Bangla or Bengali?

Bangla and Bengali mean the same thing

Bangla (বাংলা) is the language's own name for itself. Bengali is the name English has used for centuries, from the region of Bengal. Both are correct. In Bangladesh, people speaking English increasingly say Bangla, and that is the name we use on this site. Search engines, textbooks and universities often still say Bengali.

The people are Bengalis or, in Bangla, বাঙালি (bangali). The country, Bangladesh (বাংলাদেশ), simply means "the land of Bangla".

A language that inspired a revolution

In 1948 the government of Pakistan, which then included today's Bangladesh, declared Urdu the only state language. Bangla speakers, the majority of the country, protested. On 21 February 1952 police opened fire on students demonstrating in Dhaka, and several were killed. The Language Movement that followed helped lead to Bangladesh's independence in 1971.

The Shaheed Minar in Dhaka honours those students, and every year on 21 February people walk to it barefoot at dawn to lay flowers. In 1999 UNESCO declared 21 February International Mother Language Day, celebrated around the world. Few languages have been defended at such a cost, which is why Bangla matters so much to the people who speak it.

Bangladesh and West Bengal: what's different?

Bangla is spoken on both sides of the border, in Bangladesh and in the Indian state of West Bengal, as well as in Tripura, parts of Assam and large communities in the UK, the US, the Middle East and beyond. The written standard, the script and the grammar are shared, and speakers understand each other without trouble.

The differences are mostly in everyday vocabulary and greetings. Some well-known ones:

Inside Bangladesh there are also strong regional dialects, such as Sylheti and Chittagonian. LearnBangla teaches standard Bangladeshi Bangla, which is understood everywhere.

Is Bengali hard to learn?

The US Foreign Service Institute puts Bengali in its Category III: languages that take English speakers about 44 weeks of full-time study to reach professional working fluency. That is harder than Spanish or French, and easier than Arabic, Chinese or Japanese. For a beginner, though, the picture is friendlier than that number suggests.

What's easier than you'd think

• No grammatical gender. There is no he/she split in verbs, and no masculine and feminine nouns. সে (she) means both he and she.
• No a or the. Instead, small endings like টা (ta) do the job, and you can start without them.
• Verbs don't change for number. I eat, we eat: আমি খাই, আমরা খাই. Only the person and the level of politeness change the ending.
• A mostly phonetic script. Once you know the letters, you can sound out most words. See the Bengali alphabet.
• Plenty of English words. ব্যাংক bænk ট্রেন tren স্কুল skul ক্রিকেট kriket ফোন phon ক্লাস klash

What takes practice

• New sounds. Bangla tells apart breathy and plain consonants, and two kinds of t and d. Listen to these pairs:

• বাতbatrheumatism
  or
  ভাতbhatrice

  Breathy or not. ভ is said with a puff of air, ব without. Hold your hand in front of your mouth and feel the difference.

• কালkaltomorrow
  or
  খালkhalcanal

  Same again with k. খ is ক with a puff of air.

• পাতাpataleaf
  or
  পাটাpatagrinding stone

  Two kinds of t. For ত the tongue touches the back of your teeth. For ট it curls back to the roof of your mouth.

• কাদাkadamud
  or
  কাঁদাkãdato cry

  Nasal vowels. The moon-dot ঁ sends the vowel through your nose.

• Word order. The verb goes last: আমি ভাত খাই, ami bhat khai, is literally "I rice eat". It feels odd for about a week.
• Three ways to say you. Choosing the right one is part of being polite:

• Conjunct letters. When consonants join, they can change shape (ক্ষ, জ্ঞ, ন্ত). You learn them gradually, the common ones first.

The good news: you can start speaking from day one using romanised Bangla, and learn the script alongside it. Read our step-by-step guide on how to learn Bengali.