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The Berber languages, also known as the Amazigh languages or Tamazight,, ber, label=
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
Tifinagh, ⵜⵎⵣⵗⵜ, ) are a branch of the
Afroasiatic language family The Afroasiatic languages (or Afro-Asiatic), also known as Hamito-Semitic, or Semito-Hamitic, and sometimes also as Afrasian, Erythraean or Lisramic, are a language family of about 300 languages that are spoken predominantly in the geographic su ...
. They comprise a group of closely related languages spoken by
Berber Berber or Berbers may refer to: Ethnic group * Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa * Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages Places * Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile People with the surname * Ady Berber (1913–19 ...
communities, who are indigenous to
North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...
.Hayward, Richard J., chapter ''Afroasiatic'' in Heine, Bernd & Nurse, Derek, editors, ''African Languages: An Introduction'' Cambridge 2000. . The languages were traditionally written with the ancient Libyco-Berber script, which now exists in the form of Tifinagh. Today, they may also be written in the Berber Latin alphabet or the
Arabic script The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and th ...
, with Latin being the most pervasive. Berber languages are spoken by large populations of
Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to A ...
,
Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , relig ...
and
Libya Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Suda ...
, by smaller populations of
Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...
, northern
Mali Mali (; ), officially the Republic of Mali,, , ff, 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞥆𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 𞤃𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭, Renndaandi Maali, italics=no, ar, جمهورية مالي, Jumhūriyyāt Mālī is a landlocked country in West Africa. Ma ...
, western and northern
Niger ) , official_languages = , languages_type = National languagesBurkina Faso Burkina Faso (, ; , ff, 𞤄𞤵𞤪𞤳𞤭𞤲𞤢 𞤊𞤢𞤧𞤮, italic=no) is a landlocked country in West Africa with an area of , bordered by Mali to the northwest, Niger to the northeast, Benin to the southeast, Togo and Ghana t ...
and
Mauritania Mauritania (; ar, موريتانيا, ', french: Mauritanie; Berber: ''Agawej'' or ''Cengit''; Pulaar: ''Moritani''; Wolof: ''Gànnaar''; Soninke:), officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania ( ar, الجمهورية الإسلامية ...
and in the Siwa Oasis of
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
. Large Berber-speaking migrant communities, today numbering about 4 million, have been living in Western Europe, spanning over three generations, since the 1950s. The number of Berber people is higher than the number of Berber speakers. The Berber languages are strongly influenced by the
Arabic language Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
, and Arabic loanwords represent 40% of the Berber vocabulary in Morocco and 25% of Kabyle vocabulary in Algeria. Around 95% of the Berber-speaking population speak one of seven major Berber languages, each with at least 2 million speakers. They are, in decreasing order of number of speakers: Shilha (''Taclḥit''), Kabyle (''Taqbaylit''), Central Atlas Tamazight (''Tamaziɣt''), Riffian (''Tmaziɣt''),
Shawiya Shawiya, or Shawiya Berber, also spelt Chaouïa (native form: ''Tacawit'' ), is a Zenati Berber language spoken in Algeria by the Shawiya people. The language's primary speech area is the Awras Mountains in Eastern Algeria and the surrounding ...
(''Tacawit'') and
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
(''Tamaceq/Tamajeq/Tamaheq''). The now extinct
Guanche language Guanche is an extinct language that was spoken by the Guanches of the Canary Islands until the 16th or 17th century. It died out after the conquest of the Canary Islands as the Guanche ethnic group was assimilated into the dominant Spanish cul ...
spoken on the
Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, :es:Canarias, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to ...
by the Guanches, as well as possibly the languages of the ancient
C-Group culture The C-Group culture is an archaeological culture found in Lower Nubia, which dates from ca. 2400 BCE to ca. 1550 BCE. It was named by George A. Reisner. With no central site and no written evidence about what these people called themselves, R ...
in today's southern Egypt and northern
Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
, are believed to have belonged to the Berber branch of the Afroasiatic family. There is a cultural and political movement among speakers of the closely related varieties of Northern Berber to promote and unify them under a written
standard language A standard language (also standard variety, standard dialect, and standard) is a language variety that has undergone substantial codification of grammar and usage, although occasionally the term refers to the entirety of a language that include ...
called ''Tamaziɣt'' (or ''Berber''). The name ''Tamaziɣt'' is the current native name of the Berber language in the Moroccan Middle Atlas and Rif regions and the Libyan Zuwarah region. In other Berber-speaking areas, this name was lost. There is historical evidence from medieval Berber manuscripts that all indigenous North Africans from Libya to Morocco have at some point called their language ''Tamaziɣt''. The name ''Tamaziɣt'' is currently being used increasingly by educated Berbers to refer to the written Berber language, and even to Berber as a whole, including Tuareg.


Terminology

"Tamazight" and "Berber languages" are often used interchangeably. However, "Tamazight" is sometimes used to refer to a specific subset of Berber languages, such as Central Shilha. "Tamazight" can also be used to refer to Standard Moroccan Tamazight or Standard Algerian Tamazight, as in the Moroccan and Algerian constitutions respectively. In Morocco, besides referring to all Berber languages or to Standard Moroccan Tamazight, "Tamazight" is often used in contrast to
Tashelhit , now more usually known as Tashelhit , is a Berber language spoken in southwestern Morocco. The endonym is , and in recent English publications the name of the language is often rendered ''Tashelhit'', ''Tashelhiyt'' or ''Tashlhiyt''. In Morocc ...
and Tarifit to refer to Central Atlas Tamazight. Traditionally, the term ''Tamazight'' (in various forms: ''Thamazighth'', ''Tamasheq'', ''Tamajaq'', ''Tamahaq'') was used by many Amazigh people to refer to the languages they spoke, including the Middle Atlas, the Riffians, the Sened in Tunisia and the
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
. However, other terms were used by other groups; for instance, some Amazigh populations of Algeria called their language ''Taznatit'' ( Zenati) or ''Shelha'', while the Kabyles called theirs ''Taqbaylit'', and the inhabitants of the Siwa Oasis called their language ''Siwi''. In Tunisia, the local Amazigh language is usually referred to as ''Shelha'', a term which has been observed in Morocco as well. The use of ''Berber'' has been the subject of debate due to its historical background as an
exonym An endonym (from Greek: , 'inner' + , 'name'; also known as autonym) is a common, ''native'' name for a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect, meaning that it is used inside that particular place, group ...
and present equivalence with the
Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
word for "barbarian." One group, the Linguasphere Observatory, has attempted to introduce the
neologism A neologism Ancient_Greek.html"_;"title="_from_Ancient_Greek">Greek_νέο-_''néo''(="new")_and_λόγος_/''lógos''_meaning_"speech,_utterance"is_a_relatively_recent_or_isolated_term,_word,_or_phrase_that_may_be_in_the_process_of_entering_com ...
"Tamazic languages" to refer to the Berber languages.


