Ogba language

Ogba
Region	Rivers, Delta and Imo States, Nigeria
Ethnicity	Ogba People Igbo people
Native speakers	334,000 (2020) [1]
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Volta-Congo Volta–Niger yeai Igboid Nuclear Igboid Ogba
Language codes
ISO 639-3	ogc
Glottolog	ogba1241

Ogba (also Olu Ogba, mobu onu Ogbah) is an Igboid language spoken by Ogba people of Nigeria mostly in River State. They are part of the Ogba/ Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area in Rivers State. ^{[2] [3]} The king is referred to as the Eze-ogba and was politically influenced to change the title as 'Oba' just as the Benin's refer to theirs. Annually they celebrate the 'Egwu ogba' festival. The largest festival in the Egi land.

Writing system

Ogba alphabet

Uppercase
A	B	Ch	D	E	Ẹ	F	G	H	I	Ị	J	K	L	M	N	O	Ọ	P	R	S	T	U	Ụ	V	W	Y	Z
Lowercase
a	b	ch	d	e	ẹ	f	g	h	i	ị	j	k	l	m	n	o	ọ	p	r	s	t	u	ụ	v	w	y	z

Certain digraphs and trigraphs are also used.

The tones are indicated with diacritics:

• the high tone is indicated by the absence of a diacritic:⟨a, e, ẹ, i, ị, o, ọ, u, ụ⟩ ;
• the low tone is indicated with the grave accent : ⟨à, è, ẹ̀, ì, ị̀, ò, ọ̀, ù, ụ̀⟩ ;
• the falling tone is indicated with the circumflex accent : ⟨â, ê, ệ, î, ị̂, ô, ộ, û, ụ̂⟩ ;
• the downstep is indicated with the macron : ⟨ā, ē, ẹ̄, ī, ị̄, ō, ọ̄, ū, ụ̄⟩.

Phonology

Ogbah vowels ^[4]

	Front	Back
Close	i ɪ	ʊ u
Close-mid	e	o
Open-mid		ɔ
Open	a

References

1. Ogba at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
2. Ọgba Language Committee (August 11, 2013). "A DICTIONARY OF ỌGBÀ, AN IGBOID LANGUAGE OF SOUTHERN NIGERIA" (PDF). www.rogerblench.info. Roger Blench, Kay Williamson Educational Foundation, Cambridge, UK. p. 3. Retrieved April 21, 2016.
3. "The Ogbah Language". 2008-12-26. Archived from the original on March 15, 2012. Retrieved 2008-12-26.
4. Harley, Matthew (2024). "Vowel systems in Nigerian Languages". Pushing the boundaries: Selected papers from the 51-52 Annual Conference on African Linguistics. Berlin: Language Science Press. doi:10.5281/zenodo.14017793. ISSN   2511-7726.