Masaba language: Difference between revisions

Masaba
Masaba
Lumasaba
Native to	Uganda
Region	Eastern, south of the Kupsabiny, Bugisu Province
Ethnicity	Masaba, Luhya
Native speakers	2.8 million (2002 & 2009 censuses)
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Benue–Congo Southern Bantoid Bantu Northeast Bantu Great Lakes Bantu Masaba–Luhya (J.30) Masaba; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Dialects	Gisu; Kisu; Bukusu; Syan; Tachoni; Dadiri; Buya;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	Variously:; myx – Masaba (Gisu, Kisu, Dadiri, Buya); bxk – Bukusu (Tachoni); lts – Tachoni
Guthrie code	JE.31

Browse history interactively

← Previous edit Next edit →

Content deleted Content added

VisualWikitext

Inline

Revision as of 17:40, 23 December 2014

Masaba (Lumasaaba), sometimes known as Gisu (Lugisu) after one of its dialects, is a Bantu language spoken by more than two million people in East Africa. Gisu dialect in eastern Uganda is mutually intelligible with Bukusu, spoken by ethnic Luhya in western Kenya. Masaba is the local name of Mount Elgon and the name of the son of the ancestor of the Gisu tribe. Like other Bantu languages, Lumasaba has a large set of prefixes used as noun classifiers. This is similar to how gender is used in many Germanic and Romance languages, except that instead of the usual two or three, there are around eighteen different noun classes. The language is not tonal^{[citation needed]} but has a quite complex verb morphology.

Varieties

Varieties of Masaba are as follows:^[3]

Gisu (Lugisu)
Kisu
Bukusu (Lubukusu; ethnic Luhya)
Syan
Tachoni (Lutachoni; ethnic Luhya)
Dadiri (Ludadiri)
Buya (Lubuya)

Dadiri is spoken in the north, Gisu in the center, and Buya in the center and south of Masaba territory in Uganda. Bukusu is spoken in Kenya, separated from ethnic Masaba by Nilotic languages on the border.

Phonology

See Bukusu dialect for details of one variety of Masaba.

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m	n		ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	p	t		k
Plosive	voiced	b	d		g
Fricative	voiceless	f	s
Fricative	voiced	β	z
Approximant			l	j

Vowels

Masaba has a basic 5-vowel system consisting of /i, e, a, o, u/.

References

^ Masaba (Gisu, Kisu, Dadiri, Buya) at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
Bukusu (Tachoni) at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
Tachoni at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
^ Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online
^ Maho (2009)

Brown, Gillian (1972) Phonological Rules and Dialectal Variation: A study of the phonology of Lumasaaba ISBN 0-521-08485-7

External links

Kulomba Kwikumutikinyi Portions of the Book of Common Prayer in Masaba (1907) digitized by Richard Mammana and Charles Wohlers

Learn Lumasaaba Learning Lumasaaba by Catherine Mabongor

This Bantu language-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

[e17-1] Masaba (Gisu, Kisu, Dadiri, Buya) at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
Bukusu (Tachoni) at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
Tachoni at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)

[Guthrie-2] Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online

[3] Maho (2009)

[1]

[2]

[3]

@@ Line 48: / Line 48: @@
 ===Consonants===
 {| class="wikitable" style=text-align:center
+|-
-|-style="font-size: 90%;"
 !colspan=2|
 ! [[Labial consonant|Labial]]
@@ Line 61: / Line 61: @@
 |{{IPAlink|ŋ}}
 |-
-!rowspan=2| [[Stop consonant|Stop]]
+!rowspan=2| [[Stop consonant|Plosive]]
 ! <small>[[voicelessness|voiceless]]</small>
-|style="border-bottom: 0;"|{{IPAlink|p}}
+|{{IPAlink|p}}
-|style="border-bottom: 0;"|{{IPAlink|t}}
+|{{IPAlink|t}}
+|
-|rowspan=2|
-|style="border-bottom: 0;"|{{IPAlink|k}}
+|{{IPAlink|k}}
 |-
 ! <small>[[voice (phonetics)|voiced]]</small>
-|style="border-top: 0;"|{{IPAlink|b}}
+|{{IPAlink|b}}
-|style="border-top: 0;"|{{IPAlink|d}}
+|{{IPAlink|d}}
+|
-|style="border-top: 0;"|{{IPAlink|g}}
+|{{IPAlink|g}}
 |-
 !rowspan=2| [[Fricative consonant|Fricative]]
 ! <small>[[voicelessness|voiceless]]</small>
-|style="border-bottom: 0;"|{{IPAlink|f}}
+|{{IPAlink|f}}
-|style="border-bottom: 0;"|{{IPAlink|s}}
+|{{IPAlink|s}}
+|
-|rowspan=2|
+|
-|rowspan=2|
 |-
 ! <small>[[voice (phonetics)|voiced]]</small>
-|style="border-top: 0;"|{{IPAlink|β}}
+|{{IPAlink|β}}
-|style="border-top: 0;"|{{IPAlink|z}}
+|{{IPAlink|z}}
+|
+|
 |-
 !colspan=2| [[Approximant consonant|Approximant]]