The Beboid languages are any of several groups of languages spoken principally in southwest
Cameroon, although two languages (Bukwen and Mashi) are spoken over the border in
Nigeria. They are probably not most closely related to each other. The Eastern Beboid languages may be most closely related to the
Tivoid and
Momo groups, though some of the geographical Western Beboid grouping may be closer to
Ekoid
The Ekoid languages are a dialect cluster of Southern Bantoid languages spoken principally in southeastern Nigeria and in adjacent regions of Cameroon. They have long been associated with the Bantu languages, without their status being precisely de ...
and
Bantu
Bantu may refer to:
*Bantu languages, constitute the largest sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages
*Bantu peoples, over 400 peoples of Africa speaking a Bantu language
*Bantu knots, a type of African hairstyle
*Black Association for Nationali ...
.
Previous research includes a study of
noun classes
In linguistics, a noun class is a particular category of nouns. A noun may belong to a given class because of the characteristic features of its referent, such as gender, animacy, shape, but such designations are often clearly conventional. Some a ...
in Beboid languages by
Jean-Marie Hombert
Jean-Marie is both a given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include:
* Jean-Marie Abgrall (born 1950), a French psychiatrist, criminologist, specialist in forensic medicine, cult expert, and graduate in criminal law
* Jean-Marie C ...
(1980),
Larry Hyman (1980, 1981), a dissertation by Richards (1991) concerning the
phonology of three eastern Beboid languages (Noni, Ncane and Nsari), Lux (2003) a Noni lexicon and Cox (2005) a phonology of
Kemezung.
Languages
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 ex ...
survey reports have provided more detail on Eastern and Western Beboid (Brye & Brye 2002, 2004; Hamm et al. 2002) and Hamm (2002) is a brief overview of the group as a whole.
Eastern Beboid is clearly valid; speakers recognise the relationship between their languages, their distribution is the result of recent population movements and linguistically they are similar, and they are close to the Bantu languages. The term "Beboid" sometimes refers specifically to this group. Western Beboid, on the other hand, is a geographic rather than genetic group: some appear to be closer to the
Grassfields languages, and there does not appear to be much to link them together, though this may be partly due to lack of data (Good 2009, Di Carlo & Good 2012). They are also called "Yemne-Kimbi" when the eastern group is called just "Beboid" (Di Carlo & Good 2012).
;Eastern Beboid (Beboid):
Cung,
Bebe–
Kemezung,
Naki,
Saari
Saari means ''island'' in Finnish and may refer to
* Saari (name)
*Saari, Finland, a former municipality
* Saari, Estonia, a village
*Saari language in Cameroon
* Tarujen Saari, a Finnish folk-rock group
*''Saari Bhool Hamari Thi
''Saari Bhool ...
–
Noni (Ncane-Mungong-Noone),
Fio,
Mbuk
''Mountain Biking UK'' (often shortened to ''MBUK'') is a British mountain biking magazine. It is published by Our Media, an Immediate Media group company, and is currently the UK's best-selling mountain bike magazine, with a circulation of 2 ...
;Western Beboid (Yemne-Kimbi) — geographic
:
Fang
A fang is a long, pointed tooth. In mammals, a fang is a modified maxillary tooth, used for biting and tearing flesh. In snakes, it is a specialized tooth that is associated with a venom gland (see snake venom). Spiders also have external fang ...
:
Koshin
:
Mundabli and
Buu
:
Mungbam and
Missong
:
Mbu’ (Ajumbu) and
Lung
The lungs are the primary organs of the respiratory system in humans and most other animals, including some snails and a small number of fish. In mammals and most other vertebrates, two lungs are located near the backbone on either side of t ...
Also spoken in the area is
Bikya (Furu), one of the
Furu languages
The Furu languages are a proposed group of poorly attested extinct or nearly extinct and otherwise unclassified Southern Bantoid languages of Cameroon. Suggested Furu languages are:
: Bikya (Furu), Bishuo, Busuu, ?Lubu
Word lists for the first t ...
, and
Kung, one of the
Ring languages.
Names and locations (Nigeria)
Below is a list of language names, populations, and locations (in
Nigeria only) from Blench (2019).
See also
*
Beboid word lists (Wiktionary)
Bibliography
* Blench, Roger, 2011
'The membership and internal structure of Bantoid and the border with Bantu' ''Bantu IV'', Humboldt University, Berlin.
*Blench, Roger. n.d.
Beboid word lists'.
*Brye, Edward and Elizabeth Brye. 2002. "Rapid appraisal and intelligibility testing surveys of the Eastern Beboid group of languages (Northwest Province)." SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2002-019. http://www.sil.org/silesr/2002/019/
*Pierpaolo Di Carlo & Jeff Good. 2012
What are we trying to preserve?: Diversity, change, and ideology at the edge of the Cameroonian Grassfields*Good, Jeff, & Jesse Lovegren. 2009
'Reassessing Western Beboid' Bantu III.
*Good, Jeff, & Scott Farrar. 2008
'Western Beboid and African language classification' LSA.
*Hamm, Cameron, Diller, J., Jordan-Diller, K. & F. Assako a Tiati. 2002. A rapid appraisal survey of Western Beboid languages (Menchum Division, Northwest Province). SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2002-014. http://www.sil.org/silesr/2002/014/
*Hamm, C. 2002. Beboid Language Family of Cameroon and Nigeria: Location and Genetic Classification. SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2002
*Hombert, Jean-Marie. 1980. Noun Classes of the Beboid Languages. In Noun classes in the Grassfields Bantu borderland, SCOPIL 8. Los Angeles: University of Southern California.
References
{{authority control
Languages of Cameroon
Languages of Nigeria