Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.

Sometimes father turns on the television instead of the radio.

Breakdown of Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.

• ne: to be
• baba: the father
• maimakon: instead of
• rediyo: the radio
• kunna: to turn on
• wani lokaci: sometimes
• talabijin: the television

Questions & Answers about Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.

What does wani lokaci literally mean, and can it appear in other positions in the sentence?

Wani lokaci literally means “some time” or “a certain time”, and in idiomatic use it corresponds to “sometimes”.

• wani = some / a certain (masculine form)
• lokaci = time

In this sentence, clause-initial Wani lokaci works like English “Sometimes”:

• Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin…
  = Sometimes Dad turns on the television…

You can move it:

• Baba wani lokaci yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.
• Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo wani lokaci.

All are understandable, but putting wani lokaci at the very beginning is the most natural and common position for frequency adverbs in Hausa, and it clearly frames the whole clause as something that happens from time to time.

What exactly does Baba mean here? Is it “father” in general or specifically “my dad”? Could we use a different word?

In everyday speech, Baba functions very much like English “Dad” or “Daddy”:

• It usually refers to one specific person (often my dad, in context).
• It can also be used as a respectful title for an older man in some dialects, but here the natural translation is “Dad”.

Other related words:

• uba – “father” in a more formal or dictionary-like sense.
• Baba na / Babana – “my dad”.
• Uba na / Ubana – also “my father”, often a bit more formal or written.

In the sentence:

• Baba is used like a proper name (“Dad”), which is why it is capitalized in English translation (Sometimes Dad…).

If you wanted to be explicit:

• Wani lokaci Babana yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.
  = Sometimes my dad turns on the television instead of the radio.

Why do we have both Baba and yana? Isn’t yana already “he is”? Isn’t that redundant?

This is a very typical Hausa pattern. The key point is:

In Hausa, a subject pronoun is still used even when you mention the noun subject.

Breakdown:

• ya = he (3rd person masculine subject pronoun)
• na (in this combination) = part of the continuous/progressive marker
• yana = “he is (doing)”

So:

• Baba yana kunna talabijin…
  literally has the structure: “Dad, he-is turning-on the television…”

You cannot just say:

• ✗ *Baba kunna talabijin…

That’s ungrammatical; the verb phrase needs the subject pronoun (here inside yana).

So there is no redundancy from a Hausa point of view; the pattern [full noun] + [subject pronoun + tense/aspect] + verb is normal:

• Maryam tana karatu. – Maryam is studying.
• Yara suna wasa. – The children are playing.
• Baba yana kunna talabijin. – Dad is turning on / turns on the television.

What aspect or tense does yana kunna express? How is it different from ya kunna?

Yana kunna uses the Hausa progressive/continuous construction:

• yana + verb ≈ “is/was doing, keeps doing, (sometimes) does”

In contrast:

• ya kunna is perfective: a completed action.

Compare:

1. Baba yana kunna talabijin.

   • “Dad is turning on the television.” (right now)
   • Or, with a time adverb like wani lokaci, “Dad turns on the television” (as a repeated action).

2. Baba ya kunna talabijin.

   • “Dad turned on the television.” / “Dad has turned on the television.”
     (The action is seen as finished.)

So the sentence:

• Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin…

uses yana because we are describing something that can be viewed as an ongoing or repeated behavior, not a one-time completed event.

Why is the English translation “Sometimes Dad turns on the TV…” and not “Sometimes Dad is turning on the TV…” if Hausa uses yana?

Grammatically, yana kunna corresponds quite closely to English “is turning on” (progressive aspect).

However, English and Hausa don’t match one-to-one in how they normally talk about repeated actions:

• In English, when something happens from time to time, we almost always use simple present:

  • “Sometimes Dad turns on the TV instead of the radio.”
  • “He often listens to the radio in the evening.”

• In Hausa, you can still use the progressive form with an adverb of frequency:

  • Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin…
    literally, “Sometimes Dad is-turning-on the TV…”, but understood as “Sometimes Dad turns on the TV…”

So the translation uses “turns on” simply to sound natural in English, even though the Hausa form is structurally closer to “is turning on.” The meaning is the same: a repeated behavior that happens occasionally.

What does kunna mean exactly, and is it always used for switching on devices like a TV or radio?

Kunna is a verb whose core meaning is roughly “to make something start working or burning”, and by extension, “to turn on / switch on.”

