Mboteni language
| Mboteni | |
|---|---|
| Baga Pokur | |
| Native to | Guinea |
| Region | coastal villages of Binari and Mboteni |
| Ethnicity | 3000 (no date) |
Native speakers | 3,700 (2015)[1] |
Niger–Congo?
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Unwritten | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | bcg |
| Glottolog | baga1275 |
| ELP | Lua error in Module:Endangered_Languages_Project at line 21: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value). |
Mboteni, also known as Baga Mboteni, Baga Binari,[2] or Baga Pokur, is an endangered Rio Nunez language spoken in the coastal Rio Nunez region of Guinea. Speakers who have gone to school or work outside their villages are bilingual in Pokur and the Mande language Susu.[3]
Pokur has lost the noun-class concord found in its relatives.[4]
Geographical distribution
[edit | edit source]According to Fields (2008:33-34), Mboteni is spoken exclusively in the two villages of Mboteni and Binari on a peninsula south of the mouth of the Nunez River. Mboteni speakers are surrounded by Sitem speakers.[5][1]
Wilson (2007), based on his field reports from the 1950s, reported that Baga Mboteni (called Pukur by the speakers) was spoken on Binari Island by two clans that were hostile to each other.[2]
Classification
[edit | edit source]As one of the two Rio Nunez languages of Guinea, its closest relative is Mbulungish.[6]
Despite the name, Baga Mboteni is not one of the Baga languages, though speakers are ethnically Baga. The language is instead most closely related to Nalu and Mbulungish, though it shares a low percentage of cognate vocabulary with them.[3]
Phonology
[edit | edit source]| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | p b | t d | c ɟ | k g |
| Fricative | f | s | x | |
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ |
| Approximant | w | r, l | j |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i | u | |
| Mid-high | e | ə | o |
| Mid-low | ɛ | ɔ | |
| Low | a |
References
[edit | edit source]- ^ a b Mboteni at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
- ^ a b c d Wilson, William André Auquier. 2007. Guinea Languages of the Atlantic group: description and internal classification. (Schriften zur Afrikanistik, 12.) Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.
- ^ a b Fields, E. L. (2004). Before" Baga": Settlement Chronologies of the Coastal Rio Nunez Region, Earliest Times to C. 1000 CE. International Journal of African Historical Studies, 229-253.
- ^ Wilson, W. A. A. (1961). Numeration in the Languages of Guiné. Africa, 31(04), 372-377.
- ^ Fields-Black, Edda L. 2008. Deep Roots: Rice Farmers in West Africa and the African Diaspora. (Blacks in the Diaspora.) Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
- ^ Lua error in Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration at line 2172: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value).
Further reading
[edit | edit source]- Lua error in Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration at line 2172: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value).
- Fields-Black, E. L. (2008). Deep Roots: Rice Farmers in West Africa and the African Diaspora. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
External links
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