” fand ‘cash-and-carry’, which have a ‘k-sound followed by 8 pulf of breath or aspiration. But the aspiration in Bengali kb is stronger than in English, resulting in something that may sound like ai fol. lowed by the of heard in broad Seottsh Jock or German acht, Nacht TT you can make this sound Kh and there'll be plenty more practice, because there are several sounds in Bengals with such aspiration), you ean say the following seven words ‘canal Iuela to play bolt or door) hola open ati sol KHOI deceit Khelap defaulting Al the vowels of Bengali also occur with slightly naalised pro- runeiation, which we shall indicate with tilde (-) writen over the ‘Yowel letter. Some examples are: ba lenthand) ou high ‘The effect is as if there is an unpronounced ‘a’ or ‘following the vows in question. At an earlier stage of the language, there was indeed such a nasal consonant in most of these words. Eastern Bengali ftten keeps the nasal consonant or drope it altogether without any trace being let (60 you may hear bam aid wew in Barladesh). Bengal also has several diphthongs, which consis ofa unit of two vowels the socond one being u, 0, For e. The main Bengali diph- thongs are Translueration Quality Example words a 8 in English ‘my tie’ nal Teat fal there isn't Eastern) we similar to al but the socond hae she ats partis more open than | pae she gots (im for an esound) o asin English loud’ and tau gourd ‘down-and-out Kau'sour peach a similar to au but the second Khao you eat vowel sounds like @ rather ao (emall) boat a ‘asin English “say* when shel that Pronounced with an ‘emphatic finaly" lide ot the vowel 6 immediately bol book followed by a'y"sound Kol Tsay oe the vowel O followed by e; shOmOe time the sound differs from af Oe nine in being much more open on the vowel Followed by an bow bride ‘emphati final "w" sound couddo fourteen In some words, 1Wo identical vowels follow each other. We use a hyphen to make this clear: cee than’, me-e ‘il/daughter™ They are sometimes pronounced with a light y sound i the middle: ceye, smeye. Consonant sounds ()) (cot: 9) In the example words given so far, you have already seen and heard ‘fair number ofthe consonants of Bengal In giving a fl ist. itis ‘convenient to present them in groups of four of five, since thei differ ‘ences and similarities are brought out most clearly in that way. We Start with the group of velar sounds kas in English *keen’ and ‘kind’, but WITHOUT any aspiration ken someone aakash sky (co2 “The sounds of Beng ‘kh asin English ‘keen’ and ‘kind’, but with kham envelope Strong aspiration (sometimes sounding kane here HLETE TElowed ty ot Sou et) tl Eng po" tah snl check id keg but followed by apni om = 2 ‘aghat a blow sg asin Engh ‘king and ‘one ‘eg colour ‘anggulfingerltoe “These areal called velar sounds because in pronouncing them, the {ongue tovhes the back of the roof ofthe mouth (Le. the velum). N:40) Pay special attention to the difference between the pair K and ‘without any following aspiration, and the pair kh and by strong aspiration. At the end of a word, aspiration i less foree- Ful: MOKh nai” (W nok) and megh cloud” may sound as they end in and. especially in fast speech ‘The dental sounds are made with the tip of the tongue touching the back of the upper teeth {like English “two" and ‘ten’ but with the tin three tip ofthe tongue more tothe front, shat seven nd WITHOUT following aspiration ‘th {followed by aspiration that ein ‘math ed 44 like English ‘do’ and ‘deed? bet with the dul to tipof the tongue more to the front. nodl fiver yd ollowed by aspiration, ‘ham paddy, rice fodhi youhurt ‘8 as in English ‘no! and ‘nine? an salt “ewestern) an esr ‘Again itis important to make a clear contrast between the aspirated Consonants ofthis group (th and dk) and the non-apirated ones (t Sind @) At the end of word, asin pOth path and kid “shoulder “Spiation js ese strong, When the sound mis immediately followed ia dental consonant, atin cinta thought’ oF bOndbo ‘closed the nisl also dental (the tip ofthe toungue touches the back of the upper teeth, in anticipation ofthe following consonant. When followed by a vows or coming a the end ofa word, Bengali mis just tke