African Language Families

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

Not wanting to take the Meroitic as an Afroasiatic language? thread
off-topic I thought I'd start this one for alternatives to Greenberg's
rather old classification system of African languages.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

This isn't Obenga's complete phylogeny but only what I have available.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

THEOPHILE OBENGA



Origine commune de l'égyptien ancien, du copte et des langues négro-africaines modernes.
Introduction à la linguistique historique africaine

Table des matières

INTRODUCTION p. 7

CHAPITRE I. - Méthodologie p. 11
Principes de la linguistique historique.
L'indo-européen.
Critères légitimant la comparaison entre l'égyptien pharaonique, le copte et les langues négro-africaines modernes.
Recommandations du Colloque égyptologique international du Caire en 1974.

CHAPITRE II. - Identification et documentation p. 19.
Historique de la langue égyptienne.
Dialectes coptes.
Processus de l'emprunt fait au grec par le copte.
Dictionnaires, lexiques et grammaires pharaoniques et coptes.
Identification du mbochi.
Mbochi et Bantu.
Documentation scientifique sur le mbochi.

CHAPITRE III. - Phonétique historique de l'égyptien p. 29
Historique de la phonétique égyptienne.
Copte et moyen égyptien: phonologie.
Première approche relative à la vocalisation de l'égyptien pharaonique.
Systèmes consonantiques pharaonique et copte.
Voyelles coptes. Structure phonématique du copte.

CHAPITRE IV. - Définition et classement des phonèmes mbochi p. 53
Traits généraux.
Consonnes.
Voyelles.
Analyse tonématique.
Combinaison des phonèmes.
Conclusio

CHAPITRE V. - Système phonologique du berbère p. 67
Documentation.
Phonologie berbère: système consonantique et système vocalique.
Observations phonologiques.
Langues égyptienne et berbère: leur opposition irrémédiable

CHAPITRE VI. - Mythes chamito-sémitiques p. 79
Etymologie du mot " ham " ou " cham ".
Structure morphologique du sémitique, de l'égyptien et du berbère: étude comparative systématique.
Faits lexicologiques sémitiques, égyptiens et berbères: leur opposition fondamentale.
Le " chamito-sémitique " ou l'" afro-asiatique ", une véritable escroquerie scientifique.

CHAPITRE VII. - Correspondances morphologiques entre l'égyptien et le négo-africain p. 97
Classes nominales et articles définis.
Formation du pluriel.
Catégories grammaticales de genre sexuel.
Formation grammaticale d'abstraits.
Verbe-copule " être ". Pronoms personnels égyptiens et négro-africains.
Pronom personnel réfléchi.
Adjectifs et leurs emplois grammaticaux.
Adjectifs dits " nisbés ".
Obtention du comparatif et du superlatif.
Verbes et conjugaison verbale flexionnelle.
Réduplication. Causatif.
Particules verbales.
Temps et modes.
Formes simples et complexes du verbe: flexions verbales.
Particules auxiliaires verbales (morphèmes copules).
Expression du futur et tableau des éléments fonctionnels.
Particularités verbales idiomatiques. Le " m " dit de prédication.
Morphèmes négatifs: tableaux comparatifs.
Particules de liaison: tableaux comparatifs.

CHAPITRE VIII. - Cbangements et Règles de correspondances phonétiques p. 181
Lois phonétiques (" sound laws ").
Les données.
Analyse des faits pharaoniques, coptes et négro-africains.
Établissement de concordances phonétiques: les consonnes.
Arbres généalogiques.
Tableau d'ensemble.
Phénomène de métathèse.
Tableau.
Établissement de concordances phonétiques: les voyelles. Tableaux évolutifs.

CHAPITRE IX. - Faits et correspondances lexicologiques p. 259
Remarques générales.
Problème de l'emprunt linguistique et langues noncontiguës.
Intervention du copte.
Problème de l'héritage commun en linguistique.
Valeur culturelle et historique de certains lexèmes égyptiens et négroafricain:
"boeuf", "mouton/bélier", "singe/babouin" "éléphant", "hippopotame", "viande".
Deuxième approche relative à la vocalisation de l'égyptien pharaonique: ancien égyptien/nuer/banda/mande.
Confirmation par le négro-afticain de certaines lectures du pharaonique tenues pour douteuses.
Catégories ontologiques égyptiennes répandues dans toute l'Afrique noire.
Panthéon égyptien et divinités négro-africaines.
Rapprochements lexicologiques entre l'ancien égyptien, le copte et le négro-africain.

