Niger-Congo languages
There are some 1000-1500 Niger-Congo (Niger-Kordofanian) languages spoken from western Africa via eastern Africa to southern Africa. They are commonly divided into a number of subgroups as follows (cfr Williamson 1989 and Williamson & Blench 2000):
- Volta-Congo languages:
- Adamawa -- some 40-60 languages
- Benue-Congo -- some 700-900 languages, incl. 500-700 Bantoid languages (which includes 400-500 Bantu languages)
- Gur -- some 100 languages, or less
- Kru -- some 30-40 languages
- Kwa -- some 40-60 languages
- Ubangi -- some 40-50 languages
- Atlantic -- between 40-60 languages
- Ijoid -- less than 10 languages
- Kordofanian -- some 15-20 languages
- Mande -- some 40-50 languages
To these we may add the following remnant and/or hitherto unclassified Niger-Congo languages:
A SELECTION OF PRINTED LITERATURE
Bendor-Samuel, John Theodor. (Ed.) 1989. The Niger-Congo languages: a classification and description of Africa's largest language family. University Press of America, by arrangement with the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL).
Heine, Bernd; Schadeberg, Thilo C.; Wolff, Ekkehard. (Eds.) 1981. Die Sprachen Afrikas, Bd 1: Niger-Kordofanisch. Helmut Buske Verlag.
Perrot, Jean. (Ed.) 1981. Les langues dans le monde ancien et moderne, v. 1 : les languages de l'Afrique subsaharienne. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).
Westermann, Diedrich. 1927. Die westlichen Sudansprachen und ihre Beziehungen zum Bantu. Mitteilungen des Seminars für orientalische Sprachen, Beiheft 29. Walter de Gruyter & Co.
Westermann, Diedrich; Bryan, Margaret Arminel. 1952. The languages of West Africa. Handbook of African languages, part 2. Dawsons of Pall Mall for the International African Institute (IAI).
Williamson, Kay. 1989. Niger-Congo overview. In: The Niger-Congo languages (ed. by John Theodor Bendor-Samuel), p. 3-45. University Press of America, by arrangement with the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL).
Williamson, Kay; Blench, Roger M. 2000. Niger-Congo. In: African languages: an introduction (ed. by Bernd Heine & Derek Nurse), p. 11-42. Cambridge University Press.
Niger-Congo languages, according to SIL's Ethnologue.
www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=89954
Niger-Congo languages, according to Wikipedia.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niger-Congo
Felix Ameka
The multiverb constructions in a West African areal typological perspective (PDF). Online proceedings of TROSS03, Trondheim Summer School, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
edvarda.hf.ntnu.no/ling/tross/TROSS03-toc.html
Rose-Juliet Anyanwu, 2001
On the manifestation of stress in African languages (PDF). Paper presented at TAPS (Typology of African Prosodic Systems), University of Bielefeld, May 2001.
www.spectrum.uni-bielefeld.de/TAPS/Anyanwu.pdf
Roger M. Blench, 2003
Index and classification to Westermann's Niger-Congo reconstructions (PDF). Mallam Dendo, Cambridge.
www.rogerblench.info/RBOP.htm
Roger M. Blench, 2004
Is Niger-Congo simply a branch of Nilo-Saharan? (PDF). Mallam Dendo, Cambridge. (Originally published 1995 in the proceedings of the 5th international Nilo-Saharan linguistics colloquium, 1992.)
www.rogerblench.info/RBOP.htm
Roger M. Blench, 2004
Further evidence for Niger-Saharan and the problem of pan-African roots (PDF). Mallam Dendo, Cambridge.
www.rogerblench.info/RBOP.htm
Roger M. Blench, 2004
Niger-Saharan: additional glosses (PDF). Mallam Dendo, Cambridge.
www.rogerblench.info/RBOP.htm
Roger M. Blench, 2006
The Niger-Saharan macrophylum (PDF). Mallam Dendo, Cambridge.
www.rogerblench.info/RBOP.htm
C. Chanard
Systèmes alphabétiques des langues africaines d'après "Alphabets des langues africaines", Unesco-SIL 1993. LLACAN (Langage, Langues et Cultures d'Afrique Noire).
sumale.vjf.cnrs.fr/phono
Denis Creissels, 2005
S-O-V-X constituent order and constituent order alternations in West African languages (PDF). Proceedings of the 31st annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, February 2005.
www.ddl.ish-lyon.cnrs.fr/Annuaires/PDF/Creissels/Creissels_2005a.pdf
Haig Der-Houssikian, 1972
The evidence for a Niger-Congo hypothesis. Cahiers d'études africaines, v. 12, p. 316-322.
www.persee.fr/showIssue.do?issueKey=cea_0008-0055_1972_num_12_46
István Fodor, 1968
La classification des langues négro-africaines et le théorie de J.H. Greenberg. Cahiers d'études africaines, v. 8, p. 617-631.
www.persee.fr/showIssue.do?issueKey=cea_0008-0055_1968_num_8_32
Dafydd Gibbon, 2001
Computational phonology and the typology of West African tone systems (PDF). Paper presented at TAPS (Typology of African Prosodic Systems), University of Bielefeld, May 2001.
www.spectrum.uni-bielefeld.de/TAPS/gibbon.pdf
Tom Güldemann
The Macro-Sudan Belt: towards identifying a linguistic area in northern sub-Saharan Africa (PDF). From: Africa as a linguistic area. Edited by Bernd Heine and Derek Nurse.
email.eva.mpg.de/~gueldema/pdf/05MacroSudan.pdf
Larry M. Hyman, 2007
Niger-Congo verb extensions: overview and discussion (PDF). Selected proceedings of the 37th annual conference on African linguistics. Cascadilla Proceedings Project.
www.lingref.com/cpp/acal/37/index.html
Harry Hamilton Johnston, 1919/22
A comparative study of the Bantu and semi-Bantu languages (PDF). Oxford.
www.archive.org/details/comparativestudy01johnuoft
Alain Kihm
Noun class, gender, and the lexicon-syntax-morphology interfaces: a comparative study of Niger-Congo and Romance languages (PDF). Manuscrit. Laboratoire de Linguistique Formelle, Université de Paris-7.
www.llf.cnrs.fr/Gens/Kihm/index-fr.php
Jouni Maho, 2006
Niger-Congo noun class studies: a bibliographical survey (PDF).
goto.glocalnet.net/eball/ngcncs.pdf
Kenneth S. Olson, 2004
An evaluation of Niger-Congo classification (PDF). SIL electronic survey report SILESR 2004-005.
www.sil.org/silewp/abstract.asp?ref=2004-005
Kenneth S. Olson, John Hajek, 2001
The geographic and genetic distribution of the labial flap (PDF). SIL electronic working paper SILEWP 2001-002.
www.sil.org/silewp/2001/002
Henry Tourneux, 1994
Les langues africaines et l'égyptien (PDF). Politique africaine, n. 55, p. 153-158.
www.politique-africaine.com/numeros/pdf/055153.pdf
Andy Warren-Rothlin, 2007
Politeness strategies in Biblical Hebrew and West African languages (PDF). Journal of translation, v. 3, p. 55-71.
www.sil.org/siljot/abstract.asp?id=49049
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