Igbo, our reference, is natively spoken by approximately 38 million people, predominantly in Nigeria, where it is one of the country’s major languages. Belonging to the Niger-Congo language family, Igbo uses the Latin alphabet and features an analytic grammar structure with subject-verb-object (SVO) word order. It has a tonal system with two tones, which are crucial for distinguishing meaning. Igbo culture is rich with oral traditions, proverbs, and folklore, reflecting the heritage of the Igbo people and their diverse communities. (We used Standard Igbo as a grammatical reference).
Stats
Language Family: Niger-Congo
Writing System: Latin
Writing System Type: Alphabet
Writing Direction: L to R
Tones / Pitch Accent: 2
Morphology: Analytic
Cases: 0
Grammatical Gender / Noun Class: None
Number of Verb Tenses: 5
Word Order: SVO
Number of Vowels (Monophthongs): 8
Number of Consonants: 22
Areas Where Spoken
Nigeria (17.0%) (38 mil)
Resources
Books
News
Lessons
Igbo Village Square: Grammar and pronunciation
Live Lingua: Basic course
Phrasebooks
omniglot.com: Phrases
okwuid.com: Phrases and vocab
Wikitravel: Igbo phrasebook
Podcasts
Igbo Podcast: Igbo culture
Ikenga Nation Podcast: Trending topics and latest gist from Nigeria
Radio
YouTube Channels
Ije the World Traveler - Teaches You Igbo!: Cartoons for teaching Igbo to children
Okwu ID: Culture and language
OriakuTv: Nigerian movies
Nollywood Igbo Movies: Igbo Movies
Websites
Forvo: Pronunciation of words in Igbo
Igbo Guide: Culture and Language
learn101.org: Vocab, grammar, phrases