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The Berber people, or Imazighen, as they refer to themselves, inhabit North Africa west of the Nile Valley. Berber is mostly spoken in the countries of Algeria, Morocco, Niger, Mali and Libya. The Berber languages are a group of 26 closely related languages. The oldest known Berber inscriptions date back to the 4th century BC, but Berber-speaking people have lived in North Africa since at least 3,...

Bulgarian was the first Slavic language to be written. It first appeared in writing during the 9th century using the Glagolitic alphabet, which was gradually replaced by an early version of the Cyrillic alphabet over the following centuries. Bulgarian is very closely related to Macedonian, the two languages being largely mutually intelligible. Bulgaria is located at the crossroad between Europe an...

Catalan is a Romance language named after Catalonia, in northeastern Spain and adjoining parts of France. It's spoken in three regions of Spain: Catalonia, Valencia and the Balearic Islands. Outside Spain, it is the official language of Andorra. It is also spoken in some parts of France and Italy. This beautiful language is not, as some believe, a dialect of Spanish, but developed independently ou...

Chichewa, also know as Nyanja or Chinyanja, is a Bantu language spoken in parts of Southern Africa. It is the official language in Malawi, Zambia, and also spoken by some in Mozambique and Zimbabwe. "Chi" means language. The Chewa (or Nyanja) have a rich tradition of folktales, historical narratives, music-making, dancing, and craft making. As agriculturalists, they live in villages that consist o...

Learn Mandarin and learn a culture. At the heart of the Chinese civilization is its rich heritage of novels, poetry, drama, reflecting thousands of years of insights and values. One fifth of the planet speaks Chinese. Mandarin Chinese is the mother tongue of over 873 million people, making it the most widely spoken first language in the world. In addition to China, Mandarin Chinese is also spoken ...

This beautiful language is steeped in a culture of close family relationships and traditions, with a strong cultural heritage of songs, costumes, dancing, cultural rituals, and folk tales Learn Croatian, a language born in the 9th century and now the official language in six countries, all in South-Eastern Europe, and spoken mainly in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Did you know? It's also the of...

Its unique geographical position at the heart of Europe means that the Czech culture has embraced influences from both Eastern and Western Europe, developing a very distinctive culture. The great thing about learning Czech is that you will also be well on your way to picking up the other Slavic languages, such as Slovak and Polish. Did you know? The capital city of Prague is also known as the "Cit...

Danish has developed from Old Norse, spoken in Scandanavia. It is a language of culture generating many pioneering major works of literature; think of Kierkegaard, Hans Christian Andersen and Karen Blixen. Historically, the Danish combine an initial reserve with a friendly outlook. Embrace Danish and embrace the culture of ‘hygge’. ‘Hygge’ roughly translates as the notion of a cosy and war...

Also known as Afghan Persian, Dari is the the variety of Persian spoken in Afghanistan, where it is one of the two official languages along with Pashto, and the lingua franca among the different language communities. Dari is also used as the main medium of instruction in Afghan schools, and has contributed to many Asian languages such as Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi and Bengali. A very straight forward an...

The Dutch are famous for being pragmatic and preferring a direct style of communication, at the same time as favoring modesty, and this is reflected in their language. With its rich culture, Dutch is also the language of the Dutch Masters such as Rembrandt and Vermeer and Fran Hals, as well as the ever popular Van Gogh. Learning Dutch is een goed idee (good idea) as it's easy to learn and very coo...