Untranslatable words, Translated Stories

There are words in African languages that defy translation. Not because we haven’t tried—but because their meaning isn’t just linguistic. It’s lived. It’s danced into the soil, whispered between generations, stitched into lullabies and unleashed in battle cries. These words carry histories, values, relationships, and entire worldviews. When an author chooses to write them, unaltered, into a story, they’re doing more than preserving a language—they’re preserving a reality.

African literature has always had its own syntax. Whether written in English, French, Portuguese, or indigenous tongues, the spirit of the story often resists the boundaries of colonial grammar. Writers like Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, who famously abandoned English for Gikuyu, remind us that language is not just a tool—it’s a territory. Others like Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Tsitsi Dangarembga, and Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi skillfully braid African expressions into English narratives, knowing that some meanings cannot be explained—only felt.

Take the Yoruba word aburo. It literally means “younger sibling,” but it carries a coded intimacy, a built-in responsibility. Or the Igbo phrase ụmụnne, which can mean siblings, cousins, or even kin—because kinship is less about blood and more about belonging. These words stretch English’s limitations. When left untranslated in novels, they force the reader to pause and step into a different framework, to acknowledge that not all truths arrive with neat subtitles.

There is something deeply political—and beautifully poetic—about resisting translation. It’s an act of defiance, a refusal to dilute. In a world that often demands “universal” appeal, African writers who retain indigenous languages in their work are choosing to prioritize authenticity over accessibility. And when they do translate, it’s on their terms. They don’t flatten the word—they expand the reader.

Readers, too, are transforming. The global rise of African literature means more people are becoming fluent not just in stories, but in the philosophies embedded in them. They’re meeting characters who greet with sawubona (“I see you”), who invoke ancestors, who speak of time in spirals, not lines. Through fiction, people are beginning to understand that language is a map of how we relate to each other and to the world.

At Iskanchi, we champion these choices. We celebrate books that dare to speak in tongues older than the novel form itself. We believe that every “untranslatable” word is a doorway, not a dead end. Our writers are not just storytellers—they are keepers of memory, protectors of nuance, translators of spirit.

So when you read an African novel and stumble across a word that has no neat English equivalent—pause. Let it linger. Say it aloud if you can. Not everything must be translated. Some things are meant to be understood with the heart.

After all, it’s in the spaces between words that the real story begins.

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