On the origin of some northern songhay mixed languages
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Grant, Anthony P. 2013. Mindanao Chabacano and other ‘mixed creoles’: Do mixed-lexifier creoles (MLCs) tend to borrow the same kinds of other phenomena? Ibero-Asian Creoles in Comparative Perspectives, edited by Hugo C. Cardoso, Alan N. Baxter and Mário Pinharanda Nunes, 327–364. Amsterdam: Benjamins.Greenberg, Joseph, 1963. The Languages of Africa (International Journal of American Linguistics 29.1). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Heath, Jeffrey. 1999a. A grammar of Koyra Chiini: the Songhay of Timbuktu. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Heath, Jeffrey. 1999b. A Grammar of Koyraboro (Koroboro) Senni, the Songhay of Gao. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe.
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The borrowing of aspect as lexical tone: y-initial Tuareg verbs in Tasawaq (Nothern Songhay). Studies in African Linguistics 36 (2): 151-166. Kossmann, Maarten. 2011. A Grammar of Ayer Tuareg (Niger). Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag. Kossmann, Maarten. 2012. Pharyngealization and the Vowel System of Tasawaq (Northern Songhay). Nordic Journal of African Studies 21(1): 21–33. Kouwenberg, Silvia. 1994. A grammar of Berbice Dutch Creole. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Lacroix, Pierre-Francis, 1967.. “Le vocabulaire 'kandin' dans la Polyglotta Africana”, African language review 6 : 153-158. Lacroix, Pierre F. 1968. L’ensemble songhay-jerma: Problèmes et thèmes de travail. Lexicologie tihitit et tagdalt. Microfiche A 77 023 290. Paris, Institut d'Ethnologie, "Archives et documents", micro-édition. Lacroix, Pierre F. 1980. Les parlers du sous-ensemble songhay-zarma septentrional. Documents de terrain. Lexicologie tihitit et tagdalt. Microfiche A 77 023 290. Paris, Institut d'Ethnologie, "Archives et documents", micro-édition. Lacroix, Pierre F. 1981. Emghedeshie, « Songhay language of Agadez » , à travers les documents de Barth. In E.R.A. 246 du CNRS "Langage et Culture en Afrique de l'Ouest" (ed.),Itinérances -- en pays peul et ailleurs : mélanges. (Mémoires de la Société des Africanistes). Paris: Société des Africanistes. Laverdure, Patline, and Ida Rose Allard, edited by John C. Crawford. 1984. The Michif dictionary: Turtle Mountain Chippewa Cree. Winnipeg: Pemmican. Matras, Yaron. 2012. A grammar of Domari. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Mous, Maarten. 2003. The making of a mixed language: The case of Ma'á/Mbugu. Creole language library 26. Amsterdam: Benjamins Muysken, Pieter. 1997. Media Lengua, in Thomason, Sarah G. Contact languages: a wider perspective, 342-365. Amsterdam: Benjamins Nicolaï, Robert. 1979. Les dialectes du songhay (Contribution à l’étude des changements linguistiques). Doctoral dissertation, University of Nice. Nicolaï, Robert. 1981. Les dialectes du songhay (Contribution à l’étude des changements linguistiques). Paris: SELAF. Nicolaï, Robert. 1990a. L’évolution ‘problématique’ du songhay septentrional (Analyze d’une situation de contact). Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de Nice 10-11, 135-48. Nicolaï, Robert. 1990b. Parentés linguistiques (à propos du songhay). Paris. Éditions du CNRS. Nicolaï, Robert. 2003. La force des choses ou l’épreuve ‘nilo-saharienne’: Questions sur les reconstructions archéologiques et l’évolution des langues. Sprache und Geschichte in Afrika Beiheft 13. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe. Nicolaï, Robert. 2006a. Songhay-mande convergence area : questions and frames. Annual Publications in African Linguistics 4: 5-30. Nicolaï, Robert. 2006b. Aux marges de l’espace chamito-sémitique : songhay et apparentements non-linéaires. Faits de langues, Les langues chamito-sémitiques (afro-asiatiques), edited by A. Mettouchi & A. Lonnet, 245-277. Le Mans: Faits de Langues. Nicolaï, Robert. 2009. Language Contact, Areality, and History: the Songhay Question Revisited Language Contact, Language Change and History Based on Language Sources in Africa, edited by Wilhelm J.G. Möhlig, Frank Seidel and Marc Seifert. Sprache und Geschichte in Afrika 20, 187-207. