It is the result of mixing Italian with Somalo and was used mainly in the first half of the 20th century in the area of Mogadishu (the Somalian capital).
After the Somalia independence in 1960 has started to disappear.
Characteristics
Nearly 66% of the words used in this Somalia's Pidgin italian are loanworded from the Italian language; and the same happens with nearly 20% in the Somali language.
For example, the words for the months of the year are very similar (in Somali & Pidgin) to those of the Italian language[1]:
Months of the year
English/Italian
Somali & Pidgin
Latin
Osmanya
January/Gennaio
Janaayo
𐒃𐒜𐒒𐒚𐒓𐒖𐒇𐒘
February/Febbraio
Febraayo
𐒍𐒛𐒁𐒇𐒚𐒓𐒖𐒇𐒘
March/Marzo
Maarso
𐒑𐒛𐒃
April/Aprile
Abriil
𐒖𐒁𐒇𐒕𐒐
May/Maggio
Maajo
𐒑𐒖𐒕
June/Giugno
Juun
𐒃𐒓𐒒
July/Lugliio
Luuliyo
𐒃𐒓𐒐𐒛𐒕
August/Agosto
Agoosto
𐒝𐒌𐒖𐒈
September/Settembre
Sebteembar
𐒈𐒘𐒁𐒂𐒖𐒑𐒁𐒖𐒇
October/Ottobre
Oktoobar
𐒙𐒏𐒂𐒝𐒁𐒖𐒇
November/Novembre
Nofeembar
𐒒𐒝𐒍𐒖𐒑𐒁𐒖𐒇
December/Dicembre
Diseembar
𐒆𐒕𐒈𐒑𐒁𐒖𐒇
According to Mauro Tosco only italian nouns (not articles or verbs) have entered in the Somali language & Somalia's Pidgin Italian. And the nouns are borrowed always in their singular form.[2].
The morphology of the somali language never uses in the end of the words the "a", like in some italian words. So, it is always used the "o" in the loan. Examples: italian "carta" (paper/map) is "Kaarto" in somali; "farmacia" (pharmacy) is "farmashiyo" and "cartolina" (postcard) is "kaartoliino"[3]
Italians loans are particularly present in the semantic field of mechanics, bureaucracy and construction. There are also a large number of words relating to the sphere of medicine and the military army, as well as many items of clothing and some names of foods. Another, relatively large, group of words concerns political institutions: these are presumably casts of Italian (and in some cases of English, but originally these were from latin loanwords in english language) which became necessary when documents had to be drawn up officially in Somali for the first time - such as, for example, with the Constitution[4].
Giorgio Banfi's main book [5] is probably the only existing complete analysis of Italian as spoken in Somalia based upon a corpus of actual sentences. Banti's corpus was written in 1990 and was very small and drawn from two speakers only, namely, two Somali women employed as house workers by Italian expatriates in the eighties. A simplified and unstable form of Italian -according to Banfi- very probably continued to be in use among uneducated Somali when entering in contact with the Italian community. It is also possible that its use was actually boosted in the seventies and eighties: formal education in Italian was no longer available, while the number of educated Somali of the older generations (often speaking “good” Italian) and of Italian residents (many of them with a certain command of Somali) was slowly decreasing.
At the same time, there was a burgeoning number of Italian expatriates working in technical cooperation and education, many of them spending relatively short periods of time in the country.......Certainly the points in common between this "Simplified (or pidgin) Italian of Somalia" and the "Restructured Italian Pidgin of Eritrea" are striking: is there a common origin? This seems to be the answer adumbrated by Banti, who hints at a "common tradition” rather than to "parallel developments”, without further elaboration. One can hypothesize that the Eritrean troops deployed to Somalia by the Italian authorities during the colonial times may have acted as middlemen in the acquisition of a modicum of Italian on the part of Somalis, especially in Mogadishu.
The pidgin italian of Somalia is similar to the pidgin italian of Eritrea, because many eritrean colonial troops were in Italian Somalia in the late 1920s and these soldiers interacted with the civilian native population of Somalia speaking with "italianised" words that could be understood by everybody[6].....and so these words and sentences were accepted by the Somalians in their pidgin.
Indeed in the Italian pidgin of Somalia it is common the use of Italian participles as past or perfective markers. It seems reasonable to assume that these similarities have been transmitted through Italian "foreigner talk" stereotypes.
Two examples of full similarity between the Italian Pidgin of Eritrea and the one of Somalia: 1) luy andato lospεdale; in Italian: "È andato all’ospedale" (in English: "he has gone to the hospital") 2) o bεrduto soldi ki tu dato bεr me; in Italian: "ho perso i soldi che mi hai dato" (in English: "I have lost the money you gave me")
History
1939 map showing the farm area around Merca and Genale/Vittorio di Africa, where was spoken the Somalia's pidgin italian by many natives
This pidgin started in the 1920s and soon fully developed in the most developed area of italian Somalia (the triangle "Mogadiscio-Merca/Genale-Villabruzzi"), with the capital as the center where was mainly spoken in the late 1930s.
