Kafa or Kefa (Kafi noono) is a North Omotic language spoken in Ethiopia at the Keffa Zone. It is part of the Ethiopian Language Area, with SOV word order, ejective consonants, etc.
| Kafa | |
|---|---|
| Kafi noono | |
| Native to | Ethiopia |
| Region | Keffa Zone |
| Ethnicity | Kafficho |
Native speakers | 830,000 (2007 census)[1] |
| Dialects | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | kbr |
| Glottolog | kafa1242 |
A collection of proverbs in the language has been published by Mesfin Wodajo.[2]
Phonology
editConsonants
edit| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | gem. | plain | gem. | plain | gem. | plain | gem. | |||
| Plosive/ Affricate |
voiceless | p | pː | t | tː | tʃ | tʃː | k | kː | ʔ |
| voiced | b | bː | d | dː | dʒ | dʒː | g | ɡː | ||
| ejective | pʼ | pːʼ | tʼ | tːʼ | tʃʼ | tʃːʼ | kʼ | kːʼ | ||
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s | sː | ʃ | h | ||||
| voiced | z | |||||||||
| Nasal | m | mː | n | nː | ||||||
| Rhotic | ɾ | |||||||||
| Approximant | w | l | lː | j | ||||||
- /f/ may also be heard as [ɸ] in free variation.
- /b/ can be heard as a bilabial approximant [β̞] in intervocalic positions.
- /t/ can be realized as [ts] in word-final position.[3]
Vowels
edit| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| Close | i iː | u uː |
| Mid | ɛ ɛː | ɔ ɔː |
| Open | a aː |
- /a/ may also have an allophone of [ə].[3]
Manjo
edit| Manjo | |
|---|---|
| Mangiò | |
| (speculative) | |
unattested | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | None (mis) |
| Glottolog | mang1364 |
Within the Kafa culture there is a caste of traditional hunters called the Manja/Manjo 'hunters'. They may once have spoken a different language. However, Leikola has shown that currently they speak Kafa with a number of distinctive words and constructions that they use, reinforcing the distinctions between themselves and the larger Kafa society.[4]
References
edit- ^ Ethiopia 2007 Census Archived 2010-11-14 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ 2012. Functions and Formal and Stylistic Features of Kafa Proverbs: Functional and Structural Approach. Lambert Academic Publishing.
- ^ a b Theil, Rolf (2007). Kafa phonology. Journal of African Languages and Linguistics, Vol. 28, No. 2: DeGruyter Mouton. pp. 193–216.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link) - ^ Leikola, Kirsi. 2014. Talking Manjo: Linguistic repertoires as means of negotiating marginalization. University of Helsinki: PhD dissertation.
Further reading
edit- Brockelmann, Carl (1950): Zur Grammatik der Kafa-Sprache. in: Brockelmann, Carl (ed.): Abbessinische Berichte über die Verhandlungen der Sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Leipzig. pp 40–60.
- Cerulli, Enrico (1951), Studi etiopici. Vol. IV: La lingua Caffina. Roma: Istituto Per L'oriente.
- Fleming, Harold C. (1976), "Kefa (Gonga) Languages", in The Non-Semitic Languages of Ethiopia. Bender, M. L. (ed.)
External links
edit- World Atlas of Language Structures information on Kefa
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