Explore grammar guide articles about swahili
Swahili adjectives explained: inflecting Bantu stems (-zuri, -baya, -kubwa, -dogo) with class prefixes, invariable Arabic loans (safi, rahisi, ghali), colors, and comparison.
Learn the Swahili alphabet and pronunciation: 24 letters, pure vowels, digraphs (ch, sh, ny, ng', dh, th, gh), penultimate stress, and fixes for common English-speaker mistakes.
Swahili's Arabic vocabulary explained: 30-40% of the lexicon, loan patterns, phonological adaptations, religion/commerce/time vocabulary, and native-loan doublets.
Swahili dialect guide: Kiunguja (Zanzibar standard), Kimvita (Mombasa), Kiamu (Lamu), Kingwana (Congo), Tanzanian vs Kenyan Swahili, and Sheng urban slang explained.
Essential Swahili phrases for travel and daily life: greetings (Jambo, Habari, Hujambo, Shikamoo), shopping, directions, food, emergencies, and cultural context.
Master Swahili noun classes: all 18 classes explained with prefixes, agreement patterns for M-/Wa-, M-/Mi-, Ki-/Vi-, N-/N-, U-, Ku-, and locatives. Full tables and examples.
Complete Swahili numbers guide: 1-1000, noun class agreement for 1-5, invariable Arabic loans from 6, ordinals, large numbers (elfu, milioni), and Swahili time.
Swahili prepositions explained: na, kwa, ya/wa/la, the locative suffix -ni, compound prepositions (juu ya, chini ya, mbele ya), and the three-way -po, -ko, -mo distinction.
Swahili pronouns explained: independent pronouns, subject prefixes, object infixes, possessive stems that agree with noun class, and three-distance demonstratives.
Complete Swahili verb conjugation guide: subject prefixes, tense markers (-na-, -li-, -ta-, -me-, -ki-), negation, object infixes, and monosyllabic verbs. Full tables.
Over 100 essential Swahili phrases for travel, shopping, emergencies, and daily conversation. Includes Tanzanian and Kenyan variations with pronunciation and cultural context.
Comprehensive reference for Swahili food vocabulary: ugali, pilau, chapati, samaki, mboga, and matoke; meals, East African cuisine terms, restaurant phrases, and cooking verbs.
