Learn Indonesian

learn Indonesian
Ilustrasi Kongres Bahasa Indonesia I. tirto.id/Deadnauval

You can, of course, learn Indonesian without knowing the history of the language. So here are the most important points:

  • In Indonesian, the language is called bahasa Indonesia which means “language of Indonesia”
  • It is therefore not correct to refer to Indonesia as bahasa, or bahasa Indonesian
  • Before 1928, Indonesian was known as Malay (bahasa Melayu)
  • Modern Malaysian and modern Indonesian are different, but mutually intelligible
  • When I learn Indonesian, can I speak Malay (Malaysian)? Yes, you can.
  • Indonesian is one of the larger languages in the world, spoken by about 250 million speakers
  • It is written in Roman letters and has the same alphabet as English
  • The way it is written is very phonetic and therefore it is relatively easy to learn
  • As an Austronesian language it is related to Filipino, Hawaiian, Malagassy, Maori, Samoan and over one thousand more languages predominantly in Indonesia and the Pacific

Please contact the Indonesian Online team for any questions that you have about learning Indonesian.

Email: bahasa [at] pm.me
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