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Yom language

{{Short description|Gur language spoken in Benin}}

{{Infobox language

|name=Yom

|altname=Pila

|states=Benin

|region=Donga,

|ethnicity=70,000 Tamba people, 230,000 Yowa people.

|speakers=L1: {{sigfig|300,000|2}}

|date=2021

|ref=e26

|speakers2=L1: {{sigfig|150,000|2}} (2021)
No monolinguals speakers

|speakers_label=speakers

|dia1=Tangerem

|dia2=Yom

|familycolor=Niger-Congo

|fam2=Atlantic–Congo

|fam3=Gur

|fam4=Northern

|fam5=Oti–Volta

|fam6=Yom–Nawdm

|script=Latin

|minority={{flag|Benin}}

|iso3=pil

|glotto=yomm1242

|glottorefname=Yom

}}

Yom, or Pilapila, and formerly Kiliŋa or Kilir, is a Gur language of Benin. It is spoken in the town of Djougou and the surrounding area by the Yoa-Lokpa people. A very closely related dialect called taŋgələm is also spoken by the Taneka people.

Phonology

Where it differs from the IPA symbol, the conventional orthography is given below the phoneme.

=Vowels=

In Yom orthography, long vowels are written as double vowels, e.g. {{angle bracket|ɛɛ}} for {{IPA|/ɛː/}}.

class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

!

! Front

! Back

! Non-front,
non-back

High

| {{IPA|i}}, {{IPA|iː}}

| {{IPA|u}}, {{IPA|uː}}

| {{IPA|ʊ}}, {{IPA|ʊː}}

Mid

| {{IPA|e}}, {{IPA|eː}}

| {{IPA|o}}, {{IPA|oː}}

| {{IPA|ə}}

Low

| {{IPA|ɛ}}, {{IPA|ɛː}}

| {{IPA|ɔ}}, {{IPA|ɔː}}

| {{IPA|a}}, {{IPA|aː}}

=Consonants=

class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

!

! Bilabial

! Labiodental

! Alveolar

! Post-alveolar

! Palatal

! Velar

! Uvular

! Labial-velar

Stop

| {{IPA|p}}  {{IPA|b}}

|

| {{IPA|t}}  {{IPA|d}}

|

|

| {{IPA|k}}  {{IPA|ɡ}}

|

| {{IPA|k͡p}}  {{IPA|ɡ͡b}}

Nasal

| {{IPA|m}}

|

| {{IPA|n}}

|

| {{IPA|ɲ}}
{{angle bracket|ny}}

| {{IPA|ŋ}}

|

| {{IPA|ŋ͡m}}

Affricate

|

|

|

| {{IPA|t͡ʃ}}  {{IPA|d͡ʒ}}
{{angle bracket|c}}  {{angle bracket|j}}

|

|

|

|

Fricative

|

| {{IPA|f}}  {{IPA|v}}

| {{IPA|s}}  {{IPA|z}}

|

|

|

| {{IPA|ʁ}}
{{angle bracket|q}}

|

Lateral

|

|

| {{IPA|l}} {{ref|1}}

|

|

|

|

|

Approximant

|

|

|

|

| {{IPA|j}}
{{angle bracket|y}}

|

|

| {{IPA|w}}

{{refbegin}}

{{note|1|1}}Generally, /l/ is realised by [ɾ] in medial and final position. For some speakers, the two allophones are in free variation.

{{refend}}

Previously {{angle bracket|ʋ}} was used instead of {{angle bracket|ʊ}}.{{harvnb|CENALA|1990}}{{pn|date=April 2022}}

Grammar

=Genders=

Nouns are divided into genders or noun classes which can be distinguished by the pronoun used to refer to them and by their suffix, which generally bears some resemblance to the pronoun. If the noun is modified by adjectives, then the suffix appears on the adjectives and not on the noun. The table gives the singular and plural forms of the pronouns used to refer to a noun of each gender. There are also some nouns which have the pronoun də or bə without having a plural form.

border="1" cellpadding="4" style="text-align:left;"

! Gender

! Includes

mə

| Mass nouns, liquids and languages

a / ba

| Most nouns referring to people, kinship terms, personal names, some abstract nouns and borrowings

ka / sə

| Various nouns, diminutives

kʊ / i

| Various nouns, augmentatives, territories

ŋʊ / i

| Long and slender objects

bə / i

| A small class of semantically diverse nouns

də / a

| Body parts, material culture, some animals and foods

kʊ / də

| Tree and plant terms

də / ba

| A small class of marginal cultural items

nə

| Only two nouns: dɛn (today) and nən (location)

=Word order=

Yom is predominantly an SVO language, although SOV word order is also possible. Genitives precede nouns and relative clauses follow. Adjectives, numerals and demonstratives follow the noun in that order and agree with it in number and gender. Many different constituents can preposed to the beginning of the sentence using a focus construction - for example:

  • {{lang|pil|ma ji ma maŋgoŋʊ}}, "I am eating my mango"
  • {{lang|pil|ma maŋgoŋʊ ra ma ji ra}}, "It's my mango that I'm eating"

References

{{Reflist}}

=Bibliography=

  • {{cite book |last=Beacham |first=Charles Gordon |year=1968 |title=The Phonology and Morphology of Yom |type=Ph.D dissertation |publisher=Hartford Seminary Foundation}}
  • {{citation |edition=2 |title=Alphabet des langues nationales |year=1990 |publisher=CENALA |author=Centre national de linguistique appliquée (CENALA) |place=Cotonou |url=http://hdl.handle.net/10625/6700 |ref = {{sfnref|CENALA|1990}} }}

{{Languages of Benin}}

{{Gur languages}}

Category:Oti–Volta languages

Category:Languages of Benin