English 0 the lnext group (for which we use capital T and D, to distin- 11/13) guish som ftom the dental sounds € and d) i called retrofx, In ‘The sounds of Bengali 7 pronouncing these retroflex consonants, the tip of the tongue does fot touch the tcth But is pulled back a hittle to touch the ridge of the gums. The effect is that of English “or “in words ike “try” and "dry" Ifyou say these English words in slow motion and stop Just before reaching the sound" you have hit the Bengal! retroNex sounds T and D spot on. To an English ear, the Bengal retvofox ‘consonants may sound very similar to the dental ones, but in Bengal they are as different as and "Uh are in English (where “tin is not at all the same as “thin, So try to distinguish these Bengali dental and Fetrofler pais from the beginning, even iit is dificult, Tas Foglish in ey’ and ‘wee’, but Taka taka, money WITHOUT aspiration a eight Th T followed by aspiration ‘Thikana adress Thi Teter Das English “in dry" and drum’ Dam righthand) ‘ThanDa cold Dh D followed by aspiration Dhew wave Dhaka Dhaka Again, the contrasts T Th and B — Dit need to be carefully made, The following group is called palatal, since the front ofthe tongue touches the palate when pronouncing these sounds cor: ‘© asin English ‘chin’ and ‘choose’, but ear four Without much lipounding pie five ‘eh erollowed by aspiration in Eastern hele boy, son Bengali, it often sounds hike English °s* Richa something in see or "tn Tote jas in English jam’ and jar’; in Eastern JO water Bengal, it may sound lke English 2 kobjt wrist in ‘zest, often witha light 'd" before it Jn jollowed by aspiration jal hot, spicy ‘maj boatman ‘The labial sounds (ie. lip sounds) of Bengali ar: Q Pain English “pin’ and “poo! but pa foot WITHOUT any aspiration KOpalforshead similar to English a and ‘foo! but FOI Trait, ‘with the lower lip neasly touching the laf jump. Upper lip rather than the upper teth basin English "bye-bye" and "be imam acroplane khObor news‘The sounds of Bengalt ‘The sounde of Beng Q Bh followed by aspiration ‘ao good sbi doch sas in English “my” and “mummy” {ml you ‘am mango ‘The older pronunciation of f was the sound p followed by aspirs tion; this en stil be heard, especially im West Bengal. The sound Bi has a common variant which is sort of ‘V-sound as in English ety" and ‘over but with the lower ip easly touching the upper ip rather than the upper teoth "This leaves a few consonants that do not Bt neatly into a group, Fest, Bengal lso bas the sounds I and by which afe easy to pro- ounce because they are just hike English ‘and "h BUL be sure to fake the Bengali | always clear — it should sound Uke the first" (ot the second 1) in English ite’, Examples are: red at hand flu potato bibaho marriage [Next there isthe frequent sound sh, which i very similar 10 English ‘has im “shoeshine™ and “rush, except that Bengali sh has n0 lip rounding. When sh i followed by dental t or thin the same word, itis pronounced mote ike English 's'as in “sister; we will use the symbol to represent this sound. It also occurs in Toanwords from English and Arabic. Some examples of sh and sare: shal year stele Osh ten Sinema Sinema; fm sha tocome maser Naser (Muslim name) sate coming [As we saw above, the sound sis also used in Eastern Bengali as a possible pronunciation of eh, resulting in pronunciations such as ‘Sele and Kisu (or Western Bengali chele "boy" and kich something’). In this book, we will represent such words With the symbol eh but emember that there can be a ference in pronunciation of these twords between East and West Benga ‘engali ris somewhat different from English ‘rs i isa ered sound, which is similar to the rin the broad Scottish pronunciation fof Mary and Aberdeen and wo the rin Spanish (io Grande or hombre). Some words with rare rakha amar bh foput my eyebrow Bengali has a second #-sound, for which we use capital R. It isa secroflex sound, made by curling back the tip of the tongue and producing a short tailed or lapped °. The effect is somewhat sit far to that of a strong American so you could begin by aiming, for that sound. Some words with R re baRi—taRataRi—DR&Rosh house quickly ladys finger ‘Yow have