Saari, or Nsari, is an
Eastern Beboid language
The Beboid languages are any of two families of Southern Bantoid languages spoken principally in southwest Cameroon, although two (Bukwen and Mashi) are spoken over the border in southeast Nigeria. The Eastern Beboid languages may be most closely ...
of
Cameroon
Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...
. According to ''Ethnologue'', it's 84% lexically similar to
Ncane, making it very close to the Noni cluster. It is spoken in the Misaje Sub-Division, Donga-Mantung Division, North West Region. The Ethnologue has Sari as the language name, and lists the following as alternate language names: Akweto, Nsari, Pesaa, Saari, Sali.
The language is spoken by the Besaa people, who live predominately in Akweto, Kamine, and Mbissa. There are approximately 7,600 (Lewis, 2015) speakers of the language, although the exact number is unknown as there are reportedly sizable clusters of people living outside the area, particularly in the Southwest Region.
Sari Language
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References
Sources
* Blench, Roger, 2011
'The membership and internal structure of Bantoid and the border with Bantu'
''Bantu IV'', Humboldt University, Berlin.
*Richards, Russell M. 1991. Phonologie de trois langues beboides du Cameroun: Noone, Ncanti et Sari. Thèse pour le doctorat (Arrête du 23 Novembre 1988), Livres I. et II. Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris III.
Saari Dictionary
Beboid languages
Languages of Cameroon
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