Sounds, Tones and Special Letters
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Lesson overview
How Xhosa is written and pronounced: tones and special letters.
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Pacing
Read the stem stem-last (question clause first), eliminate two distractors, then verify constraints.
How Languages marks this
Focus on how Languages scenarios frame constraints, qualifiers ("FIRST", "BEST", "MOST likely"), and boundary cases.
Watch out for
Technically true statements that do not solve the specific constraint in the scenario.
Lesson content
Overview
Xhosa (isiXhosa) is spoken in South Africa, especially the Eastern and Western Cape. Before learning phrases, get to know how it sounds and how it is written.
How It's Written
Xhosa is written in the Latin alphabet. It is famous for its click sounds, written c, q and x (and in combinations such as gq and nx). It is tonal, though tones are not marked in writing. Nouns start with class prefixes — the language itself is isiXhosa.
Examples
Here are some of the greetings you'll learn in the next lesson: • Molo — Hello (to one person) • Molweni — Hello (to several people) • Unjani? — How are you? • Wamkelekile — Welcome
Learning Tip
Practise the clicks slowly on their own — c (like a disapproving "tsk"), q (a pop like a cork) and x (the sound for urging on a horse) — before saying whole words.
Practise
Say every word aloud, then take the 10-question check below (60% to pass) to unlock the next lesson. Stuck? Ask the AI tutor about this lesson. This course is in beta: it sticks to common, everyday language, but it has not yet been reviewed by native speakers, and many phrases have regional variants. If something looks wrong, please tell us.
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