now seen and heard al the consonants of Bengali, There Js just one more fact about them tht you need to know" some words Ihave long or double consonants, This the ease in words tach ss bolle she ssid sbba father (Eastern) amma mother (Eastern) Whaggo fortune In the frst two words, an extra-long I or m soured willbe heard. The third and fourth word may sound as if someone has trouble pro- ‘nouncing them and, as it were, gets stuck on the sound b org for @ ‘moment before managing to finish them. Practice It is high time for some practice now, 10 familiarise you with all these sounds, fo sharpen your ear for the distinctions among them, Jand to get you stared on pronouncing them in the best Bengal That you can muster at this moment. Do not Torgst also to do the exercises on the CD. Exercise 1 Here are some pairs of words that difer only in one single sound, First read them ov, taking care to indeed distinguish them properly ‘Then, for each pair, make a short sentence in which you correct Someone who has mispronounced them. For the first pair, Your Sentence would be: tna Sam ma tha’? (No, not am: ham!) 1 am mango ham measles 2 jal net hal hot spicy 3 Dal branch Dhat slope 44 shaRi sari (wom by women) shark ine, queue 5 KOI watertap BWOL deco (on,‘The sounds of Bengs ‘The sounds of Bangali ” 6 hat hand het market 7 Thik right, OK Th tick & hat (Cooked) vice bat rheumatism 3 cat Twant chat shes 10 eal Twant ‘he wants 11 bolo say Git ‘ihe said 12 Daka toca Exercise 2 (1) (cot 18 Included among the example words given exlier inthis section to lilstrate the Bengali sounds are all the numerals from one to ten (except for chOe “six? Find them, make a list of them, pronounce them sow and carefully a couple of times, and then learn the Sequence by heart Exercise 3 ‘Count down from ten to one. Also learn this sequence by heart. Exercise 4 () (oor: Also included among the example words given above are several rams of oy parts. Find them, make stad lag them by hear ‘Then point at your hand, and say: amar bat ‘my hand’. Also do this forthe other parts of your body that you can name in Bengal. Then repeat this, but now using the words Dam right” nd ba el where SSpproprate. Start with: amar Dan het “ay eight hand” Exercise 5 ()) (cor; 22) ‘You have invited a Bengal-speaking fiend to a family party, and want to introduce your family to hinvher. Do this by tenting Sich of your family members i turn, starting with: amar ma "oy ‘mother’. You can also find other words for relaives in this chapter Srmuke i list and learn them, Exercise 6 Using the example words given above, you can make several word pairs. Find the Bengali words for the following pairs. The fist one has been done for you. After doing this, lear them by heart. Then ‘make sentences in which you correct somcone who mixes up the 180, ‘Words, as follows: na, ekhane na, okhane (No; not here: there) Also reverse the ofder: nay okhane ma, edhane bere ~ there fomeone — something ‘who? — what? ‘khane —okane_ warm (remember this one”) ~ cold ‘open ~ closed may ~ your Tetter— envelope fon — daughter cloud sky brother (bhai) ~ sister river ~ boat mother = father right — let ‘mother — father (Eastern) yes n0 hand footv2) The Bengali script Now that you have become familiar with the sounds of Bengali the ‘next logical step isto start learning the Bengal writing system. Since ‘we give all the material also in transiteratio, you could decide to leave the seript for later, and move on to Unit I from hers. How ever, we would advise you to tackle the script as well now. Learning itis an essential part of learning the language. ‘Whether you tackle it now or later, it wil take time to get used to the 30 oF so symbols thatthe sexipt has (not counting the so-called ‘conjunct” consonants), 20 it i best to go slowly in the beginning and spread out the lexning task overtime. In this section, you will, learn about the principles ofthe script, the shapes ofthe most com= ‘mon vowel letters, and a few of the consonant letters. The other letters will be introduced gradually over the course of the units that follow Bengali is written from lef to sight and the lines follow each ‘ther from top to bottom. A