Hindi Lessons/Lesson 0

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Hindi is written with a script called devanagari. Once the script is learned, Hindi is a very easy to read language, since the script is very phonetic. A given character is pronounced the same way every time with very few exceptions, making it logical and easy to read. The script looks unusual at first and to a beginner all the characters look alike. The primary difficulties with the script are that there are some letters that are written before another character, but pronounced after it, and that there are a number of letter combinations where one character is formed from two others.

We'll start with a few consonants - 'h, n, d, m, r, k'. For now we'll consider them out of order just to get an idea how they work. They'll be presented in order later.

[edit] ह

That's the letter for the sound "H" as in "Hindi". It's easy to pronounce, it sounds just the same as the English h in hum. Every Hindi consonant "inherits" the schwa vowel / ə / with it unless it is otherwise marked but it is not typically pronounced at the end of a word. The schwa sound is pronounced as the initial a in about or the vowel sound in the. So the character ह "h" you have to read as "ha". This will become clear after learning some more characters and seeing some examples.

न The next letter we learn is "na". It's almost the same as the English "n". Now join the two together (by the only two possible ways) and pronounce them.

हन At first sight, this looks probably to you like "hn", and it is, you're right. But with every consonant comes the vowel 'a', so we have to read that as "han", remembering the final vowel is not pronounced. In the ancient language Sanskrit that Hindi decends from that last "a" was pronounced. For example the name of Buddha would be pronounce from a contemporary Hindi speaker as "Siddharth Gautam Buddh", but not as it's known round the world: Siddharta Gautama Buddha. नह That's would be of course "nah"

द That's "d" as in "hindi", pronounced with the tongue a little flatter against the back of the teeth. Consonants pronounced this way are known as dental consonants. There is another D in Hindi, which is pronounced with the toungue touching the roof of the mouth. This position is called retroflex by linguists. More retroflex consonants will be discussed later. म That's the M as in "magnet", so same as English M. If we join two Ms we'll have a word, which will be pronounced in Hindi exactly the same way as the English "mom": मम र R as in "roll". No need of further explanations. क K as in "keen", so same as Englis k.

The reason for starting with the consonants is that in Hindi there exist two types of vowel letters - vowel marks called matras and detached vowel letters. The matras are more often than the detached vowels. There is one simple rule about where to use the two types of vowels: If you have to start a word with a vowel or you have to write a vowel after another vowel the detached vowel is used. In all other cases you have to use the vowel marks. All that will be cleared out after we've learned some vowels.

We'll start with the vowel marks: (I hope you remember, that every consonant comes with an "a" unless otherwise marked so there is no matra for that sound)

ा ā That's the vowel "ā" - a straight vertical line is the matra or vowel mark. It is similar to the a in father. The dashed little circle left of it isn't written at all, it just stands in the place of where any consonant would be. Here is a consonant with the ā matra: हा

ि i That's the short "i", pronounced as the i in English "hit" or as a shortened version of the vowel in see. The most important thing about it, you should certainly know, is that it's written before a consonant, but read after it! Thus हि is pronounced hi.

ी ī That's the long version of the "i" (ee), pronounced as the English "ee" in "see". It's written after the consonant. With a character it looks like: ही.

ो o O as in "domain". With ह is looks like: हो.

ौ au au may be pronounced a lot like an English "o", though some dialects pronounce it as a dipthong. With ह it looks like: हौ. ू ū That's the long u as in "coooool". हू ु u That's the short u, as in "look". हु े e This e is pronounced as in the e in grey. Together with ह this would be: हे. ै ai That's also an e. It's e, but a bit closed sound and some speakers pronounce it as a dipthong. है

An important thing, before we continue. A dot over a vowel nasalizes it, forcing some of the expired air through the nasal cavity. When pronounced, this nasalized vowel is similar to adding a slight n or ng sound. Let's have a look at that "dot":

ं That letter (a dot) put over a letter nasalizes it. For example if we have dot over no, we'll pronounce that as "no~" (sometimes written as non) - exactly the same as the French word for "no". नो -> नों (no -> no~). In the lessons the nasalized letter is noted as ~.

These are all the basic vowel marks, allowing us to write some words, using the letters learned so far:

हिंदी - At last! We can write "hindi". Now let's have a closer look. First we see that the word starts with "i", but since that is the short i matra, it is written before but pronounced after the next consonant. So knowing that we have to look at the next letter. It's "h". So far we have "hi", next we see the dot, for which I told you that you should nasalize, so "hi~" (hin). Next too letters: D and the long "i". Now we can read the whole word: "hindi". This word can also be written with the na character written explicitly (in shortened form in this case) as: हिन्दी.

Some more words with what we know so far:

है - "hai". Means "is".

हैं - "hai~" (hain), meaning 'are'.

मैं - "mai~" = I

Next come the Detached forms of the Vowels:

First, a word about them. They're used after a vowel or at the beginning of a word, which starts with a vowel. They have exactly the same pronounciation as when used with the vowel marks:

अ a That's the sound, which is equivalent of the "inherited a", I told you about - which comes after every consonant, if there is not other vowel. आ ā Equivalent of ा. इ i Same as the short i vowel mark. ई ī Same as the long i vowel mark. ओ o Same as the O vowel mark. औ au Same as AU vowel mark. उ u Same as short u vowel mark. ऊ ū Same as long u vowel mark.

ए e Same as e vowel mark. ऐ ai Same as ai vowel mark.

