Why this exists

Ikasi & Go was built by one person, for people trying to reach a language their family left behind.

That is the thing about Basque names: each one describes a place. Mendieta is a place of mountains. Zubizarreta is the place of the old bridges. Etxeberria is simply the new house. Families took the name of the place they belonged to, and when they emigrated, that place came with them as a word.

A lot of us grew up with one of those words on our mail and no way to read the rest of the language it came from. Euskara has been spoken in the Pyrenees for thousands of years and has no known relatives anywhere on earth. It survived Rome, the empires that followed, and a dictatorship that banned it from public life, down to the names in the civil registry and the words carved on gravestones. For an English speaker, especially one an ocean away, finding a way in has never been simple.

This app is the tool I wanted: Basque explained in English, with the culture attached to every word.

How the words were made

The words are the heart of this app, so they got the most care. Each of the 939 words and phrases has its own entry: a pronunciation guide for English speakers, an example sentence, and a note explaining where the word comes from or how people actually use it.

Then it was checked, and checked again. Every headword and every example sentence was validated against Xuxen, the Basque spellchecker built on the standards of Euskaltzaindia, the Basque Language Academy. Glosses, grammar, and cultural claims were reviewed line by line.

It will not be perfect. Euskara has real regional variation and a living standard. If you find something wrong, tell me and the fix reaches everyone automatically.

What this app promises

• ✓One purchase, not a subscription. $12.99 once and it is yours, including every future vocabulary update. The free trial simply ends; it never converts into a charge.
• ✓A real free tier. The entire beginner level, across all 17 topics, with quizzes and spaced repetition. Enough to know whether this is for you.
• ✓No ads and no tracking. Your learning stays your business.
• ✓It gets better. New words and fixes arrive in the app automatically, with no update to install.

Who it is for

Anyone learning Euskara from English: the grandchild of emigrants, the person who married into a Basque family, the traveler headed to Donostia, the linguist who cannot resist a language isolate. You do not need Basque ancestry to be welcome here. You just need to be curious about one of the most remarkable languages in the world.

Questions, corrections, or a story about your own family name? Write to hello@ikasiandgo.com.

Eskerrik asko, and hasi gaur. Get the app and start today.