difference from English is that the Bengali letters are written not on the line, But RELOW the fine: each letter as it were hangs down from a line rather than standing on on as in English. You ean see this in the following example, which Contains the phrase meaning "my mother in Bengal printed script fand in trensitration, mate RT In this and many other eases the Bengali script works in a way Similar tothe alphabet, where one letter usally represents one sound You cam see the letter ¥ for the sound m, appearing in both amar Aand'ma, and the final letter 4 in amar, But you can so se thatthe {0 “a's in amar are written differently. This difference is due tothe following property of vowel leters in Bengali ‘Vowel letters in Bengali have two shapes + the ater shape s used elsewhere (Le. If the vowel comes et FFor the sound a, the two shapes are 1 (otlowing a consonant) 1 ma mother [BH elowhere) Sam mango For the vowel the symbols ace Egotiowing a consonant) {86 mil simiariy (elsewhere) imam Muslim clergyman [Note that the Pscen in St mil represents the sound 4 pronounced after a consonant (Le. after m), but its WRITTEN BEFORE the con Sonat leter. The spelling ofthe word mil also shows you another consonant letter, for L ‘Some vowel leters are wnrrreN niLow the consonant which, in pronunciation, they actually follow ~this is the ease forthe sound w ‘g(following a consonant) B ehewhere) rmukh mouth, face ‘un Una (Hind goddess, wile of Shiva) In the example word 34 you can see # further consonant letter: for kh “The vowel sound o is diferent again. When following a con- sonait in pronunciation, it takes the form of wo strokes WRETTEN ‘anouN® this consonant letter 1 (following & consonant) TT kot lap ‘6 (esewhere) For hisher “The word TET contains another new consonant letter: 7 fork ere is a summary of the Bengali letters you have seen so far. For ‘ach, write down what sound it represents. The fest one has been ‘done for yo20 Vowels Rengaileter @'T Ro fF 8 . @ ty Sound a SSS Consonants Bengali eter FXO Sound Exercise 2 (1) (cor: Using the Hist you have made in Exercise 1, now read each of the following. You vil recognise most words from the previous section, @a fe crm Oak sae Se a as 8 © ay ae Se @ oe a TR Here are four more consonants letters, with example words po StLpa foot 4 pukur pond bt a ball sand “Scat Rabo twill eat ¢ SBR eum you TE rat aight fn % SIAR anar pomegranate $14 khan Khan (Muslin ‘surname Exercise 3 “Match each of the Bengali items in column I with one of the English translations In column Tl 1 " 1 Sean ca 44 mother (and) father 2 se your mouth 3 cera Gan © my foot 4 Ton a your sister 5 ar {© mother (and) father 6 Scam hie sister 7 Maret e 8 SPR Se b ‘Were you able 10 work out the pronunciation ofthe last Bengali item? (This is something that welll come back to in Unit 6) And do you remember what the difference is between the last two Bengal tems? The Bengali script ‘The vowel leter in engali which requires most attention is the letter representing the sound O. When it doesnt follow a consonant, it has a clear shape Gt looks like a shortened version of 0), but tvhen following 4 vonsonant, it NOF WHITTEN AT ALL © 1 (fllowing © 1 KOI water jeonsonant) OT (clowhere) ER Omi itfeence "EA OmOr immortal “This means that a consonant on its own can represent a sequence ‘of that consonant followed by the sound O: such an © sound is ‘often called an “inberent” O. In fac, consonants written in isolation (@,%,B, Fete) are relerred to a6 KO, KO, mO, £0 ete, Le. the tonsonant followed by inherent O. "There is & complication involving the letter and the inherent vowel sound coming after 4 consonant. In some words, this is not the sound O but o. Two extmples ae ‘FF oti (100) much FR Kodi poet ‘You have already seen that there is a separate letter for the sound so in principle these words could (and perhaps should) be writen ‘with that letter. They would then look as follows: ‘of¥ ott ‘en obi For some words containing the sound o, both spellings exist (eg, the sevond syllable of SICA / WT4 khabo “wil ext) but for the large rajority the spelling is fixed. The ywo words given above, for example, flvays take the