As I told you those sounds are pronounced exactly the same way as the vowel marks, so no need to explain here. I'll just give you some examples:

एक - "ek" = one

उन्नीस - "unnīs" = nineteen

आप - "aap" = you

उनका - "unka" = Their

अब - "ab" = now

आंख - "aankh" = eye

अच्छा - "acchā" = good

और - "aur" = and

भाई - "bhai" = brother

Don't bother about the letters you don't know, we'll learn them shortly. The more important thing is that you should recognize and see the detached vowels. Now I'll continue with comparatively a full list of Hindi consonants. Learning them enable you to read many words in Hindi. Of course there are also combinations of characters to learn which will be the final step. The consonants are now shown in groups in their traditional order representing their pronunciation classes.

Gutturals (sound is made from the back of throat)

• क ख ग घ ङ
• k kh g gh ng

Palatals (sound is made by the tongue touching the hard palate)

• च छ ज झ ञ
• c ch j jh ñ

Cerebrals (sound is made by rolling the tongue)

• ट ठ ड ढ ण
• T Th D Dh N

Dentals (sound is made by the tongue touching the teeth)

• त थ द ध न
• t th d dh n

Labials (sound is made with lips closed or almost closed)

• प फ ब भ म
• p ph b bh m

Semi Vowels (pronounced with lips and throat open)

• य र ल व
• y r l v/w

Sibliants / Aspirants

• श ष स ह ज़
• sh ssh s h z

Compound and Others

• क्ष त्र ज्ञ श्र ऋ
• ksh tr gy shr ri

Double Letters (formed only from one consonant, but which is doubled..., actually easy to spot) (* Note that on some browsers you won't see the letters propertly and instead of seeing one letter under another, you'll see one letter left to another with the first letter having under it the special mark, called "viraama" to make it semi-consonant.) क्क ट्ट ठ्ठ त्त न्न ड्ड द्द KK TT TTH T'T' NN (*Note the similarity with TR) DD D'D'

Now, just one thing before we end the lesson, and it's very important thing: half consonants. I told you that every consonant comes with the vowel "a" with it. So when you see "sm" you should read this as "sam". But what if you want to say something that begins with "sm", not "sam". When one wants to mute the inherited a-vowel, there is a special mark called "virama". It's put below the letter and if you see a letter with such mark you don't have to pronounce "A" after it. Let us see how that virama-thing looks like:

टम = T + m = Tam ट्म = T + virama + M = Tm

You see the small mark under the T? I bet you do! Well, that's the virama, it mutes the a, so we pronounce "Tm", not "Tam". However as much as useful it may be, it's not used that much in handwriting because almost all consonants in Hindi have their "half consonant" equivalent, so it's not necessary to write the virama, but instead of this one has to write the corresponding half consonant. Half consonant are extremely easy to notice, since they look like the left half of a consonant. Here is an example:

सक = s + k = sak स्क = Half s + k = sk

Some half letters do combine with the next consonant and change shape. I'll give you some of the most used (i.e. those which you may encounter more often):

Half Letter + n: (again: on some browsers you won't see the proper combinations, but consonant + virama + n)

ब् + न = ब्न ह् + न = ह्न ग् + न = ग्न द् + न = द्न प् + न = प्न र् + न = र्न * that needs an extended explanation, see below क् + न = क्न त् + न = त्न म् + न = म्न व् + न = व्न स् + न = स्न

Half Letter + R:

ब् + र = ब्र ह् + र = ह्र ग् + र = ग्र द् + र = द्र ज् + र = ज्र ड् + र = ड्र प् + र = प्र र् + र = र्र * that needs an extended explanation, see below क् + र = क्र त् + र = त्र च् + र = च्र ट् + र = ट्र म् + र = न्र न् + र = न्र व् + र = व्र ल् + र = ल्र स् + र = स्र य् + र = य्र

Note how similar the "half letter + n" and "half letter + r" are. There is only one little difference, something like e little hook on the N version.

Half r + Consonant:

The half R, followed of course by consonant, is showed by a mark over the second consonants. This mark looks the same as the mark which differentiate the short i detached vowel from the long detached vowel i. Remember if you see that mark read it as R, but before the consonant it modifies. Some examples:

र्ह, र्स, र्म, र्न, र्ज, र्द, र्ट, र्त

That letters should be read, according to their order: rh, rs, rm, rn, rj, rd, rT, rt

So, that's it. You've learned as much as you'll need to know to be able to read most Hindi texts. For example, you can test yourself by reading (although not understanding) the Hindi version of the web-site of BBC, there you can find some names of countries or famous people, written in Devangari. That's what I did to show you some examples:

• पाकिस्तान = Pakistan
• ताजमहल = Tajmahal
• केनेडी = Kennedy
• बग़दाद = Baghdad
• क्रिकेट = Cricket
• वेबगाइड = Webguide
• इंटरनेट = Internet
• माइक्रोसॉफ़्ट = Microsoft
• इराक़ = Iraq
• सद्दाम हुसैन = Saddam Husein
• ग़ज़ा = Gaza
• इसराइल = Izrael
• इंडोनेशिया = Indonesia
• मेडागास्कर = Madagascar
• श्रीलंका = Sri Lanka
• ईरान = Iran
• कॉलिन पॉवेल = Colin Powel
• अल्जीरिया = Algeriya
• बुश = Bush (yeah, the president of the USA)
• अमरीका = America
• यूरोप = Europe
• तुर्की = Turkey
• यूरो = Euro
• कोरिया = Korea