| Kissi | |
|---|---|
| Spoken in | Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone |
| Native speakers | 327,000 (1991) |
| Language family |
Niger–Congo
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | either: kss – Southern Kissi kqs – Northern Kissi |
Kissi (or Kisi) is a Mel language of West Africa, closely related to Temne of Sierra Leone. There are two dialects, northern and southern. The northern dialect is spoken in Guinea and in Sierra Leone. In its northern form, it often uses loanwords from the Malinke and the Mende language. The southern dialect is spoken in Liberia and Sierra Leone. The two dialects are notably different, but are closely related.
In Guinea, the main places Kissi is spoken are the cities of Kissidougou and Guéckédou and their préfectures.
Contents |
Note that this is the new orthography. The old one was used in the Kissi New Testament (1986) and many documents of the time of Sekou Toure (the first President of Guinea).
| IPA | Description | English example | Kissi examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| ɲ | Palatal nasal consonant | like French champignon or Spanish año. | ɲunaa (ask) |
| ŋ | Velar nasal consonant | as in 'song' [sɒŋ] | o kɔɛ loŋ (He went there) ŋɔŋɔndo (bullfrog) |
| ɛ | Open 'e', open-mid front unrounded vowel | as in 'elderly' [ɛldərli] | laossɛ (greeting) muɛi (knife) |
| ɔ | Open 'o', open-mid back rounded vowel | as in 'coin' [kɔɪn] | mɔmɔ (rice) kɔɛ (to go) |
number one to ten in kissi
Kissidougou dialects preserve a distinction between /r/ and /l/ phonemes that have been merged as allophones in dialects south of Guéckédou. For instance, "la huŋ" means exactly the same as "ra huŋ". Also, "Thank you" is realized as "barika" around Kissidougou and "balika" south of Guéckédou.
/gb)/, the voiced labial-velar plosive [IPA-ɡ͡b] is a sound that doesn't exist in European languages. it is spoken like the beginning of a /g/ (like in "grow") and a /b/. Practice repeating 'beg' rapidly until it becomes 'gbe'. Theses are some examples:
gbaŋgbaŋ (name of a river in Kissidougou)
gbaala (outdoor kitchen)
maagbana (a city taxi)
gbɛŋgbɔ (a stool)
| Kissi pronoun | Pronunciation | English pronoun | Kissi example | English translation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| y | /i/ | I | y tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | I'm going there. |
| a | /a/ | You | a tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | You're going there. |
| o | /o/ | He/She | o tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | He's going there. |
| n | /n/ | We | n tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | We're going there. |
| la | /la/ | You (plural) | la tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | You're going there. |
| aa | /aː/ | They | aa tyo kɔlaŋ loŋ. | They're going there. |
As you can already see from these examples, verbs aren't conjugated like English verbs, but they are inflected by tone.
| Kissi pronoun | Pronunciation | English pronoun | Kissi example | English translation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ya | /ja/ | Me | o tyo ya lɔ. yɔŋgu ya ho. / k'ya ho. |
He's going to beat me. Give me that. |
| nɔm | /nɔm/ | You | y tyo nɔm lɔ. | I'm going to beat you. |
| ndu | /ndu/ | Him /Her | y tyo ndu lɔ. o tyo ndu pilɛ lɔ. |
I'm going to beat him / her. He's going to beat himself. |
| na | /na/ | Us | o tyo na lɔ. | He's going to beat us. |
| nia | /nia/ | You (plural) | o tyo nia lɔ. | He's going to beat you. |
| ndaa | /ndaː/ | Them | o tyo ndaa lɔ. | He's going to beat them. |
Definite and indefinite articles do not exist in Kissi, so "muɛi" means "the knife" as well as "a knife". If an object has to be defined (because there are more than one, for example), "this" is used:
example: muɛi coŋ - this knife
If that is not exact enough, an object is described using adjectives.
yɔŋgu ya muɛi. / k'ya muɛi. - Give me a/the knife.
yɔŋgu ya muɛi bɛndɛi. / k'ya muɛi bɛndɛi. - Give me the big knife.