Hausa

Conjugate Verbs

Facts

  • Language: Hausa
  • Alternate names: Hausawa, Haoussa, Abakwariga, Mgbakpa, Habe, Kado
  • Language code: hau
  • Language family: Afro-Asiatic, Chadic, West Chadic, West Chadic A, West Chadic A.1
  • Number of speakers: 24162000
  • Script: Latin script

More information:

    Introduction

    Hausa is an Afro-Asiatic language of the Chadic group. It is the official language of northern Nigeria and is used throughout much of western Africa as a second language. The two most important Hausa dialects are those of the Nigerian cities of Sokoto and Kano.

    Standard literary Hausa, based on the dialect of Kano, was formerly written in an Arabic-based alphabet but has been written in an orthography based on the Roman (Latin) alphabet since the early decades of the 20th century.

    The verb

    Hausa verbs are not inflected for tense, person or number. Tense is indicated by a marker attached to a preverbal pronoun; however sometimes this marker is only in the tone or vowel length change of the basic pronoun.

    Notes