form &€8 and =, with the pronunciation being 0 "Another complication is that, ifa consonant is written without a vowel letter following it, can also stand for simply the consonant ‘ound. In the word STAT amra "we, for example, tho m is directly followed by the sound r, withowt any'O or in between, while ia the ‘word 84 OmOr ‘immortal there isan inherent O sound after the Tete ¥ but not after the letter #. This isa systematic ambiguity of the Bengali sept. ‘There are two devices in Rengal spelling that are sometimes used to resolve thin ambiguity. Fist a word has tWo consonants fo lowing each other and there is no inherent vowel after the fst one, {hin is often signalled by’ giving the second consonant (or sometimes the whole combination) x special shape. Two examples are the Words brote vow" ang pri ‘each To make clear thatthe sound in these words immediatly follows the bip, the ri writen notin i usual Shape of but inthe shape of a ithe squigale below the letter % or", EI mOra to die a (cor:FE broto vow 2 prot each ‘Whenever the r does take its usual shape (Le. 3), your best gues that there fs an inerent vos before it. Examples are: BOrat "good Tuck" and pOra “lo put on (clothes) “FATE hOrut good luck Al pOra to put on This leaves the ambiguity of word-fnal consonants. The spelling doesnot tell you whether they are followed by an inherent vowel (O for) or aot, The words Te and “6Te, for example, both end in the Teter in apeling, but broto has a final vowel in pronunciation, ‘while bOrat does nat. To solve thi problem, special sign can bo Used: the MOshonto, which i small stroke written below a consom {nt to indicate the absence of an inherent vowel I this hOshoato twas used, some of the words given above would Took as follows: are sy Unfortunately, in actual practice, the NOshonto is sekdom written (except in repeating words such as ©2E% OMOK ‘sparkling clean’). ‘This s because Bengal writing is geared to native speakers of the language, who know the exact pronunciations of words anyway. 0 thatthe spelling does not need to be precise in every single detail GF You find this strange, think ofthe English words thought, "hough’ ‘cough’, and rough and then try to figure out how systematic the spelling is) But for a learner of Bengal, these ambiguities of the ‘engali script are clearly troublesome. In thi book, we will there fore give a transiteraton of each new word that Is first introduced jn Bengali spelling, so that the pronunciation is always clearly shown, If you nest to check later, you ean turn to the Bengal English glossary at the back of the book, which gives all the words in transliteration, Exercise 4 elow are two lists: the first contains words in Bongali script, the sscond contains thei tansiterations, but in srambled order. Match 13 um a 22am} 3 © IMT © kan (you know this one!) 48 FITS probor strong The Bengali script S$ @ TAI pollo she said 6 8 SH tome bomb 78 1g KOpal (you know this one too) Sov fie bh tannaar 9 Tem | bala bracelet 10 30 7M j Kalo black [As you may have guessed, after the Arabic numbers marking the items in Exereite d, we have also given the numbers in Bengali serip Learn these Bengali numbers, Do yov remember how they are pro: nowneed? Can you also count down from 10 t0 I in Bengali? And ‘can you pronounce the following figure BL Rv, BY, BY, 9,8, 9, @ 8, 8,6, Be Do not continue until you can do allthis with ase ‘A final ambiguity of the Bengal expt lies inthe spelling of the 180 Vowel sounds e and w, as in tel oil and khla “to play” oF ekhame thee’ and ek ‘one’, These two different sounds are represented by the same Bengal eter: T(ollowing a consonant) COM tel oil ‘TMT una to play a (ehewhere) (ARTE ehhane here SF wk one Note thatthe sound e/w following a consonant sound is represented by letter that is tually put mivoRE the consgoant ia wating we have soon the same thing forthe letter f sin P Ai “wha “The ambiguity of F and in Bengali writing (si pronounced © ‘orm is ofcourse solved in the transliteration system that we we, ‘Asa general guideline, you may also want to remember that there fare more words with the sound e than with w, xo thatthe promuncia- tion e is more often the right