An Introduction to African LanguagesThis book introduces beginning students and non-specialists to the diversity and richness of African languages. In addition to providing a solid background to the study of African languages, the book presents linguistic phenomena not found in European languages. A goal of this book is to stimulate interest in African languages and address the question: What makes African languages so fascinating? The orientation adopted throughout the book is a descriptive one, which seeks to characterize African languages in a relatively succinct and neutral manner, and to make the facts accessible to a wide variety of readers. The author s lengthy acquaintance with the continent and field experiences in western, eastern, and southern Africa allow for both a broad perspective and considerable depth in selected areas. The original examples are often the author s own but also come from other sources and languages not often referenced in the literature. This text also includes a set of sound files illustrating the phenomena under discussion, be they the clicks of Khoisan, talking drums, or the ideophones (words like English lickety-split) found almost everywhere, which will make this book a valuable resource for teacher and student alike. |
Contents
1 | |
2 The classification of African languages | 19 |
3 Phonetics and phonology | 55 |
4 Morphology | 97 |
5 Syntax and semantics | 117 |
6 Historical and typological issues | 153 |
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Common terms and phrases
African languages African Linguistics African tone Afrikaans Afroasiatic areal Atlantic languages Bantoid Bantu languages Bender Benue-Congo Bijagó Blench Cameroon Cavalli-Sforza Chadic Childs clicks consonant alternation creole Cushitic discussed Doke downdrift English example Fanagalo focus Fula function genetic grammatical grammaticalization Greenberg Hausa Heine high tone hlonipha ideophones Igbo Isicamtho Khoisan languages Kisi Kru languages language classification language spoken lexical Liberia linguistic logophoric Ma’a Maddieson Mande languages Mandinka marked marker Mbugu Mchombo morphemes morphology nasal negation Niger-Congo Nigeria Nilo-Saharan Nilotic noun class ofthe pattern phonetic phonological phyla phylum pidgin plural prefix prenasalized pronoun referenced segmental semantic sentence serial verbs social Songhay South Africa speakers speech structure Sudanic suffix Swahili syllable syntactic syntax Table tense tonal Traill Tsotsitaal typological University varieties verb extensions verbal vowel harmony West Africa widely spoken Williamson Wolof word order Xhosa Zulu