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Bangime
Bangime (; , or, in full, ) is a language isolate spoken by 3,500 ethnic Dogon in seven villages in southern Mali, who call themselves the ("hidden people"). Bangande is the name of the ethnicity of this community and their population grows at a rate of 2.5% per year. The Bangande consider themselves to be Dogon, but other Dogon people insist they are not.Hantgan, Abbie. “An Introduction to the Bangande People and the Bangime Phonology and Morphology.” 14 Aug. 2013. Bangime is an endangered language classified as 6a - Vigorous by Ethnologue. Long known to be highly divergent from the (other) Dogon languages, it was first proposed as a possible isolate by Blench (2005). Research since then has confirmed that it appears to be unrelated to neighbouring languages. Heath and Hantgan have hypothesized that the cliffs surrounding the Bangande valley provided isolation of the language as well as safety for Bangande people. Even though Bangime is not related to Dogon languages, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dogon Languages
The Dogon languages are a small closely-related language family that is spoken by the Dogon people of Mali and may belong to the proposed Niger–Congo family. There are about 600,000 speakers of its dozen languages. They are tonal languages, and most, like Dogul, have two tones, but some, like Donno So, have three. Their basic word order is subject–object–verb. External relationships The evidence linking Dogon to the Niger–Congo family is weak, and their place within the family, assuming they do belong, is not clear. Various theories have been proposed, placing them in Gur, Mande, or as an independent branch, the last now being the preferred approach. The Dogon languages show no remnants of the noun class system characteristic of much of Niger–Congo, leading linguists to conclude that they likely diverged from Niger–Congo very early. Roger Blench comments, and: The Bamana and Fula languages have exerted significant influence on Dogon, due to their close c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Language Isolate
Language isolates are languages that cannot be classified into larger language families. Korean and Basque are two of the most common examples. Other language isolates include Ainu in Asia, Sandawe in Africa, and Haida in North America. The number of language isolates is unknown. A language isolate is unrelated to any other, which makes it the only language in its own language family. It is a natural language with no demonstrable genealogical (or "genetic") relationships—one that has not been demonstrated to descend from an ancestor common with any other language. One explanation for the existence of language isolates is that they might be the last remaining branch of a larger language family. The language possibly had relatives in the past which have since disappeared without being documented. Another explanation for language isolates is that they developed in isolation from other languages. This explanation mostly applies to sign languages that have arisen independently ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nilo-Saharan
The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of African languages spoken by some 50–60 million people, mainly in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers, including historic Nubia, north of where the two tributaries of the Nile meet. The languages extend through 17 nations in the northern half of Africa: from Algeria to Benin in the west; from Libya to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the centre; and from Egypt to Tanzania in the east. As indicated by its hyphenated name, Nilo-Saharan is a family of the African interior, including the greater Nile Basin and the Central Sahara Desert. Eight of its proposed constituent divisions (excluding Kunama, Kuliak, and Songhay) are found in the modern countries of Sudan and South Sudan, through which the Nile River flows. In his book '' The Languages of Africa'' (1963), Joseph Greenberg named the group and argued it was a genetic family. It contains the languages which are not included in the Niger–Congo, Afroas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dogon People
The Dogon are an ethnic group indigenous to the central plateau region of Mali, in West Africa, south of the Niger bend, near the city of Bandiagara, and in Burkina Faso. The population numbers between 400,000 and 800,000. They speak the Dogon languages, which are considered to constitute an independent branch of the Niger–Congo language family, meaning that they are not closely related to any other languages. The Dogon are best known for their religious traditions, their mask dances, wooden sculpture, and their architecture. Since the twentieth century, there have been significant changes in the social organisation, material culture and beliefs of the Dogon, in part because Dogon country is one of Mali's major tourist attractions. Geography and history The principal Dogon area is bisected by the Bandiagara Escarpment, a sandstone cliff of up to high, stretching about 150 km (90 miles). To the southeast of the cliff, the sandy Séno-Gondo Plains are found, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dogo, Mopti
Dogo or Doro (''Dɔ́rɔ́'') is a village and administrative centre (''chef-lieu'') of the commune of Bimbéré Tama in the Cercle of Youwarou in the Mopti Region of southern-central Mali. Dogo village is situated on the lower slope of a mountain overlooking a narrow valley with borassus palms and ''Vitex''. Farming, herding, and gardening (tobacco and other crops) are the main economic activities. Bangime, a language isolate Language isolates are languages that cannot be classified into larger language families. Korean and Basque are two of the most common examples. Other language isolates include Ainu in Asia, Sandawe in Africa, and Haida in North America. The nu ..., is spoken in Dogo. Local surnames are Katile, Bore, Bamani, and Guindo. References Populated places in Mopti Region {{Mopti-geo-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Proto-Nilo-Saharan