Origin

Berber languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. Since modern Berber languages are relatively homogeneous, the date of the
Proto-Berber language Proto-Berber or Proto-Libyan is the reconstructed proto-language from which the modern Berber languages descend. Proto-Berber was an Afroasiatic language, and thus its descendant Berber languages are cousins to the Egyptian language, Cushitic ...
from which the modern group is derived was probably comparatively recent, comparable to the age of the Germanic or Romance subfamilies of the Indo-European family. In contrast, the split of the group from the other Afroasiatic sub-phyla is much earlier, and is therefore sometimes associated with the local
Mesolithic The Mesolithic ( Greek: μέσος, ''mesos'' 'middle' + λίθος, ''lithos'' 'stone') or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic is often used synonymo ...
Capsian culture The Capsian culture was a Mesolithic and Neolithic culture centered in the Maghreb that lasted from about 8,000 to 2,700 BC. It was named after the town of Gafsa in Tunisia, which was known as Capsa in Roman times. Capsian industry was conc ...
. A number of extinct populations are believed to have spoken Afroasiatic languages of the Berber branch. According to Peter Behrens and Marianne Bechaus-Gerst, linguistic evidence suggests that the peoples of the
C-Group culture The C-Group culture is an archaeological culture found in Lower Nubia, which dates from ca. 2400 BCE to ca. 1550 BCE. It was named by George A. Reisner. With no central site and no written evidence about what these people called themselves, R ...
in present-day southern
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
and northern
Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
spoke Berber languages. The
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. ...
Nobiin language today contains a number of key
loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...
s related to
pastoralism Pastoralism is a form of animal husbandry where domesticated animals (known as "livestock") are released onto large vegetated outdoor lands ( pastures) for grazing, historically by nomadic people who moved around with their herds. The anim ...
that are of Berber origin, including the terms for sheep and water/
Nile The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered the longest riv ...
. This in turn suggests that the C-Group population—which, along with the
Kerma culture The Kerma culture or Kerma kingdom was an early civilization centered in Kerma, Sudan. It flourished from around 2500 BC to 1500 BC in ancient Nubia. The Kerma culture was based in the southern part of Nubia, or "Upper Nubia" (in parts of presen ...
, inhabited the Nile valley immediately before the arrival of the first
Nubian Nubian may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Nubia, a region along the Nile river in Southern Egypt and northern Sudan. *Nubian people *Nubian languages *Anglo-Nubian goat, a breed of goat * Nubian ibex * , several ships of the Britis ...
speakers—spoke Afroasiatic languages.
Roger Blench Roger Marsh Blench (born August 1, 1953) is a British linguist, ethnomusicologist and development anthropologist. He has an M.A. and a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge and is based in Cambridge, England. He researches, publishes, and w ...
has suggested that Proto-Berber speakers spread from the Nile River valley to North Africa 4,000–5,000 years ago due to the spread of pastoralism, and experienced intense language leveling about 2,000 years ago.Blench, Roger. 2018
Reconciling archaeological and linguistic evidence for Berber prehistory
Hence, although Berber languages had split off from Afroasiatic several thousand years ago, Proto-Berber itself can only be reconstructed to a period as late as 200 A.D. Blench noted that Berber languages are considerably different from other Afroasiatic branches, but modern-day Berber languages display low internal diversity. The presence of Punic borrowings in Proto-Berber points to the diversification of modern Berber language varieties subsequent to the fall of
Carthage Carthage was the capital city of Ancient Carthage, on the eastern side of the Lake of Tunis in what is now Tunisia. Carthage was one of the most important trading hubs of the Ancient Mediterranean and one of the most affluent cities of the classi ...
in 146 B.C.; only Zenaga lacks Punic loanwords. Additionally,
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...
loanwords in Proto-Berber point to the breakup of Proto-Berber between 1 and 200 A.D. During this time period, Roman innovations including the ox-plough, camel, and orchard management were adopted by Berber communities along the '' limes'', or borders of the Roman Empire, as evidenced by the frequency of Latin loanwords from this period in these semantic domains. This resulted in a new trading culture involving the use of a
lingua franca A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, vehicular language, or link language, is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups ...
which became Proto-Berber.


Orthography

The Berber languages and dialects have had a written tradition, on and off, for about 2,500 years, although the tradition has been frequently disrupted by cultural shifts and invasions. They were first written in the Libyco-Berber
abjad An abjad (, ar, أبجد; also abgad) is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with other alphabets, which provide graphemes for both consonants and vow ...
, which is still used today by the
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
in the form of Tifinagh. The oldest dated inscription is from the 3rd century BCE. Early uses of the script have been found on
rock art In archaeology, rock art is human-made markings placed on natural surfaces, typically vertical stone surfaces. A high proportion of surviving historic and prehistoric rock art is found in caves or partly enclosed rock shelters; this type also m ...
and in various sepulchres. Among these are the 1,500-year-old monumental tomb of the Tuareg matriarch Tin Hinan, where vestiges of a Tifinagh inscription have been found on one of the walls. Later, between about 1000 CE and 1500 CE, they were written in the
Arabic script The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and th ...
, and since the 20th century they have been written in the Berber Latin alphabet, especially among the Kabyle and Riffian communities of Morocco and Algeria. The Berber Latin alphabet was also used by most European and Berber linguists during the 19th and 20th centuries. A modernised form of the Tifinagh alphabet, called
Neo-Tifinagh Tifinagh ( Tuareg Berber language: or , ) is a script used to write the Berber languages. Tifinagh is descended from the ancient Libyco-Berber alphabet. The traditional Tifinagh, sometimes called Tuareg Tifinagh, is still favored by the Tuar ...
, was adopted in Morocco in 2003 for writing Berber, but many Moroccan Berber publications still use the Berber Latin alphabet. Algerians mostly use the Berber Latin alphabet in Berber-language education at public schools, while Tifinagh is mostly used for artistic symbolism. Mali and Niger recognise a Tuareg Berber Latin alphabet customised to the Tuareg phonological system. However, traditional Tifinagh is still used in those countries. There are now three writing systems in use for Berber languages: Tifinagh, the Arabic script, and the Berber Latin alphabet, with the Latin alphabet being the most widely used today.


