How's your Maori?

Where I lived in Zimbabwe, the vaShona spoke chiShona and it became woven through everyday conversations in what we called Shonglish. While not acceptable in written or formal usage, it did form a bridge between cultures.

Te Reo Maori, the language of the
people groups commonly referred to as Maori, is even more interspersed with English as New Zealand functions as a bi-cultural society.

In various parts of New Zealand you are as likely to hear Mandarin, Samoan or Afrikaans as English or Maori, so multi-cultural might be a better tag for the big cities of NZ.

If you live in or hope to visit New Zealand, check out the following site to see how Te Reo Maori rolls off your tongue.

100 Maori words every New Zealander should know.

If you'd like to jump in and learn a bit more, Korero Maori might be of help or check in any NZ library or community education programme for more info.

I know just enough of several languages to make myself dangerous. Maybe I'll sign up for some lessons. I did the test of a handful of commonly used Maori words and only got 3 wrong. How can you do?

Comments

Rachael said…
Ooh, I got them all right! That's a bit of a surpise - I certainly don't use them in every day language...