CHAPITRE X. - Parlers négro-égyptiens. Leur classification p. 343
Le Négro-égyptien, acquisition fondamentale de la linguistique africaine renouvelée.
Histoire ancienne du continent afticain et linguistique africaine.
Nonexistence des langues dites " semi " bantu.
Éclatement de vieilles barrières linguistiques imposées par des théories racistes entre les langues africaines.
Nécessité d'une géographie linguistique en Aftique noire.
Trois grandes familles linguistiques africaines: le négro-égyptien, le berbère et le khoisan.
La famille négro-égyptienne avec toutes ses branches et tous ses sous-groupes.
Le verbecopule " être " en négro-égyptien: comparaison systématique.

CHAPITRE XI. - Autres Parlers africains. Leur classification p. 361
Langues sémitiques de l'Aftique: groupe sémitique éthiopien.
Quelques emprunts faits par ce groupe au couchitique.
Parlers berbères actuels.
Langues khoisan.
Lexèmes hottentot.
Comparaison entre le khoisan et le berbère: l'inexistence des langues dites " charnitiques ".

CONCLUSION p. 373

BIBLIOGRAPHIE p. 377

ANNEXES p. 395

I. - Tableau du Négro-égyptien p. 394 -
II. - Tableau du Sémitique de l'Afrique p. 396 -
III. - Tableau du Berbère p. 397 -
IV. - Tableau du Khoisan p. 398.

[NeferKemet]

Very interesting!

Apr 18, 2010 21:07:54 GMT -5 Tukuler al~Takruri said:

This isn't Obenga's complete phylogeny but only what I have available.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

As far as I can make out, and I very well could be wrong, Obenga
recognizes three unrelated language phyla native to geographical
Africa and one spoken in Africa but considered of extra-African origin.

1) négro-égyptien
2) khoisan
3) berbère

He recognizes that Semitic languages are spoken in Africa but
doesn't classify them as native to the geographical continent of
Africa calling them

4) sémitique de l'Afrique

He defines the Negro-Egyptian group as those languages
related to if not actually arising from pharaonic Egyptian.

Tamazight (the designation that North Africans themselves
have chosen for their language family as they deem the
word Berber to be one forced on them by Greek, Roman,
and later Arab colonialist invaders) is totally unrelated to
pharaonic Egyptian per Obenga and thus excluded from
the unity of the langues négro-africaines.

Of the familes considered to be Afrisan (I do believe that
the term Afrasian is a misnomer as Africa is the birthplace
of these languages -- even Semitic was born somewhere
between the Sahara and the Horn before crossing the Bab
el Mandeb to the Arabian peninsula which geologically is part
of the African continent -- and they are spoken nowhere in Asia
outside of the context of the dispersion of religion)

1) Omotic
2) Kushitic
3) Egyptian
4) Chadic (Hausa)
5) Tamazight
6) Semitic

Obenga has retained the phylum family unity of

1) Kushitic
2) Egyptian
3) Chadic


and broadened the connection by demoting and including
the below two once classified independent ranking phyla

4) Nilo-Saharan
5) Niger-Kordofanian

into his new Black-Egyptian language phylum.


Table 1. Two classifications of African language phyla

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

Rather than genetic families, Dalby proposes
region wide affinity of speech overlaid by
fragmentation of unaffiliated speakers.

Geosectors simply refer to a continent.

Phylosectors refer to affinity.

Phylozones correspond to wider or narrower affinities.

Geozones correspond to convenient geographical groupings that may
* sometimes share a geo-typological relationship
* simply be isolated languages
* groupings of diverse languages spoken in the same geographic area




From Table A : Geolinguistic framework of referential sectors & zones
©David Dalby, Observatoire linguistique 1993-2007
GEOSECTORS comprising geozones & independent phylozones; plus
PHYLOSECTORS comprising phylozones (interrelated witin each phylosector)

[Charlie Bass]

I don't see why Berber should be excluded from being an African language, its definitely closer to AE and Chadic than it is to Semitic.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

David Dalby is a proponent of linquistic affinities instead of genetic
trees for African languages. He sees a Northern Area of Wider Affinty
and a Southern Area of Wider Affinity. Outside of these areas lie the
phyla Greenberg knows as Nilo-Saharan and San. Mande also lies
outside Dalby's areas of wider affinity [some feel it is Nilo-Saharan].

