What Language Do They Speak in Nagaland? English

Nagaland’s official language is English, a deliberate choice so no tribe’s tongue outranks another. On the street you hear Nagamese, the crease-pidgin that grew from Assamese and Naga grammar, and at home each of the seventeen tribes speaks its own language.

The three layers

• English: official language, education, signage, government. Any literate Naga under fifty speaks it.
• Nagamese: the connector. Kohima market, taxi sumos, inter-tribe friendship, jokes. You will pick up “kene kawe?” (where are you going) in a day.
• Tribal languages: Angami in Kohima hills, Ao around Mokokchung, Sumi, Lotha, Konyak and on. Ethnologue counts more than 30 languages across the state.

Hindi in Nagaland?

Understood in Dimapur and among younger people through Bollywood and school, thinner in villages. English gets you further than Hindi in the hills, the reverse of most of India.

What travellers need

English, a smile, and a few Nagamese greetings. In homestays and festivals, elders may speak only their tribal language plus Nagamese; guides bridge the rest. At the Hornbill Festival the announcers work in English, Nagamese and tribal languages through the day.

Quick answers

What is the official language of Nagaland? English.

What is Nagamese? A creole of Assamese origin, the everyday link language between tribes.

Do people speak Hindi in Nagaland? In towns and among the young, yes; English works everywhere.

Language is the door to the villages. Message us for trips that put you at the right hearth.