one. The reason for this, and forthe lack of diferentiation of and s in spelling is that the sound 2 i relatively new in Bengali: few hundred yours apo it simply dide't IT i is really necessary to shove in Bengali script that the sound is meant, this can be done, though the device weed fori x somewhat ‘complicated, To show you how it works, you ist need to Testn the letter (usually called JO-fOla), This fetter can be written after a ‘consonant letter to indicate that the consonant is pronounced long ‘ST one other2 ‘The Bengt script 'A combination of this jO-40la with the letersT and ss some times used to write words containing the sound w. Look carefully hhow this is done G]_Miotowing consonant) 2H map map, baka ‘explanation 16 (eluewhere) a 8 Dialogue 1 () rcor29 Jenny is taking a Bengali language class. tm the school. she sees Dip ‘a Bangladeshi man whois taking an English class there. With Dipti ‘@'man eho Jenny doesn't know dip dip jen Tu seni: ip Tons dip slamalaikum jen, tum keemon acho? ‘walaikur-satam, dada, ami Bhalo ach. apni kemon achen? bhnalo. ¢ holo amar bondh slamaiaikum, ‘walaikumsalam, bat apai to besh bhalo bangla janen. apnar ham ki? Amar nam joni ekhane bangla shikhehi apnae nar Ki? ‘or nam Tune, she amar kjOn bhalo bondh faccha, dada, amar Klash shuru hoe jacche, ara skhon ja Khoda-hafe dipuda khoda-hafer, Tuntda. abar dekha hObe Khods-hafer Knodahafe. jeUnit: apne nam Ki? Dives Solan, Jenny, how are you? enw: Salam, elder brother, Tm fine. How are you? Drews Fine. This fe my frond Jest Sota TUN: Salam. Well well you really know Bengal quite wel. What's sess My name is Jenny. Um learning Bengali here. What's your Dieu: Hisname is Tums He's good friend of mine Jenny: Tse. Elder brother, my class Is starting, Tm going now: Goodbye, Dipu. Goodbye, Tura. We'll meet atin we: Goodbye Dive: Goodbye, Jenny: Vocabulary ‘meeting) he kamen how lan cho you are Okt ight sce ite ood ‘starting nda end s0odye (Muslin sh sell, wet Teavetking) ° realy, indeod, —abar ain ‘ctully hw bObe wel mest eat auie Addressing people () (cot: 34-35) In Dialogue 1, to words ae wsed corresponding to English 300 the polite pronoun apai (@#*fF¥) and the familiar pronoun tumi: Book meat ou but hey ae aed ire fap: to people that are older, higher in rank, or with whom you have no special relationship tumi: {© people that you know and thet are the same age or younger, oF that are lower in rank Apparently Dipu knows Jenny well, since he uses tuml to her. He must be older than Jenny, since she uses mp to hi She also doesn't Unit 1: What's your name? 29 tse his first mame, since that would not be polite. In such a cass, engali resorts tothe use of kinship terms, lke dada or haya (East frm) for'a somewhat older male (both words mean ‘elder brother), fl or apa (E) for a somewhat older female (elder sister), and {erms lke kaka or aca (E) (uncle) and kaki or eael(E) Caunt) oF [aki-ma or each (E) Caunt-mother? for people who are obviously older: The words dada, ddl and apa are sometimes combined with the first name, yielding poite-famillar forms ike dipu dada, jt dii, or Jeni apa (E). The fist two can be shortened to dipada and end ‘The distinction between tuml and apal is also important for the rammar of the verb, since they get eliflerent endings. The forms for the vero “to be” are ‘uml ksemon acho? How are you? (literally: YAMA you how are’) apni kemon achen? How are you? pour: Dialogue 1 also has the verb ending going with am (Sf) fami halo aehi I am fine (lit: I good am,20 Unit 1: apna nm ki? Unit 1: What's your name? a Possessive and plural forms ni and apa are: ‘tomar CSTE your tomar Kash your class “The postesive forms of paar SUP your apmar bondha your POLITE POSSESSIVE Tend ‘The words tum and apal also have plural forms, which must be used when addressing more than one person: tomes CEST tomra kamon acho? (Chow are you (pluraly") apoara SII apnara kamon achen? (Chow are you (plraly”) Although tomea and apnara are plural the verb forms are the same fas in the singular. This isa general rule in Bengal: verb forms for Singular and plural are always the same. So if we remind you that the word for we" is ama SEA, can you say. We