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The Dogon are an ethnic group indigenous to the central plateau region of Mali, in West Africa, south of the Niger bend, near the city of Bandiagara, and in Burkina Faso. The population numbers between 400,000 and 800,000. They speak the Dogon languages, which are considered to constitute an independent branch of the Niger–Congo language family, meaning that they are not closely related to any other languages.
Koyra Chiini, or Western Songhay, is a member of the Songhay languages spoken in Mali by about 200,000 people along the Niger River in Timbuktu and upriver from it in the towns of Diré, Tonka, Goundam and Niafunké as well as in the Saharan town of Araouane to its north. In this area, Koyra Chiini is the dominant language and the lingua franca, although minorities speaking Hassaniya Arabic, Tamasheq and Fulfulde are found. Djenné Chiini, the dialect spoken in Djenné, is mutually comprehensible, but has noticeable differences, in particular two extra vowels and syntactic differences related to focalisation.
The Dogon languages are a small closely related language family that is spoken by the Dogon people of Mali and may belong to the proposed Niger–Congo family. There are about 600,000 speakers of its dozen languages. They are tonal languages, and most, like Dogul, have two tones, but some, like Donno So, have three. Their basic word order is subject–object–verb.
Escarpment Dogon is a continuum of Dogon dialects of the Bandiagara Escarpment, including the standard language. There are three principal dialects:
Jeffrey Heath is Professor of Historical Linguistics, Morphology, Arabic and Linguistic Anthropology at the University of Michigan, US. He is known particularly for his work in historical linguistics and for his extensive fieldwork.
Koro (Kɔ́rɔ́) is a town and commune and seat of the Cercle of Koro in the Mopti Region of Mali. At the 2009 Census, the commune had a population of 62,681.
Diankabou (Jàkáw) is a village and commune and seat of the Cercle of Koro in the Mopti Region of Mali. In 1998 the commune had a population of 14,760.
Dinangourou is a village and commune of the Cercle of Koro in the Mopti Region of Mali. Jamsay Dogon is spoken in the village. A weekly Sunday market is hosted in the village. The local surname is Goro.
Dioungani is a village and commune of the Cercle of Koro in the Mopti Region of Mali. Jamsay Dogon is spoken in the commune.
Déguéré is a village and seat of the commune of Bamba in the Cercle of Koro in the Mopti Region of southern-central Mali. The village sits on the edge of the Dogon Plateau.
Dogon country is a region of eastern Mali and northwestern Burkina Faso populated mainly by the Dogon people, a diverse ethnic group in West Africa with diverse languages. Like the term Serer country occupied by the Serer ethnic group, Dogon country is vast, and lies southwest of the Niger River belt. The region is composed of three zones: the plateau, the escarpment and the Seno-Gondo plain.
Budu Dogon or Bunoge, also known as Korandabo, is a recently discovered Dogon language spoken in Mali. It was first reported online. The plural suffix on nouns is closest to Kolum so, suggesting it should be classified as a West Dogon language.
Naŋa dama, also known as Naŋa tegu, is a Dogon language spoken in Mali that is only known from one report from 1953. Roger Blench reports that its nearest relative is the recently described Walo–Kumbe Dogon, "with which it shares both lexicon and the feature that many nouns have a final -m." Hochstetler thinks they may be the same language. It may be close to Yanda Dogon (Blench) or Jamsai tegu (Hochstetler).
Yanda Dogon is a Dogon language spoken in Mali. It is reported to be lexically similar to Nanga, which is only known from one report from 1953.
The Dogul language, Dogul Dom, is a Dogon language spoken in Mali. It is closest to Bondum Dogon, though not enough for mutual intelligibility.
The Bondum language, Bondum Dom, is a Dogon language spoken in Mali. It is closest to Dogul Dogon, though not enough for mutual intelligibility. Dialects are Kindjim and Nadjamba.
Ampari Dogon, also known as Ambange or Ampari kora, is a Dogon language spoken in Mali.
The Toro language, Tɔrɔ tegu 'Mountain speech', is a Dogon language spoken in Mali. It is closest to the prestige variety of Dogon, Jamsay tegu, though speakers deny they are related and understand little of it. Hochstetler report difficulties in comprehension between Tɔrɔ tegu and one of the western Plains Dogon languages, Tomo kan.
The Dogon dialects of the western plains below the Bandiagara Escarpment in Mali are mutually intelligible. They are sometimes called the Kan Dogon because they use the word kan for varieties of speech. The dialects are:
Penange Dogon is a Dogon language spoken in Mali. It is close to Ampari. The language was first described as distinct in 2011 by Prokhorov.
References
- ↑ Jamsay at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ↑ Heath, Jeffrey (2008). A grammar of Jamsay. Berlin, New York: Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