Status

After independence, all the
Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...
countries to varying degrees pursued a policy of Arabisation, aimed partly at displacing French from its colonial position as the dominant language of education and literacy. Under this policy the use of the Berber languages was suppressed or even banned. This state of affairs has been contested by Berbers in Morocco and Algeria—especially
Kabylie Kabylia ('' Kabyle: Tamurt n Leqbayel'' or ''Iqbayliyen'', meaning "Land of Kabyles", '','' meaning "Land of the Tribes") is a cultural, natural and historical region in northern Algeria and the homeland of the Kabyle people. It is part of ...
—and was addressed in both countries by affording the language official status and introducing it in some schools.


Morocco

After gaining independence from France in 1956, Morocco began a period of Arabisation through 1981, with primary and secondary school education gradually being changed to Arabic instruction, and with the aim of having administration done in Arabic, rather than French. During this time, there were riots amongst the Amazigh population, which called for the inclusion of Tamazight as an official language. The 2000 Charter for Education Reform marked a change in policy, with its statement of "openness to Tamazight." Planning for a public Tamazight-language TV network began in 2006; in 2010, the Moroccan government launched Tamazight TV. On July 29, 2011, Tamazight was added as an official language to the Moroccan constitution.


Algeria

After gaining independence from France in 1962, Algeria committed to a policy of Arabisation, which, after 1979, encompassed public education, broadcasting, and the judiciary system. While directed towards the removal of French as an official language, these policies led to dissatisfaction and unrest amongst speakers of Berber languages, who made up about one quarter of the population. In 2002, following riots in Kabylia the previous year, it was announced that Tamazight would be added as a
national language A national language is a language (or language variant, e.g. dialect) that has some connection—de facto or de jure—with a nation. There is little consistency in the use of this term. One or more languages spoken as first languages in the te ...
, though not as an
official An official is someone who holds an office (function or mandate, regardless whether it carries an actual working space with it) in an organization or government and participates in the exercise of authority, (either their own or that of their su ...
one. It was officially added as a national language on April 8, 2003. Tamazight has been taught for three hours a week through the first three years of Algerian middle schools since 2005. On January 5, 2016, it was announced that Tamazight had been added as an official language in a draft amendment to the Algerian constitution; it was added to the constitution as an official language on February 7, 2016.


Libya

Although regional councils in Libya's Nafusa Mountains affiliated with the National Transitional Council reportedly use the Berber language of Nafusi and have called for it to be granted co-official status with Arabic in a prospective new constitution, it does not have official status in Libya as in Morocco and Algeria. As areas of Libya south and west of Tripoli such as the Nafusa Mountains were taken from the control of Gaddafi government forces in early summer 2011, Berber workshops and exhibitions sprang up to share and spread the Berber culture and language.


Other Countries

In Mali and Niger, there are a few schools that teach partially in
Tuareg languages The Tuareg () languages constitute a group of closely related Berber languages and dialects. They are spoken by the Tuareg Berbers in large parts of Mali, Niger, Algeria, Libya and Burkina Faso, with a few speakers, the ''Kinnin'', in Chad. Des ...
.


Phonology


Consonants

The influence of Arabic, the process of spirantization, and the absence of labialization have caused the consonant systems of Berber languages to differ significantly by region. Berber languages found north of, and in the northern half of, the Sahara have greater influence from Arabic, including that of loaned phonemes, than those in more southern regions, like Tuareg. Most Berber languages in northern regions have additionally undergone spirantization, in which historical short stops have changed into fricatives. Northern Berber languages (which is a subset of but not identical to Berber languages in geographically northern regions) commonly have labialized velars and uvulars, unlike other Berber languages. Two languages that illustrate the resulting range in consonant inventory across Berber languages are Ahaggar
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
and Kabyle; Kabyle has two more places of articulation and three more manners of articulation than Ahaggar Tuareg. There is still, however, common consonant features observed across Berber languages. Almost all Berber languages have bilabial, dental, palatal, velar, uvular, pharyngeal, and laryngeal consonants, and almost all consonants have a long counterpart. All Berber languages, as is common in Afroasiatic languages, have
pharyngealized Pharyngealization is a secondary articulation of consonants or vowels by which the pharynx or epiglottis is constricted during the articulation of the sound. IPA symbols In the International Phonetic Alphabet, pharyngealization can be indic ...
consonants and phonemic
gemination In phonetics and phonology, gemination (), or consonant lengthening (from Latin 'doubling', itself from '' gemini'' 'twins'), is an articulation of a consonant for a longer period of time than that of a singleton consonant. It is distinct from ...
. They have also been observed to have tense and lax consonants, although the status of tense consonants has been the subject of "considerable discussion" by linguists.


Vowels

The vowel systems of Berber languages also vary widely, with inventories ranging from three phonemic vowels in most
Northern Berber languages The Northern Berber languages are a dialect continuum spoken across the Maghreb, constituting a subgroup of the Berber branch of the Afroasiatic family. Their continuity has been broken by the spread of Arabic, and to a lesser extent by the Z ...
, to seven in some Eastern Berber and
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
languages. For example, Taselhiyt has vowels /i/, /a/, and /u/, while Ayer Tuareg has vowels /i/, / ə/, /u/, /e/, / ɐ/, /o/, and /a/. Contrastive
vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word ...
is rare in Berber languages. Tuareg languages had previously been reported to have contrasive vowel length, but this is no longer the leading analysis. A complex feature of Berber vowel systems is the role of
central vowels A central vowel, formerly also known as a mixed vowel, is any in a class of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vow ...
, which vary in occurrence and function across languages; there is debate as to whether
schwa In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa (, rarely or ; sometimes spelled shwa) is a vowel sound denoted by the IPA symbol , placed in the central position of the vowel chart. In English and some other languages, it rep ...
is a proper phoneme of Northern Berber languages.


Other

Most Berber languages: * allow for any combination of CC consonant clusters. * have no lexical tones. * either have no lexical stress (Northern Berber languages) or have grammatically significant lexical stress.


