Miskito language

Miskito ( Miskitu in the Miskito language ) is a spoken on the east coast of Nicaragua and Honduras in several slightly different dialects of the people of the Miskito Indian language.

From the Miskito following dialects are known: Miskito of Honduras or Mam (not to be confused with the Mam from the Mayan language family ), Tawira, Baymuna, Wangki and Kabu.

Background

With 180,000 people Miskito is one of the most spoken languages ​​of Nicaragua and Honduras. Also English and Spanish loan words are stressed on the first syllable. Miskito is written in Latin script. Miskaya means fishing on Miskito Miskitu called Fischer; the Miskito understand it themselves so that they refer to themselves as fishermen.

The language is unlike other Indian languages ​​of the region very easy to learn. There are no plural of nouns, verbs and not at. Nouns have as with all indigenous languages ​​of the Americas no gender, the vocabulary has significantly less vocabulary than European languages. All words are always stressed on the first syllable. There are only three vowels (a, i, u ), the consonants are all very easy to pronounce. Miskito contains not only many European loanwords, but has, in contrast to many other Indian languages ​​also adapted very well to European ways of thinking. Miskito is sometimes also spoken as a second or lingua franca.