Academic literature on the topic 'Dyula language'

“Many African languages have a long written tradition, e.g. Ge'ez, Kiswahili, Hausa, etc.” reads the summary of panel 21 of the AEGIS conference “African Manuscripts and Museum Collections in Europe”. The list could be extended to include other names familiar to a wider audience, e.g., Fula(ni) (Fulfulde), Manding (Mandenkan, Bambara, Dyula, Mandinka), Wolof, Asante (Akan), Songay. The Kanuri language however, needs some introduction. This is to a certain extent a historical paradox, because Kanuri was in fact the first African language to be extensively documented in the middle of the 19th century by Sigismund Koelle. In 1854 Koelle published two large volumes on Kanuri grammar and an anthology of oral narratives (1854a, 1854b). Remarkably, four tales from the Koelle's Kanuri anthology found their way into Volume 3 of the 3rd edition of the Grimm Brothers’ Children and Household Tales (1856).

SOMMAIRE Le rayonnement du Dioula et du français populaire en Côte d'Ivoire: Son rapport à la politique linguistique Cet article montre, à travers une présentation de la situation sociolinguistique de la Côte d'Ivoire, que: (1) le Français Standard, en dépit de son statut de langue nationale et officielle et de son prestige, n'a pu s'établir comme une langue de masse et est menacé dans son rôle de moyen de communication majeur par deux lingua francas: le Dioula et le Français Populaire; (2) l'intégration socioeconomique minimale, le taux élevé des renvois scolaires, l'importance de l'exode rural et l'immigration internationale ont considerablement renforcé cette tendance; (3) les lingua francas, et plus particulièrement le Dioula, peuvent devenir langues nationales malgré la résistance des populations à une nouvelle politique langagière. Cet article conclut que l'usage répandu d'une langue ne signifie pas toujours l'adoption de celle-ci comme langue nationale ou langue officielle. RESUMO La disvastiĝo de la djula lingvo kaj la popola franca en Ebura Bordo: Implicoj je la lingva politiko La aŭtoro montras, per priskribo de la socilingvistika situacio de Ebura Bordo, ke: (1) la norma franca lingvo, malgraŭ sia nacia kaj oficiala statuso kaj sia prestiĝo, ne estab-liĝis kiel la lingvo de la popolo kaj estas minacata en sia rolo de ĉefperilo de interetna komunikado de du interlingvoj, la djula kaj la popola franca; (2) la malforta sociekonomia integriĝo, la alta nombro de nefinantoj lernejaj kaj la graveco de interna kaj internacia migrado konsiderinde plifortigis tiun tendencon; (3) la interlingvoj, precipe la djula, havas perspektivon por fariĝi naciaj lingvoj malgraŭ tio, ke la homoj mem ne tre forte subtenas la ideon de nova lingva politiko. La aŭtoro konkludas, ke la ĝenerala utiligo de difinita lingvo ne nepre kondukas al ĝia akceptiĝo kiel nacia aŭ oficiala lingvo.

In this article I deal with the problem of division into genres and genre designation in the oral tradition of the Bamana, Maninka, and Dyula. These people belong to the Manden or Mandinka, Mandingo peoples (Mali, Guinea, and Burkina Faso). For comparison, the names of similar genres among the Dogon are also given, as the Dogon consider themselves a Manden people, even though their languages do not belong to the Mandé language family. Both expeditionary materials and written sources were used. Almost all the words related to genre formation were recorded, and a description of the genres themselves was given. It was interesting to understand what features are important for choosing genres for Manden peoples. Due to cultural characteristics and historical development, the generally accepted division into genres is not entirely suitable for the Manden peoples and forms a “Procrustean bed” for their subdivision. First of all, the degree of ‘seriousness’ of the genre is important, that is, its significance for tradition: ‘true’ texts are opposed to fictional ones. The degree of rituality of the folklore text is also significant. Restrictions on the performance of texts are associated with the ability to control the occult power of nyama energy. An important role in this is played by the presence of the griot tradition. Also, a formal feature plays a role in defining various folklore genres.

