Somali Translation
Overview
Welcome! We are a trusted provider of quality translation services. Somali is one of the many languages we cover on a daily basis through a number of different language solutions.
With a presence in the USA and South Africa, we have been providing localisation and translation solutions in African languages to companies and organisations since 2004. Our expertise is in thinking outside the translation box and finding solutions to our clients’ varied needs.
We pride ourselves on our A-Z service. Whatever your language requirements, whether Somali, Arabic, Zulu or Swahili or not, we have the experience, knowledge and insight to become your quality language service provider.
Our team deals with all levels of translation, from legal to financial to oil & gas and everything in between. Websites, manuals, advertisements, video footage and contracts are but a few of the formats we regularly deal with. Even if you need typesetting, we can take care of this for you.
To find out how we can help you, please contact one of the team who can discuss your project in more detail.
Professional Somali Translators
Our Somali translators come from a variety of backgrounds and are assigned to translation jobs according to their skills. Our team is based all over the world including Somalia, Europe, the USA and wider afield.
All our translators are professionals. This means they are either professional linguists (at an academic level) or professionals in terms of coming from industry. This mix allows us to deal with a wide range of needs; so whether you need someone who understands gaming or social marketing, or you if need someone for legal texts or engineering materials, we have the people qualified to deal with your topic.
In short, you can rest assured that your translation will always be dealt with by someone who understands you, your space and of course your texts.
If you would like more information on our Somali translators, please contact us and we can explain more.
Quick Facts
- Alternate names & spellings: Af-Soomaali, Af-Maxaad Tiri, Common Somali and Soomaaliga.
- Language ISO code: so/som
- Number of speakers: around 13 million people
- Writing system: Although a Somali script and an Arabic one were used in the past, none of them are in use today. It was with colonization that the Latin script was introduced to document Somali and nowadays it is still the most widely spread.
- Spoken in: Mainly in Somalia and independent Somaliland (northern Somalia), but also in Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya.
About Somali
Related to Oromo and Afar languages, the Somali language is one of the most widely spoken Cushitic languages and it belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family, in the same way as Arabic and Hebrew, among others.
Somali is the official language of Somalia and Somaliland, but it is generally spread over the Horn of Africa, being also spoken in Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya as second language. In addition, it is possible to find large communities of Somali speakers outside Africa in North America, Italy, Saudi Arabia and Yemen due to the waves of migration caused by the numerous civil wars.
The Somali language has deeply influences by different languages as a result of the presence of distinct cultures within its history: Arabic, English and Italian.
Back in the 7th century AD, Arab tribes arrived in the Gulf of Aden establishing a Sultanate which was not disintegrated until the 1500s. Concerning European colonization, the first Europeans who arrived in Somalia were the British with the intention of protecting their trade route; later on, in the nineteenth century, Italy showed interest in the Somali coast and both countries were fighting for the domination of the country until the Second World War. As a consequence of the presence of all these diverse cultural groups, the Somali language has been able to use different writings systems, from its own Somali script through Arabic alphabet to Latin alphabet, maintaining finally the Latin one.
Furthermore, it is also interesting to mention the bilingualism of some Somalis today, thanks also to the history of the country, being able to find Somalis who can speak English and/or Italian.
Somali dialects
Somali has three main regional dialects which are
- Northern Somali (also known as Common or Standard Somali), which is the most widely used and the standard dialect
- Benaadir Somali, which is spoken in the Benadir Coast and it is intelligible by Standard Somali speakers and finally
- Af-Ashraaf Somali, which is limited intelligible by the-Standard-form speakers.