Tama language
{{Short description|Nilo-Saharan language spoken in Chad and Sudan}}
{{distinguish|Tama language (Colombia)}}
{{Infobox language
|name=Tama
|altname=Tamongobo
|region=Wadi Fira, West Darfur, South Darfur
|speakers={{sigfig|464,000|2}}
|date=2022–2023
|ref=e27
|dia1=Tama
|dia2=Orra
|dia3=Girga
|dia4=Haura
|dia5=Erenga
|dia6=Murase
|dia7=Mileere
|dia8=Madungore
|script=Unwritten
|familycolor=Nilo-Saharan
|fam2=Eastern Sudanic
|fam3=Northern Eastern
|fam4=Taman
|fam5=Tama–Sungor
|iso3=tma
|glotto=tama1331
|glottorefname=Tama (Chad)
|lingua = 05-DAA-aa
}}
Image:Darfur Linguistic Map.svg
Tama, or Tamongobo, is the primary language spoken by the Tama people in Ouaddai, eastern Chad and in Darfur, western Sudan.{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=A0XNvklcqbwC&q=tama&pg=RA1-PA454 |title = Encyclopedia of Africa |author1=Anthony Appiah |author2=Henry Louis Gates |publisher= Oxford University Press |year= 2010 |isbn= 978-0195337709 |page=454}} It is a Taman language which belongs to the Eastern Sudanic branch of the Nilo-Saharan language family. Miisiirii is often considered a dialect, though it is not particularly close.
Demographics
Tama is spoken by 63,000 people in Dar Tama, a well irrigated area near Guéréda that extends from Kebkebiya village to nearby Sudan. There are two nearly identical dialects, one spoken in the northern and central areas, and another one spoken in the south.Rilly, Claude. 2010. Le méroïtique et sa famille linguistique. Leuven: Peeters Publishers. {{ISBN|978-9042922372}}
Phonology
= Consonants =
| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
! colspan="2" | |
| rowspan="3" |Stop
!{{Small|voiceless}} | |t̪ | | | |k | |
|---|
| {{Small|voiced}}
|b |d̪ | | |ɟ |g | |
| {{Small|implosive}}
|ɓ |ɗ̪ | | | | | |
| colspan="2" |Fricative
|f | |s | |ʃ | |h |
| colspan="2" |Nasal
|m | |n | |ɲ |ŋ | |
| colspan="2" |Rhotic
| | |r |ɽ | | | |
| colspan="2" |Lateral
| | |l |ɭ | | | |
| colspan="2" |Approximant
|w | | | |j | | |
= Vowels =
| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
! rowspan="2" | ! colspan="3" |+ATR ! colspan="3" |Advanced and retracted tongue root |
| ATR |
| Front
!Back !Back |
|---|
| align="center"
|i | |u |ɪ | |ʊ |
| Mid
|e | |o |ɛ | |ɔ |
| align="center"
!Open | |ʌ̈ | | |a | |
Vowel length is also distinctive.{{Cite book |last=Dimmendaal |first=Gerrit J. |title=Tama |publisher=Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Amsterdam: John Benjamins |year=2009 |location=In Dimmendaal, Gerrit J. (ed.), Coding Participant Marking: Construction Types in Twelve African Languages |pages=305–330}}
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=new100&morpho=0&basename=new100\esu\tam&limit=-1 Tama basic lexicon at the Global Lexicostatistical Database]
{{Eastern Sudanic languages}}
{{ns-lang-stub}}