Morphology and Syntax

Berber languages characteristically make frequent use of
apophony In linguistics, apophony (also known as ablaut, (vowel) gradation, (vowel) mutation, alternation, internal modification, stem modification, stem alternation, replacive morphology, stem mutation, internal inflection etc.) is any alternation wit ...
in the form of ablaut. Berber apophony has been historically analyzed as functioning similarly to the
Semitic root The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or "radicals" (hence the term consonantal root). Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowels ...
, but this analysis has fallen out of favor due to the lexical significance of vowels in Berber languages, as opposed to their primarily grammatical significance in Semitic languages. The
lexical categories In grammar, a part of speech or part-of-speech (abbreviated as POS or PoS, also known as word class or grammatical category) is a category of words (or, more generally, of lexical items) that have similar grammatical properties. Words that are assi ...
of all Berber languages are nouns, verbs,
pronouns In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun ( abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not ...
, adverbs, and prepositions. With the exception of a handful of Arabic loanwords in some languages, Berber languages do not have proper adjectives. In Northern and Eastern Berber languages, adjectives are a subcatergory of nouns; in Tuareg, relative clauses and stative verb forms are used to modify nouns instead. The gender, number, and case of nouns, as well as the gender, number, and person of verbs, are typically distinguished through affixes. Arguments are described with word order and
clitics In morphology and syntax, a clitic (, backformed from Greek "leaning" or "enclitic"Crystal, David. ''A First Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics''. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1980. Print.) is a morpheme that has syntactic characteristics of a ...
.


Nominal morphology

Nouns are distinguished by
gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most culture ...
,
number A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The original examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words. More universally, individual number ...
, and case in most Berber languages, with gender being feminine or masculine, number being singular or plural, and case being in the construct or free state. Gender can be feminine or masculine, and can be lexically determined, or can be used to distinguish qualities of the noun. For humans and "higher" animals (such as mammals and large birds), gender distinguishes sex, whereas for objects and "lesser" animals (such as insects and lizards), it distinguishes size. For some nouns, often fruits, insects, or building materials, gender can also distinguish the specificity of the noun. The ways in which gender is used to distinguish nouns is shown in as follows, with examples from Figuig: An example of nouns with lexically determined gender are the feminine ''t-lussi'' ("butter") and masculine ''a-ɣi'' ("buttermilk") in Figuig. Most Berber languages have two cases, which distinguish the
construct state In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin ''status constructus''). For example, in Arabi ...
from the free state. The construct state is also called the "construct case, "relative case," "annexed state" (''état d'annexion'')'','' or the "nominative case"; the free state (''état libre'') is also called the "direct case" or "accusative case." When present, case is always expressed through nominal prefixes and initial-vowel reduction. The use of the marked nominative system and
Split-S alignment The split S is an Aerobatic maneuver and an air combat maneuver mostly used to disengage from combat. To execute a split S, the pilot half-rolls their aircraft inverted and executes a descending half-loop, resulting in level flight in the op ...
varies by language. Eastern Berber languages do not have case. Number can be singular or plural, which is marked with prefixation, suffixation, and sometimes apophony. Nouns usually are made plural by one of either suffixation or apophony, with prefixation applied independently. Specifics vary by language, but prefixation typically changes singular ''a-'' and ''ta-'' to plural ''i-'' and ''ti-'' respectively.


Pronominal morphology

Berber languages have both independent and dependent pronouns, both of which distinguish between person and number. Gender is also typically distinguished in the second and third person, and sometimes in first person plural. Linguist Maarten Kossmann divides pronouns in Berber languages into three morphological groups: # Independent pronouns # Direct object clitics # Indirect object clitics; prepositional suffixes; adnominal suffixes When clitics precede or follow a verb, they are almost always ordered with the indirect object first, direct object second, and andative-venitive deictic clitic last. An example in Riffian is shown as follows: The allowed positioning of different kinds of clitics varies by language.


Verbal morphology

Verb bases are formed by stems that are optionally extended by prefixes, with mood, aspect, and negation applied with a vocalic scheme. This form can then be conjugated with affixes to agree with person, number, and gender, which produces a word. Different linguists analyze and label aspects in the Berber languages very differently. Kossman roughly summarizes the basic stems which denote aspect as follows: *
Aorist Aorist (; abbreviated ) verb forms usually express perfective aspect and refer to past events, similar to a preterite. Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of other Indo-European languages and languages influenced by th ...
, also called aoriste, without a preceding particle: ** imperative ** unmarked (taking aspect from preceding verb) * Aorist, with the preceding article ''ad:'' **
irrealis In linguistics, irrealis moods (abbreviated ) are the main set of grammatical moods that indicate that a certain situation or action is not known to have happened at the moment the speaker is talking. This contrasts with the realis moods. Every ...
(adhorative, future) * Preterite, or accompli: ** past tense, in dynamic use ** states (such as "to want, to know"), in stative use * Intensive Aorist, also called habitative or inaccompli: ** dynamic present ** habitative and iterative ** habitative imperative ** negation of any imperative Different languages may have more stems and aspects, or may distinguish within the above categories. Stem formation can be very complex, with Tuareg by some measures having over two hundred identified conjugation subtypes. The aspectual stems of some classes of verbs in various Berber languages are shown as follows:


Numerals

Many Berber languages have lost use of their original numerals from three onwards due to the influence of Arabic; Riffian has lost all except one. Languages that retain all their original numerals include Tashelhiyt, Tuareg, Ghadames, Ouargla, and Zenaga. Original Berber numerals agree in gender with the noun they describe, whereas the borrowed Arabic forms do not. The numerals 1-10 in Tashelhiyt and Mali Tuareg are as follows:


Syntax

Clauses whose
predicate Predicate or predication may refer to: * Predicate (grammar), in linguistics * Predication (philosophy) * several closely related uses in mathematics and formal logic: **Predicate (mathematical logic) **Propositional function **Finitary relation, o ...
is a finite verb form usually have the word order Verb – Subject
Object Object may refer to: General meanings * Object (philosophy), a thing, being, or concept ** Object (abstract), an object which does not exist at any particular time or place ** Physical object, an identifiable collection of matter * Goal, an ...
(VSO): All constituents besides the predicate can be placed in the beginning of the sentence as topics; in such cases, they are represented in the sentence through resumptive pronouns. In thematised position, nouns are in status absolutus and personal pronouns are in the absolutive form:
Noun A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for: * Living creatures (including people, alive, ...
and prepositional phrases can form the predicate of a clause in the Berber languages, e.g. (Berber) ''ism-ns Muha'' "his name is Muha", (Kabyle) ''ɣur-i lbhaim'' "with me is livestock" = "I have livestock". In certain dialects, however, the use of the copula ''d'' is obligatory: Kabyle ''ntta d aqbaili.'' “He is a Kabyle“. In nominal sentences, the subject, too, is in status absolutus.


