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| Manding | |
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| Geographic distribution: |
West Africa |
| Genetic classification: |
Niger-Congo Mande Manding |
| Subdivisions: |
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The Manding languages are a fairly mutually intelligible group of dialects or languages in West Africa, belonging to the Mande languages. Their best-known members are Bambara (the most widely spoken language in Mali), Mandinka (the main language of Gambia), Maninka (or Malinké, a major language of Guinea), and Dioula (Dyula or Jula) (an important language of the northern Côte d'Ivoire and western Burkina Faso.) Smaller languages/dialects belonging to the group include Khassonké or Xaasongaxango.
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Subdivisions of Manding language group
The Manding tongues, and what distinguishes one from the rest and relationship among all of them are matters that continue to be researched. In addition, the nomenclature - being a mixture of indigenous terms and words applied by English and French speakers since before colonization - makes the picture complex and even confusing.
SIL identifies five groups, Manding-East, Manding-West, Bohon, Jahanka and Sininkere. [1]
The ISO 639-3 draft defines (among others) one language as macrolanguage: Mandingo [man], with the seven individual languages coming from both the first two groups:
- Eastern Maninkakan [emk] (East)
- Forest Maninka [myq] (East -> Southeast)
- Kita Maninkakan [mwk] (West)
- Konyanka Maninka [mku] (East)
- Mandinka [mnk] (West)
- Sankaran Maninka [msc] (East)
- Western Maninkakan [mlq] (West)
Manding-West
- Xaasongaxango language [kao] (Mali)
- Maninkakan, Western [mlq] (Senegal)
- Mandinka language [mnk] (Gambia)
- Maninkakan, Kita [mwk] (Mali)
- Kagoro language [xkg] (Mali)
Manding-East
- Marka-Dafin
- Marka language [rkm] (Burkina Faso)
- Northeastern Manding
- Bamana languages
- Bamanankan [bam] (Mali)
- Dioula language [dyu] (Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire)
- Bamana languages
- Southeastern Manding
- Maninkakan, Eastern [emk] (Guinea)
- Maninka-Mori
- Wojenaka [jod] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Worodougou [jud] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Koro [kfo] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Koyaga [kga] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Mahou [mxx] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Maninka, Forest [myq] (Côte d'Ivoire)
- Maninka, Konyanka [mku] (Guinea)
- Maninka, Sankaran [msc] (Guinea)
- Manya language [mzj] (Liberia)
see also: Maninka language
Writing Manding languages
The Manding languages have a strong oral tradition, but also have written forms - adaptations of Arabic and Latin alphabets, and at least two indigenous scripts.
- Arabic was introduced into the region with Islam, and the writing was adapted to write in Manding languages to a certain degree. Arabic script or Ajami is still commonly used for Mandinka.
- The Latin alphabet was introduced into the region following European conquest and colonization. It is used fairly widely, with "official" versions in many countries, for teaching, literacy and publication.
- The N'Ko alphabet, developed in 1948 by Souleyman Kante, is designed to write Manding using a common literary standard comprehensible to speakers of all these varieties. It is gaining in popularity.
- A lesser-known alphabet for Bambara was developed in the early 20th century but is not used.
External links
See also
