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The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of African languages spoken by somewhere around 70 million speakers, mainly in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers, including historic Nubia, north of where the two tributaries of the Nile meet. The languages extend through 17 nations in the northern half of Africa: from Algeria to Benin in the west; from Libya to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the centre; and from Egypt to Tanzania in the east.
The Songhay, Songhai or Ayneha languages are a group of closely related languages/dialects centred on the middle stretches of the Niger River in the West African countries of Mali, Niger, Benin, Burkina Faso and Nigeria. In particular, they are spoken in the cities of Timbuktu, Djenné, Niamey and Gao. They have been widely used as a lingua franca in that region ever since the era of the Songhai Empire. In Mali, the government has officially adopted the dialect of Gao as the dialect to be used as a medium of primary education.
Shabo is an endangered language and likely language isolate spoken by about 400 former hunter-gatherers in southwestern Ethiopia, in the eastern part of the South West Ethiopia Peoples' Region.
In most classifications, the Eastern Sudanic languages are a group of nine families of languages that may constitute a branch of the Nilo-Saharan language family. Eastern Sudanic languages are spoken from southern Egypt to northern Tanzania.
The Mursi are a Surmic ethnic group in Ethiopia. They principally reside in the Debub Omo Zone of the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People's Region, close to the border with South Sudan. According to the 2007 national census, there are 11,500 Mursi, 848 of whom live in urban areas; of the total number, 92.25% live in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People's Region (SNNPR).
The Murle are a Surmic ethnic group inhabiting the Pibor County and Boma area in Greater Pibor Administrative area, South Sudan, as well as parts of southwestern Ethiopia. They have also been referred as Beir by the Dinka and as Jebe by the Luo and Nuer, among others. The Murle speak the Murle language, which is part of the Surmic language family. The language cluster includes some adjoining groups in Sudan, as well as some non-contiguous Surmic populations in southwestern Ethiopia.
Meʼen is a Nilo-Saharan language spoken in Ethiopia by the Meʼen people. In recent years, it has been written with the Geʽez alphabet, but in 2007 a decision was made to use the Latin alphabet. Dialects include Bodi (Podi) and Tishena.
The Tennet people are South Sudanese. Their language is sometimes referred to as Ngaarit. Tennet traditional dances are divided into the following categories: Lalu, Nyaliliya, Loduk, and so on
Mursi is a Southeast Surmic language spoken by the Mursi people who live in the South Omo Zone on the eastern side of the lower Omo valley in southwest Ethiopia. The language is similar to Suri, another Southeast Surmic language spoken to the west of the Mursi language area. It is spoken by approximately 7,400 people.
The Majang people, or Majangir, live in southwestern Ethiopia and speak a Nilo-Saharan language of the Surmic cluster. The 1998 census gave the total of the Majangir population as 15,341, but since they live scattered in the hills in dispersed settlements, their actual total number is undoubtedly much higher. They live around cities of Tepi, Mett'i, and scattered southwest of Mizan Teferi and towards Gambela.
The Majang language is spoken by the Majangir people of Ethiopia. Although it is a member of the Surmic language cluster, it is the most isolated one in the group. A language survey has shown that dialect variation from north to south is minor and does not seriously impede communication. The 2007 Ethiopian Census lists 6,433 speakers for Majang (Messengo), but also reports that the ethnic group consists of 32,822 individuals. According to the census, almost no speakers can be found in Mezhenger Zone of Gambela Region; a total of eleven speakers are listed for the zone, but almost 10,000 ethnic Mejenger or Messengo people.
The Aroid or Ari-Banna languages possibly belong to the Afro-Asiatic family and are spoken in Ethiopia.
