Recent Posts – Study Hmong

Seb in Hmong – It means ‘…and see.’

Here is a video explaining the meaning of the word ‘seb’ in Hmong. Below I have attached my slides in PDF:

PDF: The Hand – Vocabulary Sheet

PDF: The Hand

The Internal Organs

PDF: The internal organs in Hmong.

Action – Object – Modifier in Hmong

Often in English when we talk about an action we add modifying words to that action to show in what manner it was completed. For example, if you say, ‘kick him’ it has one meaning, but if you say, ‘kick him out‘ it has an entirely different meaning because of that modifier ‘out.’ A few more examples are: Stand up. … Read More

Personal Pronouns in Hmong

VIDEO: Personal Pronouns in Hmong The Basic Personal Pronouns in Hmong. Hmong personal pronouns are similar to English, with a few simple differences. Here are the basics: 1st Person – I, me, we Kuv mus lawm. I went. Lit: I go already. Wb yuav mus. We’ll go. Lit: We(2) will go. Peb tsis tuaj. We’re not coming. Lit: We(3+) not … Read More

Turning a verb into a noun in Hmong

What is a Verb? What is a Noun? A verb is an action word, or a word that describes something that you do as opposed to a ‘thing.’ So a verb could be to run, to eat, to think, to talk, to hear, to like, etc. A noun on the other hand is a person, place, or thing. So a … Read More

Hmong High Frequency Words Memrise Course

Hmong High Frequency Words To make this course I used a computer generated list of high frequency words that were taken from Bible-based publications. So you may notice some Bible-based terminology mixed in there. However they most certainly contain many words that will be useful in any kind of conversation. More importantly, they are arranged by word frequency. This means … Read More

Tone Change in Hmong

What is tone change? Tone change in Hmong is a phenomenon where the tone of one word will affect the word that immediately follows it. What causes tone change? Generally it is a ‘b’ tone (cim siab) or a ‘j’ tone (cim ntuj) that will cause the following word to change tone. An example is the word ‘tus’ which … Read More

How to say ‘I can’ in Hmong

Hmong has several ways to say you ‘can’ do something, each with it’s own unique shade of meaning. The basic ‘I can’ with ‘tau.’ The word ‘tau’ in Hmong has a basic meaning of to ‘get’ or ‘achieve.’ It is used somewhat more complexly than that, however. Generally speaking, when ‘tau’ appears after a verb it means it is a … Read More

Hmong Glossary of Grammar

Hmong Glossary of Grammar A usable glossary of grammar with examples. A note for understanding Hmong grammar: Languages are like different brands of cars. They all have the same basic parts, with the same basic functions. Each one is a little different, though. Generally, you can’t take a part out of one brand and just install it in … Read More

The Noun Classifier in Hmong

What is a noun classifier in Hmong? First of all, do you remember what a noun is? A noun is a person, place, or thing. Noun classifiers are special grammatical words placed before a noun to add depth of meaning to it, to grammatically make a reference in a sentence more specific, and to differentiate between homonyms (two words that … Read More