The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of African languages spoken by some 50–60 million people, mainly in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers, including historic Nubia, north of where the two tributaries of the Nile meet. The languages extend through 17 nations in the northern half of Africa: from Algeria to Benin in the west; from Libya to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the centre; and from Egypt to Tanzania in the east. As indicated by its hyphenated name, Nilo-Saharan is a family of the African interior, including the greater Nile Basin and the Central Sahara Desert. Eight of its proposed constituent divisions (excluding Kunama, Kuliak, and Songhay) are found in the modern countries of Sudan and South Sudan, through which the Nile River flows. In his book '' The Languages of Africa'' (1963), Joseph Greenberg named the group and argued it was a genetic family. It contains the languages which are not included in the Niger–Congo, Afroasiat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bangi Language
The Bangi language, or ''Bobangi'', is a relative and main lexical source of Lingala spoken in central Africa. Dialects of the language are spoken on both sides of the Ubangi River and Congo River. Use in trade As the Bobangi people came to dominate the slave trade along the upper Congo River The Congo River ( kg, Nzâdi Kôngo, french: Fleuve Congo, pt, Rio Congo), formerly also known as the Zaire River, is the second longest river in Africa, shorter only than the Nile, as well as the second largest river in the world by discharge ... in the late 18th century, the Bangi language was used to facilitate trade between different ethnic groups in the region. Linguist John Whitehead claimed that the Moye, Likuba, Bonga, Mpama, Lusakani, and peoples all used Bangi for intercommunication in the 1890s. Traders in the region who did not speak Bangi used a trade language that borrowed heavily from Bangi. At the height of indigenous trade along the upper river, the Bobangi domi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bandiagara
Bandiagara () is a small town and urban commune in the Mopti Region of Mali. The name translates roughly to "large eating bowl"—referring to the communal bowl meals are served in. Mainly on its Bandiagara Escarpment it has about 2,000 speakers of the vibrant Bangime language, an isolate used mainly as an anti-language; it has the highest point of the country. Bandiagara is 65 km east-southeast of Mopti. A seasonal river, the Yamé, flows in a northeasterly direction through the town. The population includes a number of different ethnic groups including Dogons, Fulani and Bambaras.*. History Bandiagara is said to have been founded in 1770 by Nangabanu Tembély, a Dogon hunter. In 1864, Tidiani Tall, El Hadj Umar Tall's nephew and successor, chose Bandiagara as capital of the Toucouleur empire. It is the birthplace of Malian authors Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Madina Ly-Tall and Yambo Ouologuem. In the music video for the song ''Reset'' by Three Trapped Tigers i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anti-language
A cant is the jargon or language of a group, often employed to exclude or mislead people outside the group.McArthur, T. (ed.) ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (1992) Oxford University Press It may also be called a cryptolect, argot, pseudo-language, anti-language or secret language. Each term differs slightly in meaning; their use is inconsistent. Etymology There are two main schools of thought on the origin of the word ''cant'': * In linguistics, the derivation is normally seen to be from the Irish word (older spelling ), "speech, talk", or Scottish Gaelic . It is seen to have derived amongst the itinerant groups of people in Ireland and Scotland, who hailed from both Irish/Scottish Gaelic and English-speaking backgrounds, ultimately developing as various creole languages. However, the various types of cant (Scottish/Irish) are mutually unintelligible. The Irish creole variant is simply termed " the Cant". Its speakers from the Irish Traveller community know i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prefix
A prefix is an affix which is placed before the stem of a word. Adding it to the beginning of one word changes it into another word. For example, when the prefix ''un-'' is added to the word ''happy'', it creates the word ''unhappy''. Particularly in the study of languages, a prefix is also called a preformative, because it alters the form of the words to which it is affixed. Prefixes, like other affixes, can be either inflectional, creating a new form of the word with the same basic meaning and same lexical category (but playing a different role in the sentence), or derivational, creating a new word with a new semantic meaning and sometimes also a different lexical category. Prefixes, like all other affixes, are usually bound morphemes. In English, there are no inflectional prefixes; English uses suffixes instead for that purpose. The word ''prefix'' is itself made up of the stem ''fix'' (meaning "attach", in this case), and the prefix ''pre-'' (meaning "before"), bot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tense–aspect–mood
Tense–aspect–mood (commonly abbreviated ) or tense–modality–aspect (abbreviated as ) is a group of grammatical categories that are important to understanding spoken or written content, and which are marked in different ways by different languages. TAM covers the expression of three major components of words which lead to or assist in the correct understanding of the speaker's meaning: * Tense—the position of the state or action in time, that is, whether it is in the past, present or future. * Aspect—the extension of the state or action in time, that is, whether it is unitary (perfective), continuous or repeated (imperfective). * Mood or Modality—the reality of the state or action, that is, whether it is actual (realis), a possibility or a necessity (irrealis). For example, in English the word "walk" would be used in different ways for the different combinations of TAM: * Tense: He walked (past), He walks (present), He will walk (future). * Aspect: He walked (uni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
