Splash Biography

Is learning a new language on your bucket list? Want to learn how to greet people in Pulaar, a dialect of one of the most widely spoken West African languages today? You're at the right place! Come and learn some basic Pulaar and scratch out that wish from your bucket list.

Got two hours to grapple with the third most widely spoken language in West Africa? Then, Crash Course: Fulfulde might just be the kosan (milk) to your bon-bon (cookie). What is Fulfulde? Fulfulde – also known as Fulani, Peul, Pulaar, Toucouleur, and Fula - is the language of the Fulbe, cattle-raising and farming people of Nigeria, Senegal, Mali, Guinea, Cameroon, and Niger. Pulaar in spoken in over twenty countries in Africa, and while Fula speakers are not a majority in any country they live, in Guinea they represent a plurality of the population (the largest single group). At the end of this Crash Course, students will be able to greet, answer and ask basic questions, and communicate their basic needs in Pulaar. The standard Pulaar Latin-based alphabet will be the primary writing system. Why should YOU sign up for this class? “Si bahe cumɗi gooto fof ñifata ko waare mum.” If the beards are all on fire, each person must put out his own beard (Pulaar proverb). That’s why.