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The Senufo or Senufic languages has around 15 languages spoken by the Senufo in the north of Ivory Coast, the south of Mali and the southwest of Burkina Faso. An isolated language, Nafaanra, is also spoken in the west of Ghana. The Senufo languages constitute their own branch of the Atlantic–Congo sub-family of the Niger–Congo languages. Garber (1987) estimates the total number of Senufos at some 1.5 million; the Ethnologue, based on various population estimates, counts 2.7 million. The Senufo languages are bounded to the west by Mande languages, to the south by Kwa languages, and to the north and east by Central Gur languages.
Mpra, or Mpre, is an extinct language spoken in the village of Butei in central Ghana, located between the towns of Techiman and Tamale near the confluence of the Black and White Voltas. Mpra has been difficult to classify due to its divergent vocabulary. It is known only from a 70-word list given in a 1931 article. Blench (2007) considers it to be a possible language isolate. A poorly attested language spoken in the nearby village of Tuluwe, Mpur, may also turn out to be yet another language isolate. Both Butie and Tuluwe are located near the village of Mpaha.
Nafaanra is a Senufo language spoken in northwest Ghana, along the border with Ivory Coast, east of Bondoukou. It is spoken by approximately 61,000 people. Its speakers call themselves Nafana, but others call them Banda or Mfantera. Like other Senufo languages, Nafaanra is a tonal language. It is somewhat of an outlier in the Senufo language group, with the geographically-closest relatives, the Southern Senufo Tagwana–Djimini languages, approximately 200 kilometres (120 mi) to the west, on the other side of Comoé National Park.
The Ligbi tribe speaks the Mande language spoken in Ghana in the north-west corner of the Brong-Ahafo Region. Ligbi is spoken by approximately 10,000 speakers. It is fairly closely related to Jula, Vai and Kono. A small population of Ligbi speakers is reported to live in Ivory Coast. Ligbi is also known as Wela (Hwela) or Numu. The latter of these refers to a subsection of the Ligbi people; Numu is Dyula for 'blacksmith'.
The Gonja language is a North Guang language spoken by an estimated 230,000 people, almost all of whom are of the Gonja ethnic group of northern Ghana. Related to Guang languages in the south of Ghana, it is spoken by about a third of the population in the northern region. The Brong-Ahafo and Volta regions lie to the south of the Gonja-speaking area, while Dagombas, Mamprussis and Walas are to the north. Its dialects are Gonja and Choruba.
Ghana is a multilingual country in which about eighty languages are spoken. Of these, English, which was inherited from the colonial era, is the official language and lingua franca. Of the languages indigenous to Ghana, Akan is the most widely spoken.
There are over 500 native languages spoken in Nigeria. The official language of Nigeria is English, the former language of colonial British Nigeria. As reported in 2003, Nigerian English and Nigerian Pidgin were spoken as a second language by 60 million people in Nigeria. Communication in the English language is much more popular in the country's urban communities than it is in the rural areas, due to globalization.
Chakato is a West Chadic language spoken in Plateau State, Nigeria. It was identified by Roger Blench in 2016. It is spoken by about 500 people in one village, Dokan Tofa, which is located on the Jos-Shendam road in Plateau State. Blench (2017) suggests that Chakato may be related to spurious records of the Jorto language. Chakato speakers claim that their language is closely related to Goemai.
Shompen, or Shom Peng is a language or group of languages spoken on Great Nicobar Island in the Indian union territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, in the Indian Ocean, northwest of Sumatra, Indonesia.
The twenty Central Plateau languages are a residual branch of the Plateau family spoken in central Nigeria. Tyap has 130,000 speakers, and the closely related Jju has well over 300,000. Hyam has another 100,000. Cori is famous for being one of very few languages with six tone levels, though only three are needed for writing.
Ukaan is a poorly described Niger–Congo language or dialect cluster of uncertain affiliation. Roger Blench suspects, based on wordlists, that it might be closest to the (East) Benue–Congo languages. Blench (2012) states that "noun-classes and concord make it look Benue-Congo, but evidence is weak."
The Guang languages are languages of the Kwa language family spoken by the Guang people in Ghana and Togo:
Alumu is a Plateau language spoken by approximately 7,000 people in Nassarawa State, Nigeria. It has lost the nominal affix system characteristic of the Niger–Congo family.
Gua (Gwa) is a Guang language spoken in many parts of Ghana including the Gonjas, the people of Larteh, the people of Winneba, Senya Beraku and some groups in the Volta Region of Ghana. It is also called Anum-Boso, after its two dialects.
Kresh is a small language group of South Sudan. It is generally considered to be a branch of the Central Sudanic languages. Boyeldieu (2010) judges that this has yet to be demonstrated satisfactorily, but Starostin (2016) finds convincing evidence, and that its closest relative within that family appears to be Birri.
Cara, also called Teriya after the village it is spoken in, is a small Plateau language of central Nigeria. Cara is spoken by about 3,000 people in Teriya village, Bassa, Plateau State, Nigeria.
Nchumbulu is a highly endangered language that is spoken in Ghana by the Brong Ahafo region west of Lake Volta near Kaplang and is spoken in three villages in the area.
Mvanip (Mvano), or Magu, is a minor Mambiloid language of Nigeria. Despite the small number of speakers, language use is vigorous. Ethnologue classifies Mvanip as threatened.
Mpur is an unclassified and unattested language once spoken in the village of Tuluwe at the confluence of the Black and White Voltas, and in Kusawgu Division. It is near the poorly attested language Mpra spoken in the nearby village of Butie, which may turn out to be a language isolate, though the Mpra people come from further west.
Nigbo is an extinct Plateau language of Nigeria. It was spoken near Agameti on the Fadan Karshi-Wamba road near Sanga LGA, Kaduna State. The language, listed in Blench (2012) and (2019), is not reported in Ethnologue or Glottolog. It is presumably an Alumic language based on its proximity to Akpondu, a language closely related to Alumu and Tesu.
References
- 1 2 Dompo at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Dompo". Glottolog 3.0 . Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ Blench, Roger (2007) Recovering data on Mpra [=Mpre] a possible language isolate in North-Central Ghana
- Blench, Roger. 1999. Recent Field Work in Ghana: Report on Dompo and a note on Mpre .
- Blench, Roger. 2015. The Dompo language of Central Ghana and its affinities .
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