Lexicon

Above all in the area of basic lexicon, the Berber languages are very similar. However, the household-related vocabulary in sedentary tribes is especially different from the one found in nomadic ones, whereas Tahaggart has only two or three designations for species of palm tree, other languages may have as many as 200 similar words. In contrast, Tahaggart has a rich vocabulary for the description of camels. Above all the northern Berber languages have replaced a great part of the inherited vocabulary with Arabic loans. On the one hand, the words and expressions connected to Islam were borrowed, e.g. Shilha ''bismillah'' "in the name of
Allah Allah (; ar, الله, translit=Allāh, ) is the common Arabic word for God. In the English language, the word generally refers to God in Islam. The word is thought to be derived by contraction from '' al- ilāh'', which means "the god", a ...
" < Classical Arabic ''bi-smi-llāhi'', Tuareg ''ta-mejjīda'' "mosque" (Arabic ''masjid''); on the other, Berber adopted cultural concepts such as Kabyle ''ssuq'' "market" from Arabic ''as-sūq'', ''tamdint'' "town" < Arabisch ''madīna''. Even expressions such as the Arabic greeting ''as-salāmu ʿalaikum'' "Peace be upon you!" were adopted (Tuareg ''salāmu ɣlīkum''). The Berber languages often have original Berber designations besides the Arabic loans; for instance, both the inherited word ''ataram'' and the loan ''lɣərb'' (Arabic ''al-ġarb'') coexist in Kabyle. In more recent times, European languages have also had some influence on Berber, so that words such as "internet" were adopted in it (Kabyle ''intərnət'').


Population

The exact population of Berber speakers is hard to ascertain, since most North African countries do not record language data in their censuses.
Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensi ...
provides a useful academic starting point; however, its bibliographic references are very inadequate, and it rates its own accuracy at only B-C for the area. Early colonial censuses may provide better documented figures for some countries; however, these are also very much out of date. : ''Few census figures are available; all countries (Algeria and Morocco included) do not count Berber languages. The 1972 Niger census reported Tuareg, with other languages, at 127,000 speakers. Population shifts in location and number, effects of urbanization and education in other languages, etc., make estimates difficult. In 1952, André Basset (LLB.4) estimated the number of Berberophones at 5,500,000. Between 1968 and 1978 estimates ranged from eight to thirteen million (as reported by Galand, LELB 56, pp. 107, 123–25); Voegelin and Voegelin (1977, p. 297) call eight million a conservative estimate. In 2006,
Salem Chaker Salem Chaker (born 1950 in Nevers) is an Algerian linguist. A specialist in Berber linguistics (syntax, diachrony, sociolinguistics), he is recognized as the "dean" of modern Berber studies. Biography Salem Chaker was born in 1950 in Nevers, ...
estimated that the Berberophone populations of Kabylie and the three Moroccan groups numbered more than one million each; and that in Algeria, 9,650,000, or one out of five Algerians, speak a Berber language (Chaker 1984, pp. 8–9).'' The total number of speakers of Berber languages in the
Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...
proper appears to lie anywhere between 16 and 25 million, depending on which estimate is accepted; if we take Basset's estimate, it could be as high as 30 million. The vast majority are concentrated in Morocco and Algeria. The Tuareg of the
Sahel The Sahel (; ar, ساحل ' , "coast, shore") is a region in North Africa. It is defined as the ecoclimatic and biogeographic realm of transition between the Sahara to the north and the Sudanian savanna to the south. Having a hot semi-arid cli ...
adds another million or so to the total.


Morocco

In 1960, the first census after Moroccan independence was held. It claimed that 32 percent of Moroccans spoke Berber, including bi-, tri- and quadrilingual people. A 2007 estimate put the number of Amazigh speakers in Morocco at 7.5 million.
Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensi ...
also put the Berber-speaking population at roughly 7.5 million, divided into three main dialects. * Riffian: 1.3 million * Shilha: 3.9 million * Central Atlas Tamazight: 2.3 million A survey included in the official Moroccan census of 2004 and published by several Moroccan newspapers gave the following figures: 34 percent of people in rural regions were first language Berber speakers and 21 percent in urban zones were; the national average was 28.4 percent or 8.52 million. The division of Moroccan Berber languages into three groups, as used by Ethnologue, is common in linguistic publications, but is significantly complicated by the presence of local differences: Shilha is subdivided into Shilha of the
Draa River :''Dra is also the abbreviation for the constellation Draco.'' The Draa ( ber, Asif en Dra, ⴰⵙⵉⴼ ⴻⵏ ⴷⵔⴰ, ary, واد درعة, wad dərʿa; also spelled Dra or Drâa, in older sources mostly Darha or Dara) is Morocco's longest ...
valley, Tasusit (the language of the
Sous The Sous region (also spelt Sus, Suss, Souss or Sousse) ( ar, سوس, sūs, shi, ⵙⵓⵙ, sus) is an area in mid-southern Morocco. Geologically, it is the alluvial basin of the Sous River (''Asif n Sus''), separated from the Sahara desert b ...
s) and several other mountain languages. Moreover, linguistic boundaries are blurred, such that certain languages cannot accurately be described as either Central Morocco Berber (spoken in the central and eastern
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area) or Shilha.