The Baale language, Baleesi or Baalesi is a Surmic language spoken by the Baale or Zilmamo people of Ethiopia, and by the Kachepo of South Sudan. It is a member of the southwest branch of the Surmic cluster; the self-name of the language and the community is Suri, which is the same as that of the Suri language, evoking an ethnonym that embraces the Tirma, Chai, and Baale communities, although linguistically the languages of these communities are different. There are currently 9,000 native speakers of Baleesi, 5,000 in South Sudan and 4,100 in Ethiopia; almost all of these are monolingual.
The Kwegu are an ethnic group that lives on the western banks of the Omo River in the newly formed South Ethiopia Region. Some members of the Kwegu also live on the eastern banks of the river among the Mursi. Previously they were hunter-gatherers, but today they are engaged in a mixed economy of hunting, farming, beekeeping, and fishing.
Kwegu is a Surmic language spoken in the Southwest of Ethiopia, on the west bank of the Omo River.
Murle is a Surmic Language spoken by the Murle people in the southeast of South Sudan, near the Ethiopian border. A very small number of Murle live across the border in southwestern Ethiopia.
Suri, is a Surmic language spoken in the West Omo Zone of the South West Ethiopia Peoples' Region in Ethiopia, to the South Sudan border by the Suri. The language has over 80% lexical similarity to Mursi. The language is often referred to by another form of its name, Surma, after which the Surmic branch of Eastern Sudanic is named, but that form is frequently used for the three related languages spoken by the Surma people: Suri, Mursi, and Me'en.
Suri is a collective name for three ethnic groups mainly living in Suri woreda, in southwestern Ethiopia. They share many similarities politically, territorially and culturally, economically but speak different languages. They all speak South East Surmic languages within the Nilo-Saharan language family, which includes the Mun, Majang, and Me'en people's languages.
Tennet is a Surmic language spoken by the Tennet people in South Sudan. The Tennet home area is a group of fifteen (15) villages at the northern part of Eastern Equatoria state, 65 kilometers northeast of Torit.
Gumuz is a dialect cluster spoken along the border of Ethiopia and Sudan. It has been tentatively classified within the Nilo-Saharan family. Most Ethiopian speakers live in Kamashi Zone and Metekel Zone of the Benishangul-Gumuz Region, although a group of 1,000 reportedly live outside the town of Welkite. The Sudanese speakers live in the area east of Er Roseires, around Famaka and Fazoglo on the Blue Nile, extending north along the border. Dimmendaal et al. (2019) suspect that the poorly attested varieties spoken along the river constitute a distinct language, Kadallu.
References
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian (2023-07-10). "Glottolog 4.8 - Surmic". Glottolog . Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.7398962 . Archived from the original on 2023-11-08. Retrieved 2023-11-07.
- ↑ Yigezu, Moges. 2001. A comparative study of the phonetics and phonology of Surmic languages. Bruxelles: Univ. libre de Bruxelles. Doctoral dissertation, University of Bruxelles.
- ↑ Unseth, Peter. 1989. "An Initial Comparison and Reconstruction of Case Suffixes in Surmic Languages," Journal of Ethiopian Studies 22:97–104.
- ↑ Unseth, Peter. 1991. "Possessive Markers in Surmic Languages," Proceedings of the 4th Nilo-Saharan Linguistics Colloquium, ed. by M. L. Bender, pp. 91–104. (Nilo-Saharan: Linguistic Analyses and Documentation, vol. 7.) Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag.
- ↑ Unseth, Peter. 1997a. "An Archaic Surmic Causative Prefix," Occasional Papers in the Study of Sudanese Languages 7:41–48
- ↑ Unseth, Peter. 1998. "Two Old Causative Affixes in Surmic," Surmic Languages and Cultures, ed. by Gerrit Dimmendaal, pp. 113–126. Cologne: Köppe.
- ↑ Chan, Eugene (2019). "The Nilo-Saharan Language Phylum". Numeral Systems of the World's Languages.
- ↑ p. 54. Unseth, Peter. 1988. "The Validity and Unity of the Southeast Surma Language Grouping," Northeast African Studies 10.2/3:151–163.