In an oral discourse passed down through many generations, the village elder Vase Kamara describes how a slave named Zo Musa Kòma founded the ancient town of Musadu in Guinea-Conakry, and he explains how the legendary Kamara ancestor Foningama later became a leader in Musadu. We tentatively date some elements of the Zo Musa stories to about the fourteenth and fifteenth century, when the Manding began to assimilate and push the Southwestern and Eastern Mande-speaking peoples from the Musadu area in the Konyan to the forest. Some of the Foningama related accounts seem to correspond to the era when the Kamara who settled in the Konyan became active in the sixteenth-century Mane “invasions.”Stories about Musadu's founding provide information about these movements and help bridge the histories of the savanna and forest peoples who live in Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire, and Liberia. The Musadu legend links the Konyaka to their kinsmen who live in the traditional heartland of the Mali empire in present-day northern Guinea and southern Mali. In addition, some Manding, Vai, Loma, Gola, Kpelle, Konor, Dan, and Mano trace their origins to Musadu, and reflect one Loma writer's claim that “all of the tribes in Liberia are from Musadu, or have some association with Musadu” (Korvali 1960:7).The main actors are Manding (Mandekan) speakers who migrated to the Mau/Gbè and Konyan regions of western Côte d'Ivoire and southern Guinea respectively. The Mauka/Gbèka and Konyaka are members of the Northern Mande language group and are classified as Maninka (Malinke). The Bamana (Bambara), Dyula (Jula), and Vai are other Northern Mande speakers. Vase claims that Foningama was Manding, and that Zo Musa was Kpelle. The Kpelle, Loma, and Konor are Southwestern Mande speakers, and the Dan (Gio) and Mano are Eastern Mande speakers.

The region of West Africa is of interest for the study of the origin and development of writing because a number of scripts were created there for several local languages during the 19th and 20th centuries, especially for the Mande family (the Vai, Mende, Kpelle, Looma, and Bamana syllabaries). In 1949 the Guinean enlightener Soulemayne Kanté developed the N’Ko alphabet for the Manding (Manden) languages, which belong to the Mande family and include, in particular, Bamana (Bambara), Jula (Dyula, Dioula), and Maninka. The name “N’Ko” originates from the phrase N ko ‘I say’ in Manding languages. This script is predominantly used in Guinea for Maninka (Maninka-Mori), which is native to more than 3.5 million people in Guinea, Mali and Sierra Leone. The N’Ko alphabet is also widely used in Liberia, the Côte d’Ivoire, and the African diaspora (mainly in Nigeria and Egypt) by a hundred thousand to a million persons. This article provides information about studies of various aspects of the N’Ko alphabet. First of all, the complexity of the graphic forms of each of the 27 letters is calculated according to certain principles. For example, the point corresponds to 1, the straight line segment is 2, and the arc is 3; also certain weight is given to various types of connections and crossed lines. A frequency analysis of the distribution of letters is undertaken in the corpus of Maninka texts written in N’Ko, with more than 3.1 million words. This made it possible, in particular, to trace the extent to which the complexity of the graphic form of the signs correlates with their frequency. It appears that such a correlation is not very significant: the correlation coefficient is –0.38, whereas, for example, for the Morse code in English texts it reaches –0.82. The full inverse correlation, when simpler characters are always used to represent more frequent letters, corresponds to –1. It has also been shown that frequency analysis can serve as a further justification for certain orthographic principles in N’Ko, particularly of tone notation. The next task was to calculate orthographic uncertainty: in an ideal alphabet, where there is a one-to-one correspondence between phonemes (sounds) and graphemes (signs), this uncertainty is equal to zero. In the N’Ko alphabet, its values are quite small: 0.37 without taking into account the tone notation, and 0.22 with tone notation. For comparison, the values corresponding to some “old” writing systems are as follows: in the Ukrainian alphabet, it equals 1.12, while a slightly simpler Italian orthography provides uncertainty at the level of 0.56. The results obtained in this study can be useful for studying phonotactics, prosodic elements, and the history of writing and lexicography, as well as in comparative and contrastive studies.