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe. Nicolaï, Robert. N.d. A Songhay-Mande Convergence Area? Facts, Questions, Frames.http://www.unice.fr/ChaireIUF-Nicolai/TextesRN/Songhay-mande_convergence.pdf Prost, André. 1956. La langue soˑnay et ses dialectes. Paris: SELAF. Rueck, Michael and Christiansen, Niels. 1999. Northern Songhay speech varieties in Niger. SIL Electronic Survey Reports 1999-008. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. http://www.sil.org/silesr/1999/1999-008/silesr1999-008esr.pdf Schuh, Russell G. 1975. Kandin in the Polyglotta Africana: two languages in one. African Languages/Langues africaines 1:300-305. Smith, Norval S. H. 1987. The origin of the creole languages of Surinam. PhD dissertation, University of Amsterdam. Souag, Lameen. 2009. The subclassification of Songhay and its historical implications. Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 33(2): 181-213. Souag, Lameen. 2010. The Western Berber Stratum in Kwarandzyey. Etudes berbères V, Essais sur des variations dialectales et autres articles, edited by Harry Stroomer, Maarten Kossmann, Dymitr Ibriszimow, Rainer Vossen, 177-189. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe Souag, Lameen. 2012. The subclassification of Songhay and its historical implications. Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 33(2): 181-213. Souag, Lameen. 2014. Review of R. Christiansen-Bolli (2010). Journal of Language Contact 7 (2): 453-459. Souag, Lameen. 2015. Explaining Korandjé: Language contact, plantations and the trans-Saharan trade. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Linguistics 30: 189-224. Souag, Lameen. n.d. 380-item Korandje- English- French wordlist. MS in author’s possession. Stauffer, Daniel Ray. 1997. Essential elements of Songhai grammar. MA thesis, University of Texas at Arlington. Thomason, Sarah and Terrence Kaufman 1997. Contact languages: a wider perspective. Creole language library #17. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins. Thomason, Sarah Grey. 2001. Language contact: an introduction. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. Tilmatine, Mohamed. 1991. Talelbala: Eine Songhaysprachinsel in der algerischen Sahara. [Afrikanistische Arbeitspapiere, Sondernummer]. Berlin: Freie Universität. Tilmatine, Mohamed. 1996. Un parler berbèro-songhay du sud-ouest algérien (Tabelbala): Elements d’histoire et de linguistique, Etudes et Documents Berbères 14 : 163-198. Vakhtin, Nikolai B., and Evgenij Golovko. 1990. Aleut in contact : the CIA Enigma. Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 22: 97-125. Wolff, H. Ekkehard and Manou Ousseina Alidou. 2001. On the non-linear ancestry of Tasawaq (Niger). Or: how “mixed” can a language be? Historical Language Contact in Africa, special volume of Sprache und Geschichte in Afrika 6/17, 523-574, ed. by Derek Nurse. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe. 1 Lacroix (1981) suggests that Tasawaq is a vernacularised version of the ancient vehicular Songhay of Niger and Mali. 2 Korandje, presents an especially interesting case, since it is geographically located much farther north than the other NS languages. Souag (2009, 2010) postulates that it has been influenced by the Tuareg-Berber language, Tetserret, of Niger (the closest relative of Zenaga), and has certainly been very strongly influenced by local varieties of Algerian Arabic, though in terms of its combination of elements from other languages it otherwise most resembles Tasawaq. See also section 3.1. Additionally, Kwarandzyey contains some lexical items which Anthony Grant first surmised and Lameen Souag proved were from Dogon of Mali (Lameen Souag, personal communication). 3 Lacroix (1981) sees Emghedeshie as an earlier version of Tasawaq. Barth’s data from the 1850s, consisting of about 800 words and numerous sentences or short phrases (often embedded in translations of Christian prayers) are the only data of this language which we have. 4 Tabarog, another Northern Songhay variety, spoken by the Ibarogan, is spread out in approximately the same regions as Tagdal. Rueck and Christiansen (1999) found a high degree of intelligibility between Tabarog and Tagdal. Furthermore, in personal contacts with Tabarog speakers, it seems that they themselves consider their speech variety an “accent” of Tagdal. Therefore, for the purposes of this paper, we will consider Tabarog a variety of Tagdal. 