Algeria

In 1906, the total population speaking Berber languages in Algeria (excluding the thinly populated Sahara region) was estimated at 1,305,730 out of 4,447,149, i.e. 29 percent. (Doutté & Gautier, ''Enquête sur la dispersion de la langue berbère en Algérie, faite par l'ordre de M. le Gouverneur Général'', Alger 1913.) The 1911 census, however, found 1,084,702 speakers out of 4,740,526, i.e. 23 percent; Doutté & Gautier suggest that this was the result of a serious undercounting of
Shawiya Shawiya, or Shawiya Berber, also spelt Chaouïa (native form: ''Tacawit'' ), is a Zenati Berber language spoken in Algeria by the Shawiya people. The language's primary speech area is the Awras Mountains in Eastern Algeria and the surrounding ...
in areas of widespread
bilingualism Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. More than half of all ...
. A trend was noted for Berber groups surrounded by Arabic (as in the city of Blida) to adopt Arabic, while Arabic speakers surrounded by Berber (as in Sikh ou Meddour near the city of Tizi Ouzou) tended to adopt Berber. In 1952, André Basset estimated that about a third of Algeria's population spoke Berber. According to historian Charles-Robert Ageron in 1886, Algeria had around 1.2 million Berber speakers and 1.1 million Arab speakers. The Algerian census of 1966 found 2,297,997 out of 12,096,347 Algerians, or 19 percent, to speak "Berber". In 1980, Salem Chaker estimated that "in Algeria, 3,650,000, or one out of five Algerians, speak a Berber language" (Chaker 1984, pp. 8–9). According to Ethnologue, more recent estimates include 14 percent (corresponding to the total figures it gives for each Berber language added together, 4 million) and (by deduction from its Algerian Arabic figures) 29 percent (Hunter 1996). Most of these are accounted for by three languages (percentages based on historical population data from appropriate dates): * Kabyle: 2,540,000 or 9 percent (Ethnologue, 1995); 6,000,000 or 20 percent (Ethnologue, 1998). Mainly in
Algiers Algiers ( ; ar, الجزائر, al-Jazāʾir; ber, Dzayer, script=Latn; french: Alger, ) is the capital and largest city of Algeria. The city's population at the 2008 Census was 2,988,145Census 14 April 2008: Office National des Statistiques d ...
, Béjaïa, Tizi Ouzou,
Bouïra Bouïra is the capital of Bouïra Province, Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates ...
,
Sétif Sétif ( ar, سطيف, ber, Sṭif) is the capital of the Sétif Province in Algeria. It is one of the most important cities of eastern Algeria and the country as a whole, since it is considered the trade capital of the country. It is an inner ci ...
and Boumerdès. *
Shawiya Shawiya, or Shawiya Berber, also spelt Chaouïa (native form: ''Tacawit'' ), is a Zenati Berber language spoken in Algeria by the Shawiya people. The language's primary speech area is the Awras Mountains in Eastern Algeria and the surrounding ...
: ~2 million or 8.5 percent of the population as of 2005. Mainly in Batna, Khenchela, Sétif, Souk Ahras,
Oum El Bouaghi Oum El Bouaghi ( ar, أم البواقي) is a municipality in Algeria. It is the capital of Oum El Bouaghi Province Oum El Bouaghi or Oum el-Bouaghi ( ar, ولاية أم البواقي) is a province ('' wilaya'') of Algeria in the Aures re ...
and
Tébessa Tébessa or Tebessa ( ar, تبسة ''Tibissa'', ''Tbessa'' or ''Tibesti''), the classical Theveste, is the capital city of Tébessa Province region of northeastern Algeria. It hosts several historical landmarks, the most important one being the ...
. * Shenwa: 56,300 speakers according to an estimate, in the Dahra Range region, more precisely Mount Chenoua, just west of Algiers in the provinces of Tipaza, Chlef and Aïn Defla. Two main languages: Beni Menacer, west and south of the Mount Chenoua area and in the Mount Chenoua area, with 55,250 speakers. A fourth group, despite a very small population, accounts for most of the land area where Berber is spoken: *
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
: 25,000 in Algeria (Ethnologue, 1987), mainly in the Hoggar Mountains of the Sahara. Most Tuareg live in Mali and Niger (see below). Other Berber languages spoken in Algeria include: the Berber of Blida, the languages of the Beni Snouss and Beni Boussaid villages in the province of
Tlemcen Tlemcen (; ar, تلمسان, translit=Tilimsān) is the second-largest city in northwestern Algeria after Oran, and capital of the Tlemcen Province. The city has developed leather, carpet, and textile industries, which it exports through the p ...
, the
Matmata Berber Matmata Berber is a Zenati Berber dialect spoken around the town of Matmâta in southern Tunisia, and in the villages of Taoujjout, Tamezret and Zrawa. According to Ben Mamou's lexicon, its speakers call it ''Tmaziɣṯ'' or ''Eddwi nna'', ...
spoken in the Ouarsenis region, the Mozabite language spoken in the region of the province of Mzab and the language of the Ouargla oasis.


Tunisia

Basset (1952) estimated about 1 percent, as did Penchoen (1968). According to Ethnologue, there are only 26,000 speakers (1998) of a Berber language it calls " Djerbi", but which Tunisians call "Shelha", in Tunisia, all in the south around Djerba and Matmata. The more northerly enclave of Sened no longer speaks Berber. This would make 0.3 percent of the population. Chenini is also one of the rare remaining Berber-speaking villages in Tunisia.


Libya

According to Ethnologue (by deduction from its combined Libyan Arabic and Egyptian Arabic figures) the non-Arabic-speaking population, most of which would be Berber, is estimated at 4 percent (1991, 1996). However, the individual language figures it gives add up to 162,000, i.e. about 3 percent. This is mostly accounted for by the languages: * Nafusi in the Nafusa Mountains and Zuwara Berber in the city of Zuwarah in the
Tripolitania Tripolitania ( ar, طرابلس '; ber, Ṭrables, script=Latn; from Vulgar Latin: , from la, Regio Tripolitana, from grc-gre, Τριπολιτάνια), historically known as the Tripoli region, is a historic region and former province o ...
region: 184,000. * Tahaggart (Tamahaq) language of the Tuareg branch of the town of Ghat: 17,000 (Johnstone 1993).