Национальный фольклор является одним из важнейших оснований культуры, в том числе гендерной, от которой в значительной степени зависит будущее общества, народа. Известно, что в ингушском фольклоре особое место отведено женщине. В то же время ее традиционный образ представляется сегодня недостаточно изученным. И цель настоящей статьи состоит в том, чтобы заполнить эту лакуну. Обратившись к образцам национального фольклора и работам исследователей, затрагивавших эту тему ранее, автор приходит к выводу, что культ женщины-матери сыграл огромную роль в зарождении ингушской гинекократии. Однако у ингушей этот феномен получил особенные формы, отличные, например, от гинекократии древней Спарты, сарматской или скифской гинекократии. Ингушская традиционная гинекократия основана на отведении женщине особой роли в семье и обществе.A woman in the Ingush epic is represented, above all, by a wise rational person with a strong spirit who loves her people endlessly. She is sincerely devoted to family and society. The world of natural phenomena in the mythical views of the ancient Ingush was endowed with images of powerful mothers of natural phenomena and mothers of painful diseases. Each phenomenon had its own origin, had its own woman mother. The heroine of Ingush legends and tales often acts as an avenger for insults and blood of relatives and family members. Ingush folklore is one of the significant reasons for the spiritual content of culture, including a womans culture, on which the future of humankind depends. The names of mythological deities, patrons, both female and male, are carefully preserved in the Ingush epic. It is noteworthy that their etymology is quite transparent for an expert in the Ingush language. Apparently, the mythological motifs of the ancient peoples of the Earth are often intertwined. For example, Astar (land) is similar to Greek Gaia and Roman Juno. The noble Tusholi is similar to the Roman Diana. In the Ingush pantheon, Tusholi is the only patroness of fertility and of people in front of Dyala (the supreme gog). Public education, based primarily on Ingush folklore and spiritual values, has always been inherent in women. Having learned songs and stories about noble deeds and brave heroes in childhood, having heard them from their grandmothers and mothers, it was women who passed them on to their children and grandchildren. A remarkable knowledge of the native language and folklore, and then the projection of this knowledge contributed to the true wisdom of a woman. The resourcefulness of a woman who saves her fellow tribesmen from enemies is described in the legend Milk Kinship. The Ingush in ancient times were a peoples army the entire population was warriors. The Ingush woman was the second echelon of the standing army. What can make a person free Their high culture, nourishing the spirit of the individual, determines the choice of means in various situations of the complex life cycle. We can formulate the following definition from a brief review of Ingush folklore. National folklore is one of the important foundations of the spiritual content of culture, including gender culture, on which the future of society and people depends. A woman is a reliable companion of her husband, an excellent mother of children, an excellent housewife and, if necessary, a loyal defender of her home and country. Traditionally, a woman in an Ingush family is a fullfledged hostess and manager of funds. At any Ingush holiday, be it a wedding or a holiday, the best room is reserved for women, delicious dishes are served for women.

It is commonly agreed that phonological elements must be prosodically licensed in order to be interpreted phonetically (cf. Ito, 1986). The licensing of segments is generally assumed to follow from the Universal Association Conventions. The licensing of phonological units smaller than the segment, however, has not been fully addressed. There is no agreement on the exact licensing mechanisms at play and on what constitutes a proper anchor for the initial association of floating subsegmentals. This thesis proposes a principled account of subsegmental licensing within the theory of segmental structure known as feature geometry, as modified by Piggott (to appear). It is shown that the manifestation of nasality in Maukaka, Koyaga, Jula, and Terena result from the way licensing operates. It is argued that, universally, floating subsegmental units are licensed through mapping, which associates a unit to an available position. It is also proposed that whenever there is no proper position for the mapping of a subsegmental element, this element may be licensed by Chomsky-adjunction. This type of adjunction has played a role in syllabification but not in the organization of feature.