are fine"? The intimate pronoun ‘There is one more pronoun meaning ‘you’ eal ZB, the intimate pronoun. Its used to very good fiends, young children and ser fits, but also to addrexs God. Since it can express close friendship ‘but also convey contempt, ie must be handled with care. To express close relationship, the use of tumi usualy suftices. The corresponding verb form, possessive and plural of eal are: tui kamon achisk? how are you? nomiare tor bond your friend IrstaTE: POSSESSIVE fora Kamion achish? how are you (plural)? mTIMATE PLURAL Exercise 1 () (cot Read the following mini-alogue slamalaikum, kaki, apni bhalo achen? ~ hf, Bhalo ach. tumi kiemon acho, babar? ami bhalo, © holo amar skuler bond = gecha, tomar nam ki? ~ amar nam shonTu, kaki el shonTu, klash shuru hoe jacehe, amra jai, kaki-ma, secha, Khoda-hate, 1 How many speakers are there? 2 What are their names and, roughly, their ages? Making simple sentences “There are two points to remember about making simple sentences + the ver usually comes at the end (though it ean be followed by na Bot) + the verb to be’ is often left out in sentences of the type am here" or he fa my fiend Some examples ilustrating these two principles ama Dhakae thaki We lve in Dhaka fmtam Khabo ma Ton" eat mango amar bot ekhane My Book is here fi bangladeshi Tam Bangladeshi Exercise 2 For this exercise, you need a pen (kOlom TR), a book (bot $8), a notebook (khata "72, an envelope kham ¥1H). 2 cup (kap 1"), a Ssucer (pire). 2 pen! (pens). a pair of scissors (kel or keel (E}). ‘newspaper (kbOborer hago) and a key (cab). After learning the ‘words for these objects, put some of them atthe far end of the table, Teaving others close by. Then say in Bengali where each objet is, amar bol ekhane, amar kel okhane, and s0 on. Next, move some objects around and say where they are now. Repeat several times. Exercise 3 [Now imagine thatthe objects of Exercise 2 belong to your younger brother Shon. Tell Shontw where his pea, book, ete. ate (ew hon, tomar bot ekhane, tomar kOtom okhane). “Then do the same thing, but imagine the objects ate your father’s (o say baba, apaar Khata ekhane, apnar kap okhane ee), Mai 1m Bengali questions the verb remains in its normal position atthe fend of the sentence. Furthermore, question words (eg. kl "what 19 questions2 Unit 1: apna nam ki? othae ‘where’, kao why”) do not have to come atthe beginning of the question, Look at the folowing examples. ‘apni Kothae thaken? Where do you live? (lit: you where live?) fami Ki Khabe? What do you want to ea? (it: you what ‘miles? “Where it his bicycle? (it his beyele where?) ‘But watch out withthe word Ki, Inthe example above it means "what However in qocstions which require the answer yes oF no". "Are {You earning Bengall?), Kiss another meaning allt does i signal thatthe sentence is question, This word Klis often placed after the fiat word or word group of the question sentence. It is unsressed. or saikel Kothac? tum Ki bangla shikicho? {mt Ai hind! fan? ‘Are you learning Bengali? Do you know Hindi? pn ki Kolkatae thaken? Do you live in Kolkata (Caleuta)? fapnar me-e Ki ckhane? Is your daughter here? Bt since questions, just like in English, also have special question intonation, the question marker ki ean be Ie out, eg. apar me-e tkhane? "Ts your daughter here” Exercise 4 You are at Bengali function, where you meet several people. Ask them the following questions. Where appropriate, stsay akTa prose Korte parft ‘Can Task a question” literally: a question do I-can?) 1 (your Bengalt teacher) — Is your daughter here? 2 (to. fellow student who is older than you) - How are you? 3 (io a young boy) Do you know Bengali? 4 (Go one of the musicians) ~ What is your name? 5 (toe good friend) ~ Shall we eat some mango? 