Other Countries

* Egypt: The oasis of Siwa near the Libyan border speaks a Berber language; according to Ethnologue, there are 5,000 speakers there (1995). Its population in 1907 was 3,884 (according to the 1911 ''
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''). * Mauritania: According to Ethnologue, only 200 to 300 speakers of Zenaga remain (1998). It also mentions Tamasheq, but does not provide a population figure for it. Most non-Arabic speakers in Mauritania speak
Niger–Congo languages Niger–Congo is a hypothetical language family spoken over the majority of sub-Saharan Africa. It unites the Mande languages, the Atlantic-Congo languages (which share a characteristic noun class system), and possibly several smaller groups of ...
. * Niger: Ethnologue counts 440,000
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
(1991) speaking: ** Tamasheq: 250,000 ** Tamajaq: 190,000 * Mali: Ethnologue counts 720,000
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
(1998) speaking: ** Tawallamat Tamajaq: 450,000 ** Tayart Tamajeq: 250,000 **
Tamahaq Tamahaq (''Tahaggart Tamahaq'', ''Tamahaq Tahaggart'') is the only known Northern Tuareg language, spoken in Algeria, western Libya and northern Niger. It varies little from the Southern Tuareg languages of the Aïr Mountains, Azawagh and Adagh ...
: 20,000 * Burkina Faso: Ethnologue counts 20,000 to 30,000
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
(
SIL International SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) is an evangelical Christian non-profit organization whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to e ...
1991), speaking
Kel Tamasheq The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
. However Ethnologue is very inaccurate here, appearing to miss the largest group of Tamasheq in Burkina in the province of
Oudalan Oudalan is one of the 45 provinces of Burkina Faso, located in its Sahel Region. Its capital is Gorom-Gorom. The 2019 census reported 158,146 people living in the province. Departments The province is divided into 5 departments. See also *Reg ...
. The Tamasheq-speaking population of Burkina is nearer to 100,000 (2005), with around 70,000 Tamasheq speakers in the province of Oudalan, the rest mainly in Seno, Soum, Yagha, Yatenga and Kadiogo provinces. About 10 percent of Burkina Tamasheq speak a version of the Tawallamat language. * Nigeria: Ethnologue notes the presence of a "few"
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
, speaking Tawallamat Tamajaq. * France: Ethnologue lists 860,000 speakers for Riffian and 537,000 speakers for Kabyle and 400,000 for Shilha and 150,000 for Central Morocco Berber . For the rest of Europe, it has no figures. * Spain: Berber is spoken amongst
Melilla Melilla ( , ; ; rif, Mřič ; ar, مليلية ) is an autonomous city of Spain located in north Africa. It lies on the eastern side of the Cape Three Forks, bordering Morocco and facing the Mediterranean Sea. It has an area of . It was pa ...
's 80,000 inhabitants, but there has been no census as to the percentage of its speakers. A minority of
Ceuta Ceuta (, , ; ar, سَبْتَة, Sabtah) is a Spanish autonomous city on the north coast of Africa. Bordered by Morocco, it lies along the boundary between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It is one of several Spanish territori ...
's inhabitants speak Berber. * Israel: Around two thousand mostly elderly Moroccan-born Israelis of Berber Jewish descent use Judeo-Berber languages (as opposed to
Moroccan Jews Moroccan Jews ( ar, اليهود المغاربة, al-Yahūd al-Maghāriba he, יהודים מרוקאים, Yehudim Maroka'im) are Jews who live in or are from Morocco. Moroccan Jews constitute an ancient community dating to Roman times. Jews b ...
who trace descent from Spanish-speaking
Sephardi Jews Sephardic (or Sephardi) Jews (, ; lad, Djudíos Sefardíes), also ''Sepharadim'' , Modern Hebrew: ''Sfaradim'', Tiberian: Səp̄āraddîm, also , ''Ye'hude Sepharad'', lit. "The Jews of Spain", es, Judíos sefardíes (or ), pt, Judeus sefa ...
expelled from Spain, or Arabic-speaking Moroccan Jews).


Subclassification

A listing of the other Berber languages is complicated by their closeness; there is little distinction between language and dialect. The primary difficulty of subclassification, however, lies in the eastern Berber languages, where there is little agreement. Otherwise there is consensus on the outlines of the family: * Eastern Berber (scope debated) * Northern Berber ** Zenati (incl. Riffian and Shawiya) ** Kabyle **
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(incl. Shilha and Central Atlas Tamazight) *
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
* Western Berber ** Zenaga ** Tetserret The various classifications differ primarily in what they consider to be Eastern Berber, and in how many varieties they recognise as distinct languages. There is so little data available on Guanche that any classification is necessarily uncertain; however, it is almost universally acknowledged as Afro-Asiatic on the basis of the surviving glosses, and widely suspected to be Berber. Much the same can be said of the language, sometimes called " Numidian", used in the Libyan or Libyco-Berber inscriptions around the turn of the Common Era, whose alphabet is the ancestor of Tifinagh.


Kossmann (1999)

Maarten Kossmann (1999) describes Berber as two dialect continua, * Northern Berber and *
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
plus a few peripheral languages, spoken in isolated pockets largely surrounded by Arabic, that fall outside these continua, namely * Zenaga and * the Libyan and Egyptian varieties. Within Northern Berber, however, he recognises a break in the continuum between Zenati and their non-Zenati neighbours; and in the east, he recognises a division between Ghadamès and
Awjila Awjila ( Berber: ''Awilan'', ''Awjila'', ''Awgila''; ar, أوجلة; Latin: ''Augila'') is an oasis town in the Al Wahat District in the Cyrenaica region of northeastern Libya. Since classical times it has been known as a place where high quality ...
on the one hand and Sokna (
Fuqaha, Libya Fuqaha or El-Foqaha ( ar, الفقهاء) is a spring-fed town in central Libya, 200 km by road south of Sokna, on the western edge of the great central Haruj volcano and lava field. It is an isolated Berber-speaking locale, and it shares this i ...
), Siwa and Djebel Nefusa on the other. The implied tree is: * NafusiSiwi (including Sokna) * Ghadamès
Awjila Awjila ( Berber: ''Awilan'', ''Awjila'', ''Awgila''; ar, أوجلة; Latin: ''Augila'') is an oasis town in the Al Wahat District in the Cyrenaica region of northeastern Libya. Since classical times it has been known as a place where high quality ...
* Northern Berber ** Zenati ** Kabyle and
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*
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
* Zenaga


''Ethnologue''

Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensi ...
, mostly following Aikhenvald and Militarev (1991), treats the eastern varieties differently: * Guanche * Eastern Berber ** Siwa ** Eastern Berber ("Awjila–Sokna") * Northern Berber (including Nafusi and Ghadames within Zenati) *
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
* Zenaga


Blench (2006)

Blench (ms, 2006) has the following classification: * Guanche† * East Numidian (Old Libyan)† * Berber and within Berber, * Eastern Berber languages ** Siwa **
Awjila Awjila ( Berber: ''Awilan'', ''Awjila'', ''Awgila''; ar, أوجلة; Latin: ''Augila'') is an oasis town in the Al Wahat District in the Cyrenaica region of northeastern Libya. Since classical times it has been known as a place where high quality ...
** Sokna† ** Ghadames * Northern Berber (including Nafusi within Zenati) *
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
* Zenaga


Influence on other languages

The Berber languages have influenced
Maghrebi Arabic Maghrebi Arabic (, Western Arabic; as opposed to Eastern or Mashriqi Arabic) is a vernacular Arabic dialect continuum spoken in the Maghreb region, in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Western Sahara, and Mauritania. It includes Moroccan, Al ...
languages, such as Moroccan, Algerian, Libyan and Tunisian Arabic. Their influence is also seen in some languages in West Africa. F. W. H. Migeod pointed to strong resemblances between Berber and Hausa in such words and phrases as these: Berber: obanis; Hausa ''obansa'' (his father); Berber: a bat; Hausa ''ya bata'' (he was lost); Berber: eghare; Hausa ''ya kirra'' (he called). In addition he notes that the
genitive In grammar, the genitive case ( abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can a ...
in both languages is formed with n = "of".Migeod, F. W. H., ''The Languages of West Africa''. Kegan, Paul, Trench & Trübner, London 1913. pages 232, 233.


