Hehe language

Last updated
Hehe
Kihehe
Native toTanzania
Ethnicity Hehe
Native speakers
810,000 (2006) [1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 heh
Glottolog hehe1240
G.62 [2]
Linguasphere 99-AUS-ua

Hehe, also known by its native name Kihehe [kihehe] , is a Bantu language that is spoken by the Hehe people of the Iringa region of Tanzania, lying south of the Great Ruaha River. [3] In the 1970s, it was estimated that 190,000 people spoke Hehe. [4] A more recent estimate puts the number at 1,200,000. [5] There has been some Bible translation (British and Foreign Bible Society). Hehe may be mutually intelligible with Bena. [3]

Contents

There are four main dialects: Kalenga (in the centre of the region, north-west and west of Iringa), Koisamba (in the Rift Valley to the north-west), Sungwa (east of Iringa round the Udzungwa Mountains), and Mufindi (south of Iringa). Among other differences, Sungwa has sounds /t͡s/ and /d͡z/ which are absent from other dialects. [6]

Grammar

Hehe has 15 noun classes, marked with prefixes. [7]

Hehe has a complex tense-aspect-mood system. [8]

Phonology

Consonants

Labial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Stop/
Affricate
voiceless p t t͡ʃ k
implosive ɓ ɗ ʄ ɠ
prenasal ᵐb ⁿd ⁿdʑ ᵑɡ
Fricative voiceless f s h
voiced ( z )
prenasal ⁿz
Approximant ʋ l j w

Vowels

Front Central Back
High i u
Mid e o
Low a

In addition to these ten vowels, Kihehe also has a syllabic / / (sometimes pronounced [mu] by some speakers). This can occur initially, medially, or finally, and can bear a tone, e.g. ḿtalám̩'s/he is a tough person' (four syllables, with a high tone on the first and third). Unlike the nasal in the nasalised consonants, this syllabic /m̩/ does not assimilate to the following consonant or cause a following implosive consonant to become plosive. [21]

Syllable structure

Apart from /m̩/, and the fact that words may begin with a vowel, every syllable in Kihehe consists of the form C(G)V, where C = consonant, V = vowel (long or short), and G = glide (/w/ or /y/). Two different vowels normally cannot follow each other. When a prefix such as tu-'we' is added to a verb starting with a vowel, the vowels are combined into one syllable conforming to this pattern, e.g. tu + íᵐba becomes tʷíːᵐba'we sing', with lengthening of the /i/ to compensate for the shortening of the /u/. [22] An exception is the prefix ĕː (rising tone), which is added to 3rd person singular verbs without assimilation of the vowels, e.g. ĕː-alyá's/he would have eaten'. [23]

References

  1. Hehe at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online
  3. 1 2 Dwyer, David J.; Yankee, Everyl (January 1985). African Language Resource Handbook: A Resource Handbook of the Eighty-two Highest Priority African Languages (PDF) (Prepublication ed.). East Lansing: Michigan State University. ED256170.
  4. Voegelin, C. F.; Voegelin, F. M. (1977). "Bantu Proper = Narrow Bantu". Classification and Index of the World's Languages . Elsevier. p. 57. ISBN   0-444-00155-7.
  5. Eberhard et al. in Ethnologue 2016.
  6. Nyamahanga, Richard Mathias (2025). Aspects of the Phonology of Kihehe. Indiana University PhD thesis (open access), pp. 1–2.
  7. Odden, David (2005). "Doing an Analysis". Introducing Phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 177. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511808869.009. ISBN   978-0-521-53404-8.
  8. Mtavangu, Norbert (2008). "Tense and aspect in Ikihehe". Occasional Papers in Linguistics. 3: 34–41.
  9. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 6, 37.
  10. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 134.
  11. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 134.
  12. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 32.
  13. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 16, 68–71.
  14. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 10, 117–8.
  15. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 128.
  16. Johnson, Martha B. (2015). A Contribution toward a Kihehe Grammar (Report).
  17. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 12–14.
  18. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 14.
  19. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 14, 52.
  20. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 58–9.
  21. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 49–51.
  22. Nyamahanga (2025), pp. 54–5.
  23. Nyamahanga (2025), p. 65.