6 (toa pervon that you've just met) ~ Where do you live? Dialogue 2 () (eor:2n Mark is sitting n a Bengal restaurant in London. He tals with the uner (malik) about what Kinds of people like Bengali fod (every= body rar ou! mark: nOmoshkar. Inalik: Omoshkar, are! apni bangla janen? Unit 1: What's your name? a3 mark: ji, Olpo ekTu jani ami bangali Khabar khub bhalobsi Imalik: Atcha. Oneke- bangali Khabar pOchondo Ore. mark: elesTurenTe Ki onno dether lok o athe? aki shudhu buiTish ar bengali ashe? malik: shOb desher Tok ashe. takie dekhun — ekhane skjOn pakistani bhOddrotok boshe achen, ckhane ekjoRa markin ‘GOmpoti, duiOn coinik mohila,o kjOn mishorio chatto, tachatRs-o Onek Dharoti lok ashe, ‘mark: tal to dekh, apnar resTurenTer khabar mone hOe khub ‘alo, malik: ta Thik, apnar nisheOei khide pe-eche, apni ki khaben boi, Manx: Hello, Owner: Hell, My, my! You know Bengali? Mani: Yes, F know a litle bit 1 fike Bengali food very much OWNER: Good. Many people ike Bengal! food Manik: Do people from other countries also come this restaurant? (Or do only British and Bongall people come here? People from all counries come here. Look — here, a Pakistan! gentleman is sting. there an American couple, ‘iso Chinese ladies, and an Egyptian student. Also, many Indian people come here Manx: Tee, indeed. The food in your restaurant is very good. I Owner: Ownen: That's right, You must be hungry Tellme, what would you ike to car? Vocabulary sOmeher bello ute athey comets) i Ses (polit form: E) shady only Otpo kta ile ~ sad Khabar food soy ab sery. very much fakledetn look haloes Tove BhOddroiok gentleman Onkol ssany people Base achen sting is seated Oconto beltey ke) soa sia) pair Kore SOmpot — coupte4 Unit 1: apne iam ki? Unit 1: What's your name? facade) desis ” tat Once many Thi ant ta oat thee erty, sorely eked Tacs, tscems—apmar Khe pe-eche You are hunny Vocabulary: greetings and leave-takings ‘The general word for saying ‘hello’ (and also ‘goodbye’ in Bengali ‘used to be nOmoshkar. Iti sill used widely by Hindus, Buddhists fand Christians. But among Muslims, the Atabic form slamalaikum (Gr its Tonger form, avsalam-alakum) is now usual. The proper reply to itis walaikum-salam, For lesve-taking, both parties We Koda hafer (or allal-hafe). Bengals appreciate tif you use the form that they would normally use. An informal greeting that does not show religious affiliation i ‘dnb, which is used for leaverlaking as well Vocabulary: nationalities Some names of nationalities and countries a Banglades Samet val indian tare Sana, Nd, aml, tc Burmese ton Coen Palin; pakntanh paket rd, pana shndi Tesnian pant parse Fart Egyptian mishorio Or ao Chinese” Gatco Ge ct English igre tit ret Brith Hei ukto-nfo (UK) Inge French {Ora fae Trash ‘American markin—_jaklo-rastr (US) age ‘The word bangall Bengali’) does not express a nationality but 1 cultural identity, shared by all speakers of bangla in bangladesh ‘and posheim bangla ‘West Bengal) in Dharot. Aller the name of language, the word Dasha ‘language’ i often added: bangla Bhass bormf Dhasha tc. (the Bengali/Burmese etc. language). To say “tndians’, Pakistanis’ ct. -ra i added after the name ofthe naton- ty: Bharotors, pakistanira, ct. Exercise 5 Make a card for each nationality/eountry given above, writing the English words on one side and the Bengali oncs on the other. Learn the terms. Then shuffle the cards and pick out we with the Eoglish {ext facing you. Suppose you have picked out Indian’ and "Feench’ ‘Then say in Bengal nOmoskbikar. ekTa prosao Korte par? aml bharotio. ami Olpo (CkTu fOrashi Dasha jan pal iOrashi? (Cello, May Task a question? Lam Indian, 1 know a tittle French, Are you French”) (Or suppose you have picked out ‘Chinese’ and "Egyptian. Then say ‘nOmoskhkar. #kTa prosno korte par? ami coinik. ami Olpo ‘Tu arbi asa jan. apni ki mishorio? (Hello. May Task a question? Tam Chinese, U know a lite ‘Arabi: Are you Fayptian?) Go through the cards several times in this way. Dialogue 3 ()) (co1:38) Jonny is applying fora visa for Bangladesh. An officer atthe Bangladesh High Commission i» London writes down some base data about her. Kaunselor: apnar nam ki? Jeni: ‘amar nam jeni smith Kunselor: apni Kon desher nagorik? Jeni: fami Batis Kaunselor: spnar Thikana bOlen. seni: ‘ami fOnDone thaki, wegaro nOmbor, niu feTar len, js ear pi car kaunselor: apnar fon nOmbor bOlen. sei: fmnar fon nOmbor shunno dui shunno- dui echOe shat plc nOe aT shat ek kaunselor: pai ki kaj KOren? se: fini atkjOn shebika. «kT hashpatate kaj kor Kaunselor: sccha. ami shOD likhechi, apni okhane boshe ekTu ‘Opekkha KOven