Jagham language
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| Ekoi | |
|---|---|
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| Native to | Nigeria, Cameroon |
| Ethnicity | Ekoi people |
Native speakers | (120,000 cited 2000)[1] |
| Dialects |
|
| Nsibidi, Latin script | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | etu |
| Glottolog | ejag1239 |
| ELP | Template:Endangered Languages Project |
| Linguasphere | Template:Infobox language/lingualist |
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The Jagham language, Ejagham, also known as Ekoi, is an Ekoid language of Nigeria and Cameroon spoken by the Ekoi people. The E- in Ejagham represents the class prefix for "language", analogous to the Bantu ki- in KiSwahili
The Ekoi are one of several peoples who use Nsibidi ideographs, and may be the ones that created them.
Dialects
Ekoi is dialectally diverse. The dialects of Ejagham are divided into Western and Eastern groups:
- Western varieties include Bendeghe, Northern and Southern Etung, Ekwe and Akamkpa-Ejagham;
- Eastern varieties include Keaka and Obang.[2]
Blench (2019) also lists Ekin as an Ejagham dialect.[3]
Phonology
Consonants
| Labial | Alveolar | Post-alv./ Palatal |
Velar | Labio- velar | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | ||
| Plosive/ Affricate |
voiceless | p | t | t͡ʃ | k | k͡p |
| voiced | b | d | d͡ʒ | ɡ | ɡ͡b | |
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s | |||
| voiced | (β) | (ɣ) | ||||
| Tap | ɾ | |||||
| Approximant | j | w | ||||
- Stop sounds /b, ɡ/ are lenited to fricatives [β, ɣ] when in intervocalic positions.
- Velar sounds [k, ɡ; (ɣ)] can be heard as uvular [q, (ʁ)] when in syllable-final position.[4]
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | ʉ[a] | u |
| Close-mid | e[b] | ə | o[b] |
| Open-mid | ɛ | ɔ | |
| Open | a |
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Writing system
A Jagham alphabet was developed by John R. Watters and Kathie Watters in 1981.
| a | b | bh | ch | d | e | ə | f | g | gb | gh | i | j | k | kp | m | n | ny | ŋ | o | p | r | s | t | u | ʉ | w | y |
Morphology
Ekoi has the following noun classes, listed here with their Bantu equivalents. Watters (1981) says there are fewer than in Bantu because of mergers (class 4 into 3, 7 into 6, etc.), though Blench notes that there is no reason to think that the common ancestral language had as many noun classes as proto-Bantu.
| Noun class | Prefix | Concord |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | N- | w, ɲ |
| 2 | a- | b |
| 3 | N- | m |
| 5 | ɛ- | j |
| 6 | a- | m |
| 8 | bi- | b |
| 9 | N- | j, ɲ |
| 14 | ɔ- | b |
| 19 | i- | f |
('N' stands for a homorganic nasal. 'j' is "y".)
References
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- ^ Ekoi at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Blench, Roger. "Ekoid: Bantoid languages of the Nigeria-Cameroun borderland" (PDF). p. 1.
- ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Blench, Roger (2019). An Atlas of Nigerian Languages (4th ed.). Cambridge: Kay Williamson Educational Foundation.
- ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Watters, John R. (1981). A Phonology and Morphology of Ejagham- with notes on Dialect Variation. Los Angeles: University of California at Los Angeles.
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Works cited
- Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Tadadjeu, Maurice (1993). "Cameroun". In Rhonda L. Hartell (ed.). Alphabets des langues africaines. Dakar: Unesco et Société internationale de linguistique.