5 Koelle (1854) provides a vocabulary from the same region of what appears to be a Berber Tamajaq-Hausa mixed language, known as Kandin (see also Lacroix 1967, Schuh 1975). Koelle’s material, a lexicon of about 400 items with next to no structural or phrasal material, is the only record of this language, but its existence could hint at a more complex pattern of cases of language mixing in the region, of which we now only have a partial picture. 6 Greenberg (1963) placed all Songhay languages in the Nilo-Saharan family, as do Bender (1996) and Ehret (2001), each basing their conclusions upon different criteria. Greenberg’s classification has met with resistance (e.g. Nicolaï 2003) from some researchers. Nicolaï (1979: 14) suggested an overall division of the Songhay family into a Northern and Southern branch, with Northern Songhay subdivided into a sedentary and nomadic branch, as Figure 1 demonstrates. Souag (2009) questions the idea of Songhay being divided into Northern and Southern, suggesting instead a division of Western and Eastern, with the ancient vehicular Songhay from which Northern Songhay originated coming from one of these. Regardless, questions of overall classification of Songhay are beyond the scope of this paper. 7 For example, Tasawaq is the only Northern Songhay language with phonemic lexical tone. 8 Souag (2012) discusses the small sets of grammatical and lexical features which mark out Northern Songhay languages, including Korandje, as a group against all other Songhay languages, and also provides the evidence linking them with Western Songhay in a Northwestern subgroup against Eastern Songhay. 9 At least from the standpoint of the three NS languages in the Azawagh Valley of modern-day Niger and Mali. Kwaradzey, on the other hand, presents difficulties and seems to defy categorization within Nicolaï’s scheme. 10 I.e. whether they could be considered ‘bilingual mixtures’ (Thomason and Kaufman 1997, 2001; see also Bakker and Mous eds 1994, Grant 2013). 11 i.e. the three Northern Songhay languages in the Azawagh Valley of Niger and Mali 12 Special thanks to Mrs. H. Ramatou for her help in Zarma; to Christian and Louise Grandouiller, Mrs. I. Azigzan and Elhadj Atawan for their help in Təwəlləmət; to especially Mr. I. Amani and Mallam Boula for their help with Tasawaq; and to Mr. B. ag Chafayen and Mr. Soukeredji for their help with Tadaksahak. 13 A few written documents do exist. However, they are written in Arabic, and the writers were usually more concerned with details of the many internecine wars during the period than with the sociolinguistics of the region. 14 Adamou (1979) and Hamani (1989) in turn depended heavily on the writings of Ibn Hawqal, who traveled throughout the region in the 9th century CE, for their conclusions about the ancestors of modern-day Tagdal speakers. 15 This is, of course, relative, since intermixing between North African and sub-Saharan populations has been a reality in the Sahel region for millennia. 16 Again, this too is relative. 17 Ibn Hawqqal (in Adamou 1979, Hamani 1989) wrote about encountering a group of semi-nomadic Berbers called the Al-Agdali (sic) in the 900s CE in modern-day northern Niger. While this does not in itself guarantee that modern-day Igdalen are their descendants, it does provide some strong circumstantial evidence, which Hamani and Adamou take for granted as identifying the ancestors of Igdalen. 18 Benítez-Torres (2009) suggests religion as one possible motivating factor. It may also have been the case that neither Songhay-speakers nor Berber-speakers were willing to let them be full members of their respective in-groups. However, we cannot be sure about what their motivation might have been. 19 for example, Ma’á (Mous 2003), regardless of whether the intended language maintenance was successful or not 20 Souag (2009) suggests the existence at one time of a Proto-Northern Songhay that, presumably, would have had at least some of the Berber features present in Tagdal and Tadaksahak from the beginning (see section 2.2 below), before losing them in sedentary Tasawaq. (See section 4 below for some possible scenarios which might have led to the origin of the various NS languages in the Azawagh Valley of modern-day Mali and Niger.) 