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The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of around 210 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 Nilotic languages are spoken by some 14 million people ( see Nilotes), including the Dinka, Nuer, Luo, Turkana, Kalenjin, and Maasai. Nilo-Saharan languages, Group of perhaps 115 African languages spoken by more than 27 million people from Mali to Ethiopia and from southernmost Egypt to Tanzania.
- Overview
- Linguistic characteristics
- Morphology
- Verbs
- Gender
The considerable typological diversity that characterizes the Nilo-Saharan languages corresponds to their wide geographic spread. Structural properties—for example, with respect to sound systems and word order—often are shared with unrelated neighbouring language groups. Thus, rich and complex consonant systems with universally rare distinctions—su...
The considerable typological diversity that characterizes the Nilo-Saharan languages corresponds to their wide geographic spread. Structural properties—for example, with respect to sound systems and word order—often are shared with unrelated neighbouring language groups. Thus, rich and complex consonant systems with universally rare distinctions—su...
Apart from widespread lexical roots whose form and meaning relationships are similar, there are grammatical properties that clearly point toward a common historical origin for the Nilo-Saharan languages. Bari, a Nilotic language of South Sudan, demonstrates one widespread morphological property whereby either the singular or the plural form of a no...
The verb tends to constitute the most complex aspect of Nilo-Saharan languages. It frequently involves extensive marking for conjugational features such as person, number, tense (the expression of time), aspect, or voice, with consonant mutation often accompanying such morphological processes. A widespread and rather permanent distinction is that b...
Gender distinctions between masculine and feminine (or neuter) nouns are common in the neighbouring Afro-Asiatic family (as they are in Indo-European languages) but not in Nilo-Saharan, which has only a few exceptions. Gender as a derivational property of nouns is found, for example, in Southern and Western Nilotic languages, whereas in the Eastern...
Jan 31, 2023 · There are around 80 languages in the Nilo-Saharan family. These tonal languages are spread throughout parts of central, eastern and northeastern Africa, including places like Chad, Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya. Examples of Nilo-Saharan languages include Lugbara in Uganda, Zarma in Niger and Dholuo in Kenya.
Other modern Nilo-Saharan languages with more than a million speakers are the Saharan language Kanuri (mainly in Nigeria), Nile Nubian, and the Nilotic languages Dinka (South Sudan), Kalenjin (Kenya), Luo (mainly in Kenya and Tanzania), and Teso (Uganda and Kenya).
The Nilo-Saharan languages are a family of African languages. They are spoken by around 50 million people, who mainly live in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers. The languages go through 17 countries in the northern half of Africa: from Algeria to Benin in the west.
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The languages go through 17 countries in the northern half of Africa: The Nilo-Saharan languages are a family of African languages. They are spoken by around 50 million people, who mainly live in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers.