Dalby also recognizes a Fragmentation Belt that cuts through both areas
of affinity and the northern unaffiliated areas (Nilo-Saharan region). This
belt is defined by the fact that the vast majority of African language units
are found in a broad swathe of territory stretching in the west from southern
Mauritania to the Gulf of Guinea going eastward clear across the continent to
the western portions of Ethiopia and northern Kenya.



FIG. 12.1 Diagrammatic language map of Africa
from UNESCO's General History of Africa v1. p.310


Dalby tore a hole in Greenberg by introducing the Fragmentation Belt where
languages within the belt defy assignment to any one family because different
criteria will land them in different families, whereas Greenberg lumped them by
only one consideration, typology.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

Who excludes 'Berber' from the families of African languages?

Apr 19, 2010 12:30:29 GMT -5 Charlie Bass said:

I don't see why Berber should be excluded from being an African language, its definitely closer to AE and Chadic than it is to Semitic.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

The three groupings Dalby makes of African languages

1 - Africa (a geosector)
2 - Afro-Asian (a phylosector)
3 - TransAfrican (a phylosector)

are mutually exclusive, so to speak, in that there
are no overlappings across or between groups.

Its too mathematical and geometric that each group
can only have 10 subgroups, but each one of the 30
subgroups can only belong to one main group. Stilted
and artificial? Maybe so.

Transafrican is indeed a phylosector and so its
components are affiliated with no fragmentation.

Dalby's Afro-Asian is essentially the same as Afrisan.
Because of the fragment zone where Dalby finds his
Songhaic phylosector and East Sahel isolate(s) it
looks like he may be unsure of the existance of any
Nilo-Saharan or Niger-Congo phylogenetic units.

For Dalby, his Saharic and Nilotic are each phylozones
contained within his Africa geosector. So no Nilo-Saharan.
Other Nilo-Saharan languages fall into Dalby's Afro-Asian
phylosector as phylozones (his Charic for example).

Likewise with the old Niger-Congo phylum. Dalby sees
his Mandic and Kordofanic as phylozones within his Africa
geosector. However, the bulk of Niger-Congo corresponds
with Dalby's phylozones within his TransAfrican phylosector.

Of interesting note are Dalby's Khoisanic phylozone and
Kalaharic geozone in his Africa geosector.

For Dalby, languages can have one of two basic "superfamily"
designations either as a geosector or phylosector and
"families" reside within a geozone (fragmented) or phylozone
(affiliated).

[homeylu]

Good post, well informed. To compliment the thread, here is a map to show the geographic location where most of the languages above are spoken.

[Charlie Bass]

Apr 19, 2010 12:50:49 GMT -5 Tukuler al~Takruri said:

Who excludes 'Berber' from the families of African languages?

Apr 19, 2010 12:30:29 GMT -5 Charlie Bass said:

I don't see why Berber should be excluded from being an African language, its definitely closer to AE and Chadic than it is to Semitic.

Correction, I meant i see no reason why Obenga should exclude Berber from being a "Negro-african" language.

[NeferKemet]

I cannot find this book. I've tried looking for it. Is it available at Amazon?

Apr 18, 2010 21:12:37 GMT -5 Tukuler al~Takruri said:

THEOPHILE OBENGA



Origine commune de l'égyptien ancien, du copte et des langues négro-africaines modernes.
Introduction à la linguistique historique africaine

.

[anansi]

Apr 19, 2010 15:27:12 GMT -5 Charlie Bass said:

Apr 19, 2010 12:50:49 GMT -5 Tukuler al~Takruri said:

Who excludes 'Berber' from the families of African languages?

Correction, I meant i see no reason why Obenga should exclude Berber from being a "Negro-african" language.

And that's where it gets political with some Amazigh activist, calling their language non African..it's more than a mild slap in the face imo.

[Tukuler al~Takruri]

I'll post Obenga's analytic reasoning in the Archive folder soon enough.

Apr 19, 2010 15:27:12 GMT -5 Charlie Bass said:

Apr 19, 2010 12:50:49 GMT -5 Tukuler al~Takruri said:

Who excludes 'Berber' from the families of African languages?

Correction, I meant i see no reason why Obenga should exclude Berber from being a "Negro-african" language.