Wè language

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wè
Spoken in:	Côte d'Ivoire
Region:	Dix-Huit Montagnes, Moyen-Cavally
Total speakers:	over 300,000
Language family:	Niger-Congo Atlantic-Congo Volta-Congo Kru Western Kru Wee Wè
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	none
ISO 639-2:	`kro`
ISO 639-3:	either: `gxx` — Wè Southern `wec` — Wè Western
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-based pronunciation key.

Wè (also called Guéré) is a Kru language spoken by over 300,000 people in the Dix-Huit Montagnes and Moyen-Cavally regions of Côte d'Ivoire.

1 Phonology
2 References
3 External links

[edit] Phonology

The phonology of Wè (based on the Zagna variety of Wè Southern)^[1] is briefly sketched out here.

[edit] Consonants

The consonant phonemes of Wè are as follows:

	Bilabial		Labiodental		Labial-velar		Alveolar		Palatal		Velar		Labialized velar
Stops	p	b			k͡p	g͡b	t	d	c	ɟ	k	g	kʷ	gʷ
Implosives		ɓ
Nasals		m						n		ɲ
Fricatives			f	v			s	z
Lateral approximant								l
Approximants										j				w

Allophones of some of these phonemes include:

[k͡m] is an allophone of /k͡p/ before nasal vowels
[ŋ͡m] is an allophone of /g͡b/ before nasal vowels
[ŋʷ] is an allophone of /w/ before nasal vowels
[ɗ] is an allophone of /l/ in word-initial position
[r] is an allophone of /l/ after a coronal consonant (alveolar or palatal)

In addition, while the nasal consonants /m, n/ and contrast with /ɓ/ and /l/ before oral vowels, and are thus separate phonemes, before nasal vowels only the nasal consonants occur. /ɓ/ and /l/ do not occur before nasal vowels, suggesting that historically a phonemic merger between these sounds and the nasals /m, n/ may have occurred in this position.

[edit] Vowels

Like many West African languages, Wè makes use of a contrast between vowels with advanced tongue root and those with retracted tongue root. In addition, nasal vowels contrast phonemically with oral vowels.

	Oral		Nasal
	Front	Back	Front	Back
Close (ATR)	i	u	ĩ	ũ
Close (RTR)	ɪ	ʊ	ɪ̃	ʊ̃
Mid (ATR)	e	o		õ
Mid (RTR)	ɛ	ɔ	ɛ̃	ɔ̃
Open (RTR)		a		ã

[edit] Tones

Wè is a tonal language and contrasts ten tones. These are indicated by superscript numbers 1 to 5, where 1 indicates the lowest tone and 5 the highest tone. Two numbers indicate a contour tone (falling or rising) that moves from the value of the first number to the value of the second. Examples of the tones are:

Tone	Number	Example
Low	1	g͡ba¹ "to scatter"
Mid	3	g͡ba³ "to destroy"
High	4	mɛ⁴ "to die"
Superhigh	5	ji⁵ "full"
Low-high rising	14	g͡bla¹⁴ "hat"
Low-superhigh rising	15	k͡plɔ̃¹⁵ "banana"
Mid-high rising	34	ɓlo³⁴ "wall"
High-superhigh rising	45	de⁴⁵ "younger brother"
High-low falling	41	g͡ba¹a⁴¹ "goat"
Mid-low falling	31	sre³¹ "penis"