Myanmar is a country of many languages.  There are over one hundred languages and dialects spoken by the many peoples of Myanmar.  The national language is Burmese (Myanmar language) and it spoken by majority of the population.  Many people from other statues use their own languages at home and they use Burmese outside.  The schools teach both Burmese and English, which is Burma’s official second language.  In fact, most people are able to understand (speak and read) English to support two daily English newspapers in Rangoon (the main business center of Myanmar).

In the Burmese language, there are 33 consonants and 12 basic vowels.  The 12 basic vowels can be extended with the use of two tone marks to 21 vowels.  For Myanmar language, it is important to learn the use of tones.  There are four tones and these are Creaky, which is the short and falling tone that ends with a weak closure of the glottis, Low tone, this is the long and level that may fall or rise at the end, a High tone, that is a long tone that starts high then falls slowly from the high to low pitch and lastly, we have the Stopped tone, it is a very short, high tone ending in a glottal stop.

The image below shows the Myanmar consonants.