Common uses:

• kunna talabijin – turn on the TV
• kunna rediyo – turn on the radio
• kunna wayar salula – turn on a mobile phone
• kunna wuta – light a fire / turn on the light
• kunna mota – start a car (switch on the engine)

So in this sentence:

• yana kunna talabijin = “he is turning on the television.”

Another verb you may hear is buɗe (“to open”), which some speakers also use for devices:

• buɗe rediyo – literally “open the radio,” meaning “switch on the radio”

But kunna is the most general, transparent verb for switching something on or igniting it.

How does maimakon work? Is it like “instead of”? Can I also use it with verbs?

Yes, maimakon means “instead of / in place of”.

In the sentence:

• …yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.
  = “…he turns on the television instead of (turning on) the radio.”

Structure here is:

• [Action with X] + maimakon + [Y]

With nouns:

• Na sha shayi maimakon kofi.
  – I drank tea instead of coffee.
• Ta sayi litattafai maimakon kaya.
  – She bought books instead of clothes.

With verbs/clauses, you usually follow maimakon with a finite clause:

• Maimakon ya saurari rediyo, yana kallo talabijin.
  – Instead of listening to the radio, he is watching TV.
• Maimakon in tafi, na tsaya.
  – Instead of going, I stayed.

You can also front the maimakon phrase for emphasis:

• Maimakon rediyo, Baba yana kunna talabijin.
  – Instead of the radio, Dad turns on the television.

But the basic idea is always: X happens in place of Y.

Are talabijin and rediyo real Hausa words or just borrowed from English? Anything special to know about them?

Both words are loanwords, ultimately from English:

• talabijin ← television
• rediyo ← radio

Points to note:

• They are fully treated as normal Hausa nouns:

  • They can be objects of verbs: kunna talabijin, kunna rediyo.
  • They can take the Hausa definite marker: talabijin ɗin, rediyon nan, etc.

• Pronunciation (approximate):

  • talabijin: ta-la-BI-jin (stress near the end)
  • rediyo: RE-di-yo or re-DYO depending on speech style

As for plurals, in everyday conversation you rarely need the plural of “TV” or “radio,” but when people do pluralize:

• Many speakers make rediyo → rediyoyi (“radios”).
• For talabijin, usage varies; often context or a number (talabijin biyu – “two televisions”) is enough.

For understanding this sentence, it is enough to treat them as the Hausa words for “television” and “radio”.

There is no word for “the” in the Hausa sentence. How would I specifically say “the television” or “the radio”?

Hausa does not have a separate word for “the” or “a/an.”
Definiteness is shown by context and often by suffixes or demonstratives.

In this sentence:

• talabijin and rediyo can mean either “a TV / a radio” or “the TV / the radio” depending on context. Because we usually have one household TV and one household radio, English naturally translates this as “the television” and “the radio.”

To make definiteness explicit, you have several options:

• Use the definite suffix -n / -r / -ɗin, etc.:

  • talabijin ɗin – the (specific) television
  • rediyon ɗin – the (specific) radio

• Or use demonstratives:

  • talabijin nan – this television
  • wancan rediyon – that radio

So you could make the sentence more explicitly definite as:

• Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin ɗin maimakon rediyon ɗin.
  – Sometimes Dad turns on the (particular) TV instead of the (particular) radio.

Can the word order change without changing the meaning? For example, can I move wani lokaci or the maimakon phrase?

Yes, Hausa word order is fairly flexible for these adverbial phrases, though some positions are more natural.

The original:

• Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.

Some acceptable variations and their feel:

1. Baba wani lokaci yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo.
   – Still “Sometimes Dad turns on the TV instead of the radio,” a bit more “inside” the clause; the contrast is unchanged.

2. Baba yana kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo wani lokaci.
   – Also understandable; sounds like “Dad turns on the TV instead of the radio sometimes,” with a slight end-focus on sometimes.

3. Maimakon rediyo, Baba yana kunna talabijin.
   – “Instead of the radio, Dad turns on the TV.”
   Here the contrast (radio vs. TV) is fronted and emphasized.

4. To say the opposite idea (“Sometimes Dad turns on the radio instead of the TV”):

   • Wani lokaci Baba yana kunna rediyo maimakon talabijin.

Naturalness tips:

• Wani lokaci is very commonly put at the beginning of the sentence when it modifies the whole clause.
• The maimakon phrase most often comes immediately after the thing that is chosen:
  • kunna talabijin maimakon rediyo
  • sha shayi maimakon kofi, etc.

All of these follow standard Hausa patterns; you just adjust the position to change what you want to emphasize.