Our company worked on a very interesting project – voice-over in Xhosa language. Read why we were surprised by the language’s particularities. 

Xhosa voiceover project

Several years ago we worked on an important Xhosa voiceover project. When the project was delivered by our Xhosa voiceover artist, our managers started to check the audio file to eliminate the chance of existing any kind of mistakes (in audio or in reading the script) that could the voiceover or sound engineer made.

How our managers were surprised when they realized that the recording in Xhosa was full of clicks and claps! They though that this was a mistake made by the sound engineer and wrote him to fix it, because the original audio file in English was absolutely clean.

In reply, the sound engineer just sent a link, without saying nothing.

Check out yourself, why this case made our company smile:

As you see, all those clicks and claps was the Xhosa language itself!

Here are some facts about the Xhosa language you should know before doing localization into Xhosa:

The Xhosa language is one of the most widely spoken languages in South Africa, speaken by more than 8 million people today. It’s a tonal language and it contains click consonants. The word “Xhosa” itself begins with a click. In the whole it has more than 18 clicks.

Our company deals with a lot of interesting projects every day. And voiceover in Xhosa was one of them.