21 Rueck and Christiansen are, therefore, used more for the sake of convenience and availability than for their completeness but their data have been crosschecked with those from sounder sources. 22 We will not spend too much time describing and comparing with the inflectional morphologies of mainstream Songhay languages, as many of these have already been described ad infinitum. We point the reader, for example, to Heath (1999 a,b), Feodor Rojanski’s online table (http://mandelang.kunstkamera.ru/files/mandelang/rozhansk2eng.pdf), Prost (1956) and Stauffer (1997). and Stauffer (1997). See also Heath (2005) and Kossmann (2011) for an overview of Berber inflectional subsystems. 23 Tasawaq (Ousseina 1988: 28) also has two third person emphatic pronouns ngyà and ngyì, which Tagdal and Tadaksahak do not have. 24 with the exception of the first person singular prefix ɣay in Tasawaq (see Table 2 below) 25 Tayart and other Tuareg languages do not tend to have pronoun clitics in the nominal position, only in accusative and dative (see Kossmann (2011: 77). 26 The second and third examples in Table 3 were elicited from mother-tongue Tasawaq speakers. 27 The negative particle wǝr in Tayart and other Berber languages does not indicate aspect; this is done instead via lengthening of vowels and consonants in the verb stem (Kossmann 2011: 55, 62, 64). 28 Sometimes the negation na- will appear in Gao Songhay and in Zarma with the auxiliary ma- (Stauffer 1997). 29 One feature of the perfective aspect in NS languages which we are not discussing for the sake of space is gemination of the initial consonant of the verb root in certain environments, as described in Christiansen (2010: 31, 76). For example, a-ddut ‘she pounded’, a-nnas ‘it is fat’ would be the same in all three languages in question. 30 Songhay from Gao (Heath 1999:198) has a future marker ga ti. 31 Tayart and other Berber languages tend to express Tense-Aspect-Mode via lengthening and shortening of vowels and consonants in the verb stem, rather than through use of affixes (see Kossmann: 2011 and Heath: 2005). 32 Northern Songhay languages tend to be more agglutinative than mainstream Songhay languages. Therefore, in most mainstream Songhay languages the TAM markers will often appear as verb auxiliaries rather than as bound morphemes (see Stauffer 1997: 51). Another key difference between NS and mainstream Songhay is the presence of the incompletive aspect ga or go in many Songhay languages, which also functions to mark the future tense. NS languages, on the other hand, have the incompletive aspect b- and the future marker tǝ- in the nomadic varieties or bti- in Tasawaq. Otherwise, the inflections are similar. 33 Because vocabulary of various origins in the various Northern Songhay languages has generally kept its original canonical shapes, it is fairly easy most of the time to distinguish its origin. For example, underived verb roots of Berber origin will most often begin with ǝ-, which in many Berber languages marks the perfective (Heath 2005: 295, Kossmann 2011: 45-48). In Tagdal ǝ- marks the imperative. Meanwhile, in Tadaksahak the same Berber verb root in the imperative begins with y-. In Tasawaq, in the few cases where the Berber verb root appears without a causative marker (see Kossmann 2007 a,b), these also begin with initial y-. 34 For the sake of convenience, the verb roots chosen were among those whose causative forms in Tagdal and Tadaksahak happen to be identical. Christiansen (2010: 57-58) notes some verb roots in Tadaksahak which follow certain Tuareg patterns by taking the causative allophones ʃ-, ʒ- and z- in environments which Tagdal would normally take the usual s-. Regardless, the idea is that both Tagdal and Tadaksahak take the Tuareg-Berber causative prefix with Berber roots. 35 Unlike the Tasawaq causative suffix –nda, Zarma uses –ndi (see section 2.2.2 below). 