Extinct languages

A number of extinct populations are believed to have spoken Afro-Asiatic languages of the Berber branch. According to Peter Behrens (1981) and Marianne Bechaus-Gerst (2000), linguistic evidence suggests that the peoples of the
C-Group culture The C-Group culture is an archaeological culture found in Lower Nubia, which dates from ca. 2400 BCE to ca. 1550 BCE. It was named by George A. Reisner. With no central site and no written evidence about what these people called themselves, R ...
in present-day southern
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
and northern
Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
spoke Berber languages. The
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. ...
Nobiin language today contains a number of key pastoralism related
loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...
s that are of Berber origin, including the terms for sheep and water/
Nile The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered the longest riv ...
. This in turn suggests that the C-Group population—which, along with the
Kerma culture The Kerma culture or Kerma kingdom was an early civilization centered in Kerma, Sudan. It flourished from around 2500 BC to 1500 BC in ancient Nubia. The Kerma culture was based in the southern part of Nubia, or "Upper Nubia" (in parts of presen ...
, inhabited the Nile valley immediately before the arrival of the first
Nubian Nubian may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Nubia, a region along the Nile river in Southern Egypt and northern Sudan. *Nubian people *Nubian languages *Anglo-Nubian goat, a breed of goat * Nubian ibex * , several ships of the Britis ...
speakers—spoke Afro-Asiatic languages. Additionally, historical linguistics indicate that the
Guanche language Guanche is an extinct language that was spoken by the Guanches of the Canary Islands until the 16th or 17th century. It died out after the conquest of the Canary Islands as the Guanche ethnic group was assimilated into the dominant Spanish cul ...
, which was spoken on the
Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, :es:Canarias, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to ...
by the ancient Guanches, likely belonged to the Berber branch of the Afro-Asiatic family.Richard Hayward, 2000, "Afroasiatic", in Heine & Nurse eds, ''African Languages,'' Cambridge University Press


See also

*
List of Berber-language television channels This is a list of Berber-language television channels. Morocco State *Tamazight TV ( Shilha, Central Tamazight, Riffian, Standard Moroccan Tamazight) *2M TV partially in Shilha *Arrabia partially in Shilha, Central Tamazight, Riff ...
* Amazigh Cultural Association in America


Notes


References

* Medieval Berber Orthography, Boogert,
Leiden University Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; nl, Universiteit Leiden) is a public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. The university was founded as a Protestant university in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, as a reward to the city o ...
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* Brett, Michael; & Fentress, Elizabeth (1997). ''The Berbers (The Peoples of Africa)''. . (Pbk). * Abdel-Masish, Ernest T. 1971. ''A Reference Grammar of Berber (Middle Atlas Berber)''. Ann Arbor: Center for Near Eastern and North African Studies, The University of Michigan * Basset, André. 1952. ''La langue berbère''. Handbook of African Languages 1, ser. ed. Daryll Forde. London: Oxford University Press * Chaker, Salem. 1995. ''Linguistique berbère: Études de syntaxe et de diachronie''. M. S.—Ussun amaziɣ 8, ser. ed. Salem Chaker. Paris and Leuven: Uitgeverij Peeters * Dallet, Jean-Marie. 1982. ''Dictionnaire kabyle–français, parler des At Mangellet, Algérie''. Études etholinguistiques Maghreb–Sahara 1, ser. eds. Salem Chaker, and Marceau Gast. Paris: Société d’études linguistiques et anthropologiques de France * de Foucauld, Charles Eugène. 1951. ''Dictionnaire touareg–français, dialecte de l’Ahaggar''. 4 vols. aris Imprimerie nationale de France * Delheure, Jean. 1984. ''Aǧraw n yiwalen: tumẓabt t-tfransist, Dictionnaire mozabite–français, langue berbère parlée du Mzab, Sahara septentrional, Algérie''. Études etholinguistiques Maghreb–Sahara 2, ser. eds. Salem Chaker, and Marceau Gast. Paris: Société d’études linguistiques et anthropologiques de France * ———. 1987. ''Agerraw n iwalen: teggargrent–taṛumit, Dictionnaire ouargli–français, langue parlée à Oaurgla et Ngoussa, oasis du Sahara septentrinal, Algérie''. Études etholinguistiques Maghreb–Sahara 5, ser. eds. Salem Chaker, and Marceau Gast. Paris: Société d’études linguistiques et anthropologiques de France * Kossmann, Maarten G. 1999. ''Essai sur la phonologie du proto-berbère''. Grammatische Analysen afrikanischer Sprachen 12, ser. eds. Wilhelm J. G. Möhlig, and Bernd Heine. Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag * Kossmann, Maarten G., and Hendrikus Joseph Stroomer. 1997. "Berber Phonology". In ''Phonologies of Asia and Africa (Including the Caucasus)'', edited by Alan S. Kaye. 2 vols. Vol. 1. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. 461–475 * Naït-Zerrad, Kamal. 1998. ''Dictionarrie des racines berbères (formes attestées)''. Paris and Leuven:
Centre de Recherche Berbère Centre de Recherche Berbère (CRB, ) is a department at the Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales (INALCO) specializing in the Berber languages. The center is the oldest organization which focuses on Berber culture and languag ...
and Uitgeverij Peeters * Karl-Gottfried Prasse, Ghubăyd ăgg-Ălăwžəli, and Ghăbdəwan əg-Muxămmăd. 1998. ''Asăggălalaf: Tămaẓəq–Tăfrăsist – Lexique touareg–français''. 2nd ed. Carsten Niebuhr Institute Publications 24, ser. eds. Paul John Frandsen, Daniel T. Potts, and Aage Westenholz. København: Museum Tusculanum Press * Quitout, Michel. 1997. ''Grammaire berbère (rifain, Berber, chleuh, kabyle)''. Paris and Montréal: Éditions l’Harmattan * Rössler, Otto. 1958. "Die Sprache Numidiens". In ''Sybaris: Festschrift Hans Krahe zum 60. Geburtstag am 7. February 1958, dargebracht von Freunden, Schülern und Kollegen''. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz * Sadiqi, Fatima. 1997. ''Grammaire du berbère''. Paris and Montréal: Éditions l’Harmattan.


External links


"What does Berber sound like?" (Thamazight poems as text & MP3)



The Berber Language Profile

Etymology of "Berber"

Etymology of "Amazigh"

Early Christian history of Berbers





Imyura Kabyle site about literature

Amawal: The online open source Berber dictionary
{{DEFAULTSORT:Berber Languages Afroasiatic languages Maghreb Languages of Algeria Languages of Morocco Languages of Mali Languages of Niger Languages of Mauritania Languages of Tunisia Languages of Gibraltar Languages of Sicily Languages of Western Sahara