Dan language
Dan | |
---|---|
Yacouba | |
Native to | Ivory Coast, Guinea, and Liberia |
Ethnicity | Dan people |
Native speakers | 1.6 million (2012)[1] |
Niger–Congo?
| |
Latin | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | Either:dnj – Danlda – Kla |
Glottolog | dann1241 |
Dan /ˈdæn/[2] is a Southern Mande language spoken primarily in Ivory Coast (~800,000 speakers) and Liberia (150,000–200,000 speakers). There is also a population of about 800 speakers in Guinea. Dan is a tonal language, with 9 to 11 contour and register tones, depending on the dialect.
Alternative names for the language include Yacouba or Yakubasa, Gio, Gyo, Gio-Dan, and Da. Dialects are Gio (Liberian Dan), Gweetaawu (Eastern Dan), Blowo (Western Dan), and Kla. Kla is evidently a distinct language.
Phonology
Vowels
Front | Central | Back | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Unrd. | Rnd. | Unrd. | Rnd. | ||
Close | i | ɯ | u | ||
Near-close | ɪ² | ɯ̽² | ʊ² | ||
Close-mid | e | ɵ¹ | ɤ | o | |
Mid | ə¹ | ||||
Open-mid | ɛ | ʌ | ɔ | ||
Open | æ | ɑ | ɒ | ||
Syllabic | ŋ̍ |
¹Only in Liberian Dan.
²Only in Eastern Dan when in the position of extra-high tone.
Front | Back | ||
---|---|---|---|
Unrd. | Rnd. | ||
Close | ĩ | ɯ̃ | ũ |
Open-mid | ɛ̃ | ʌ̃ | ɔ̃ |
Open | æ̃ | ɑ̃ | ɒ̃ |
Consonants
Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labial- velar |
Glottal | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
plain | lab. | |||||||
Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | ŋʷ | ŋ͡m | ||
Plosive | voiceless | p | t | k | kʷ | k͡p | ||
voiced | b | d | ɡ | ɡʷ² | ɡ͡b | |||
Implosive | ɓ | ɗ | ||||||
Fricative | voiceless | f | s | x¹ | h³ | |||
voiced | v | z | ||||||
Approximant | j | w | ||||||
Lateral | l | |||||||
Trill | (r) |
¹Only in Liberian Dan.
²Not in Liberian Dan.
³Not in western Dan.
- /l/ is heard as [r] when preceded by alveolar or palatal consonants.
- Consonant combinations /sl, zl/ are heard as lateral fricative sounds [ɬ, ɮ].[3]
Writing system
The orthography of Liberia includes this alphabet:
Dan alphabet (Liberia) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
A | B | Ɓ | D | Ɗ | E | Ɛ | F | G | GB | H | I | K | KP | KW | L | M | N | NW | NY | Ŋ | O | Ɔ | Ə | Ɵ | P | R | S | T | U | Ɥ | V | W | X | Y | Z |
a | b | ɓ | d | ɗ | e | ɛ | f | g | gb | h | i | k | kp | kw | l | m | n | nw | ny | ŋ | o | ɔ | ə | ɵ | p | r | s | t | u | ɥ | v | w | x | y | z |
IPA value | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a | b | ɓ | d | ɗ | e | ɛ | f | ɡ | ɡ͡b | h | i | k | k͡p | kʷ | l | m | n | ŋʷ | ɲ | ŋ | o | ɔ | ə | ɵ | p | r | s | t | u | ɯ | v | w | x | j | z |
Dan West alphabet (Côte d'Ivoire) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
A | AƆ | B | BH | D | DH | E | Ɛ | Ë | ƐA | F | G | GB | GW | I | K | KP | KW | L | M | N | NG | O | Ɔ | Ö | P | R | S | T | U | Ü | V | W | Y | Z |
a | aɔ | b | bh | d | dh | e | ɛ | ë | ɛa | f | g | gb | gw | i | k | kp | kw | l | m | n | ng | o | ɔ | ö | p | r | s | t | u | ü | v | w | y | z |
IPA value | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a | ɒ | b | ɓ | d | ɗ | e | ɛ | ʌ | æ | f | ɡ | ɡ͡b | gʷ | i | k | k͡p | kʷ | l | m | n | ŋ | o | ɔ | ɤ | p | r | s | t | u | ɯ | v | w | j | z |
Dan East alphabet (Côte d'Ivoire), 1982 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
A | AƆ | B | BH | D | DH | E | Ë | Ɛ | ƐA | F | G | GB | GW | H | I | Ɩ | K | KP | KW | L | M | N | O | Ö | Ɔ | P | R | S | T | U | Ü | Ʋ | Ʋ̈ | V | W | Y | Z |
a | aɔ | b | bh | d | dh | e | ë | ɛ | ɛa | f | g | gb | gw | h | i | ɩ | k | kp | kw | l | m | n | o | ö | ɔ | p | r | s | t | u | ü | ʋ | ʋ̈ | v | w | y | z |
IPA value | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a | ɒ | b | ɓ | d | ɗ | e | ʌ | ɛ | æ | f | ɡ | ɡ͡b | gʷ | h | i | ɪ | k | k͡p | kʷ | l | m | n | o | ɤ | ɔ | p | r | s | t | u | ɯ | ʊ | ʉ | v | w | j | z |
Dan East alphabet (Côte d'Ivoire), 2014 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
A | Œ | B | BH | D | DH | E | Ʌ | Ɛ | Æ | F | G | GB | GW | H | I | Ɩ | K | KP | KW | L | M | N | O | | Ɔ | P | R | S | T | U | Ɯ | Ʋ | V | W | Y | Z | |
a | œ | b | bh | d | dh | e | ʌ | ɛ | æ | f | g | gb | gw | h | i | ɩ | k | kp | kw | l | m | n | o | ɤ | ɔ | p | r | s | t | u | ɯ | ʋ | v | w | y | z | |
IPA value | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
a | ɒ | b | ɓ | d | ɗ | e | ʌ | ɛ | æ | f | ɡ | ɡ͡b | ɡʷ | h | i | ɪ | k | k͡p | kʷ | l | m | n | o | ɤ | ɔ | p | r | s | t | u | ɯ | ʊ | v | w | j | z |
The capital ɤ will be encoded in a future version of The Unicode Standard.[6]
Tones are marked as follows: extra high tone: a̋; high tone: á; medium tone: ā; low tone: à; extra low tone: ȁ; high drop tone: â; extra low hanging tone: aʼ.
The digraphs ⟨bh, dh, gb gw, kp, kw⟩ keep the same values as in the spelling of 1982, and the nasal vowels are also indicated by appending the letter n after the letter of the vowel ⟨an, æn, ʌn, ɛn, in, ɔn, œn, un⟩.
References
- ^ Dan at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
Kla at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) - ^ Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
- ^ Vydrin, Valentin (2020). Dan. In Rainer Vossen and Gerrit J. Dimmendaal (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of African Languages: Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 451–462.
- ^ "ScriptSource - Error - Writing System Not Found".
- ^ "Proposal to Encode Additional Latin and Cyrillic Characters" (PDF).
- ^ "Proposal to encode a capital Ram's Horn" (PDF).
External links
- English-Dan Online Dictionary
- Roberts, David, Ginger Boyd, Johannes Merz, & Valentin Vydrin. 2020. Quantifying written ambiguities in tone languages: A comparative study of Elip, Mbelime, and Eastern Dan. Language Documentation & Conservation 14: 108-138. http://hdl.handle.net/10125/24915.