Manza language
From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
| Manza | |
|---|---|
| Mandja | |
| Native to | Central African Republic |
| Ethnicity | Mandja |
Native speakers | (220,000 cited 1996)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | mzv |
| Glottolog | manz1243 |
Manza (Mānzā, Mandja) is a Ubangian language spoken by the Mandja people of the Central African Republic. It is closely related to Ngbaka and may be to some extent mutually intelligible.
Phonology
[edit]The phonology consists of the following:[2]
Consonants
[edit]| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labio- velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | (ɲ) | ŋ | ŋ͡m | ||
| Plosive | voiceless | p | t | k | k͡p | ||
| voiced | b | d | ɡ | ɡ͡b | |||
| prenasal | ᵐb | ⁿd | ᵑɡ | ᵑᵐɡ͡b | |||
| implosive | ɓ | ɗ | |||||
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s | h | |||
| voiced | v | z | |||||
| prenasal | ⁿz | ||||||
| Tap | ⱱ | ɾ | |||||
| Approximant | (l) | j | w | ||||
- Sounds /ɾ/ and /ⱱ/ are very rare in word-initial position.
- /ⁿz/ can be heard in free variation as a prenasal affricate sound [ⁿd͡ʒ].
- [l] is only heard in free variation of /j/.
- /j/ can be heard as [ɲ] when preceding a nasal vowel.
Vowels
[edit]| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Close-mid | e | o | |
| Open-mid | ɛ | ɔ | |
| Open | a |
- /a/ can have an allophone of [ɐ], when in complementary distribution.
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | ĩ | ũ | |
| Open-mid | ɛ̃ | ɔ̃ | |
| Open | ã |
- The nasalization of /ɛ̃/ may also be heard more lower as [æ̃] in free variation.
Writing system
[edit]| a | b | bh | d | dh | e | ɛ | f | g | gb | h | i | k | kp | l | m | mb | n | nd | ndj | ngb | ŋ | ŋg | ŋm | o | ɔ | p | r | s | t | u | v | vb | w | y | z |
The tones are indicated on the letters using diacritics:
- the middle tone is indicated using the umlaut: ⟨ä, ë, ɛ̈, ï, ö, ɔ̈, ü⟩ ;
- the high tone is indicated using the circumflex accent: ⟨â, ê, ɛ̂, î, ô, ɔ̂, û⟩.
References
[edit]- ^ Manza at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ Moore, Troy C. (2000). Manza Phonology Statement. SIL.
- ^ Ngodi, Gounoukon & Moore 2017, p. 34-35.
Works cited
[edit]- Ngodi, Edmond; Gounoukon, Orphe-Magloire; Moore, Troy (2017). Hârâ nɛ mɛ̈ yɔ̂ rɔ̂ nû mandja [Lire et écrire en mandja] (3 ed.). Bangui: Association centrafricaine pour la traduction de la Bible et d’alphabétisation (ACATBA) et SIL International.
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