Kissi (or Kisi) is a
Mel language of West Africa, There are two dialects, northern and southern, and both are
tonal languages. The northern dialect is spoken in
Guinea
Guinea, officially the Republic of Guinea, is a coastal country in West Africa. It borders the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Guinea-Bissau to the northwest, Senegal to the north, Mali to the northeast, Côte d'Ivoire to the southeast, and Sier ...
and in
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Sierra Leone's land area is . It has a tropical climate and envi ...
. The southern dialect is spoken in
Liberia
Liberia, officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the West African coast. It is bordered by Sierra Leone to Liberia–Sierra Leone border, its northwest, Guinea to Guinea–Liberia border, its north, Ivory Coast to Ivory Coast–Lib ...
and
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Sierra Leone's land area is . It has a tropical climate and envi ...
. The two dialects are notably different, but are closely related.
In Guinea, the main places Kissi is spoken are the cities of
Kissidougou and
Guéckédou and their préfectures.
Phonology
Vowels
can also approximate to the sounds .
Consonants
Kissidougou dialects preserve a distinction between /r/ and /l/ phonemes that have been merged as allophones in dialects south of Guéckédou. For instance, means exactly the same as . Also, "thank you" is realized as around Kissidougou and south of Guéckédou.
is considered an allophone of /l/ in Kissidougou.
/w/ can also have an allophone of
when preceding front vowel sounds.
The voiced labial-velar stop occurs only in onomatopoeic phrases, and medial gb can be regarded as an allophone of its voiceless counterpart.
* 'outdoor kitchen'
* (a river in Kissidougou)
* 'stool'
* 'city taxi'
Tone
Kissi has four tones: two register and two contour. The two register tones are level and high, and the two contour tones are a rising mid tone and a falling high tone. Kissi also has an extra-high tone, but occurs only sparingly, functioning in only a few grammatical contexts.
Grammar (northern Kissi)
Pronouns
As you can already see from these examples, verbs aren't conjugated like English verbs, but they are inflected by tone.
Articles
Definite and indefinite articles do not exist in Kissi, so means "the knife" as well as "a knife".
If an object has to be defined (because there are more than one, for example), "this" is used:
example: - this knife
If that is not exact enough, an object is described using adjectives.
- Give me a/the knife.
- Give me the big knife.
References
*G. Tucker Childs. A Grammar of Kisi, A Southern Atlantic Language. 1995. 370 pp.
*G. Tucker Childs: A Dictionary of the Kisi Language. With an English-Kisi Index
*Denise Paulme. Les Gens du Riz: Les Kissi de Haute-Guinée. Paris. Librairie Plon. 1954, 1970. 324 pp
Online version
External links
Sound Files - KQS Kissi-Northern at globalrecordings.netSound Files - KSS Kisi-Southern (Gissi) at globalrecordings.netSound Files - The complete New Testament in Kisi (Select language "Kisi Southern")Sample text at language-museum.com
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Mel languages
Languages of Liberia
Languages of Guinea
Languages of Sierra Leone