Almost all of Mogadishu's native inhabitants understood the Italian language in 1941, while more than 2/3 of them could speak a kind of Italian using "Somalia's Pidgin Italian", according to D'Ambrosio[7].
Indeed during the Trust Territory of Somaliland of the United Nations Trusteeship period from 1949 to 1960, Italian along with Somali were used at an official level internally, while the main working language of the UN, English, was the language used in diplomatic, international and occasionally economic correspondence.
After independence in 1960, the Italian remained an official language for another nine years. Italian was later declared an official language again by the Transitional Federal Government along with English in 2004. But, in 2012, it was removed from the Interim Constitution of the Federal Government of Somalia, leaving Somali and Arabic as the only official languages.
Italian is a legacy of Somalia's Italian colonial period when it was part of the Italian Empire. Italian - of course - was the mother tongue of the Italian settlers in Somalia.
The Somali school system in the colonial era before World War II was in the Italian language and was mainly limited to primary schools and some secondary schools (such as the "Scuola Regina Elena" of the capital). But in the capital Mogadishu of "Italian Somalia" there was an important secondary school: The "Lyceum De Bono" of Mogadishu. In this Lyceum, the "National Institute of Legal, Economic and Social Studies" was created in the early 1950s as a post-secondary school in the Italian language for pre-university studies to access Italian universities.
Although it was the primary language since colonial rule, Italian continued to be used among the country's ruling elite even after independence in 1960, when it remained the official language for nearly a decade.
It is estimated that more than 200,000 native Somalis (nearly 20% of the total population of former Italian Somalia) spoke fluent Italian and/or Somalia's Pidgin Italian when independence was declared in 1960.
After a military coup in 1969, all foreign entities were nationalized by Siad Barre (who spoke fluently Italian[8]), including the main university in Mogadishu, which was renamed 'Jaamacadda Ummadda Soomaliyeed' (Somali National University). This marked the initial decline in the use of Italian in Somalia.
However, Italian is still widely spoken by the elderly, the educated, and the government officials in Somalia. Approximately 5,000 Somalis -nearly all old males- knew and/or used Somalia's Pidgin Italian in 2020.
Before the Somali civil war, Mogadishu still had an Italian language school, but it was later destroyed during the conflict.
However, since 2020 the italian language is being reintroduced in the secondary level schools of Somalia. Also radio transmissions in italian were recreated in 2021[9].
Somali words from Italian
These are the most used italian words loanworded in the Somali language and in the Somalia's Pidgin Italian[10]:
Somali - Italian (english)
Boorso – Borsa (bag)
Goono – Gonna (skirt)
Jalaato – Gelato (ice cream)
Katiinad – Cateena (chain)
Foorno – Forno (oven)
Toosh – Torcia (torch)
Okayaalo – Occhiali (glasses)
Kooba diin – Comodino (night table)
Katabaan – Attaccapanni (coat hanger)
Armaajo – Armadio(wardrobe)
Suugo – Sugo (sauce)
Fargeeto – Forchetta (fork)
Fiilo – Filo (cord)
Jaalo – Giallo (yellow)
Taako – Tacco (heels)
Matoor - motore (motor)
Finally, even if this pidgin has disappeared (but some very old Somalians -in their eighties or nineties- still remember it in the 2020s), according to the linguist Mauro Tosco "an italian, and therefore romance, layer will certainly remain in the Somalian language".
↑ Caney John. "The modernization of Somali vocabulary". Introduction.
Bibliography
Banfi, Giorgio. Sviluppo del sistema verbale nell'italiano parlato da Somali a Mogadiscio. Angeli ed. Milano, 1990
Bandini, Franco. Gli italiani in Africa, storia delle guerre coloniali 1882-1943. Longanesi. Milano, 1971.
D'Ambrosio, Luigi B. Italianised cities of Benadir. UdG. Genova, 2018 ()
Hoffman, Saul. Il lascito linguistico italiano in Dodecaneso, Libia e corno d’Africa: L2, pidgin e prestiti. Universita' di Pavia. Pavia, 2012
Laitin, David. Politics, Language, and Thought: The Somali Experience. University of Chicago Press. Chicago, 1977 ISBN 0-226-46791-0
Mauro Tosco. A case of weak Romancisation: Italian in East Africa ()
Tripodi, Paolo. The Colonial Legacy in Somalia and in the Italian Empire. St. Martin's P Inc. New York, 1999.
Turchetta, Barbara. “\Il corno d’Africa. In: "Il mondo in italiano.Varieta' e usi internazionali della lingua". Laterza, 2009 (pp. 33–40).
Voigt, Rainer. Italian language in Ethiopia, Somalia and Eritrea. In: "Encyclopaedia Aethiopica": He-N. Siegbert Uhlig. Vol. 3. Wiesbaden, 2007: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, pp. 222–224
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