36 This brings up the question of why Songhay roots can’t take Berber derivational morphology. Part of the answer may be that both the Songhay and Berber portions of the languages are quantity-sensitive. However, they are counting moras in very different ways. Therefore, if true then the two sub-systems may be, in effect, incompatible. However, this is a question that requires further study. 37 This can be somewhat deceptive, however. Kossmann (pc, 2015) communicated that he observed a tendency among at least some Tasawaq speakers to form causatives by means of the verb da ‘do’ as a type of auxiliary. If so, this could be a sign of language change. 38 There seems to be some disagreement among our Tasawaq-speaking contacts concerning whether or not the examples of Berber causatives in Table 13 constitute ‘real’ Tasawaq. Could this be a case of Berber beginning to relexify Tasawaq? 39 Rueck (personal communication) once related that, in doing their survey (Rueck and Christiansen: 1999), when presenting the passive and reflexive derivational forms the response from Tasawaq speakers was often, ‘but I don’t speak Tamajaq.’ Therefore, it seems that the passive and reflexive forms are perceived as Tuareg. It is possible that the causative above is preserved as well. 40 This brings up the question, not as yet answerable, of whether y- verb roots of Berber origin in Tasawaq would take Berber or Songhay derivational morphemes. 41 For example, one speaker we heard consistently used the Berber verb ǝgzǝm* ‘slaughter’ when the more common verb in all of the Northern Songhay languages is the Songhay dumbu ‘slaughter’. 42 Or in some varieties of Tagdal and in Tadaksahak, tʃa:'ren, sira:yen in Tasawaq. 43 Benítez-Torres (2009) also points out another syntactic construction using n ga kan – literally ‘among’ – which has a very similar function as ʃarayen. It is likely that, while the ʃarayen construction is of Songhay origin, n ga kan could possibly be a calque from Berber-Tamajaq. 44 All of the examples of the sira:yenconstruction in Tasawaq were elicited from mother-tongue speakers in Niger by one of the authors. 45 keeping in mind the caveats in footnote 35 and 36 above 46 Depending on whether the Tadaksahak construction using tʃaːrenin 18 above is acceptable or not; this requires further study. 47 Its original source of inspiration was Smith (1987), which compares the origins of function words in Saramaccan and St Lucian Creole French. Here, Smith’s original 20 categories have been enlarged upon and some further ones have been added. 48 Tayart (Kossmann 2011) is another common Berber variety with which Tagdal and Tasawaq speakers are in close contact, though less so than Təwəlləmət. 49 With at least the very strong possibility of a few productive Berber causative forms, though definitely not the other derivational prefixes. 50 Nicolaï (1981: 207), in the publication of his 1979 doctoral thesis, analyses Tasawaq as having high, low and falling tones, while Alidou (1988) only analyses two tones, high and low. 52 The only exception is Tagdal, with one Songhay derivational form, kanda ‘cause to fall’ (kanəndain Tasawaq), which does not exist in Tadaksahak. 53 The tʃaːrenconstruction occurs only rarely in Tadaksahak, if at all. Tadaksahak prefers the reflexive affix nǝm-. 54 Though his division of the larger Songhay language family into Northern and Southern branches is somewhat more problematic, as Souag (2009) points out. 55 Many of one of the author’s Tuareg friends from LWC Songhay-speaking areas, themselves often bilingual, readily recognise the Songhay and Berber elements, finding them funny. As one friend once asked, “How can you speak this language without laughing after every sentence?” 56 Unfortunately, because the languages would initially have begun to develop some 500 years ago or more, no one alive today was able to observe their initial development. 57 Or possibly Tasawaq could itself be the direct descendant of Proto-Northern Songhay. 58 Assuming that the instances of Berber causatives in sedentary Tasawaq are actually historic Tasawaq. Yüklə 0,56 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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