Dinka language

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This article is about the language, for the ethnic group see Dinka.

Not to be confused with Mandinka language.
Dinka
Thuɔŋjäŋ
Pronunciation [t̪uɔŋ.ɟa̤ŋ]
Native to South Sudan and neighboring areas
Ethnicity Dinka people
Native speakers
 unknown (1.4 million cited 1982–1986; some figures undated)[1]
Latin alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-2 din
ISO 639-3 din – inclusive code
Individual codes:
dip – Northeastern (Padang)
diw – Northwestern (Ruweng)
dib – South Central (Agar)
dks – Southeastern (Bor, Twic, Nyarweng & Hol)
dik – Southwestern (Rek & Twic)

Dinka, or Thuɔŋjäŋ, is a Nilotic dialect cluster spoken by the Dinka people, the major ethnic group of South Sudan. There are five main varieties, Ngok, Rek, Agaar, Twic/Twi East, and Bor, which are distinct enough to require separate literary standards and thus to be considered separate languages. Jaang or Jieng is used as a general term to cover all Dinka languages. Rek is the standard and prestige dialect.

The closest non-Dinka language is Nuer, the language of the Dinka's traditional rivals. The Luo languages are also closely related.

The Dinka are found mainly along the Nile, specifically the west bank of the White Nile, a major tributary flowing north from Uganda, north and south of the Sudd marsh in southwestern and south central Sudan in three provinces: Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile, and Southern Kurdufan.

Linguistic features

See also: Dinka alphabet

Phonology

There are 20 consonant phonemes:

Labial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar
Nasal m n̪ n ɲ ŋ
Plosive pb t̪d̪ td cɟ kɡ
Fricative ɣ
Rhotic ɾ
Approximant l j w

Dinka has a rich vowel system, with at least thirteen phonemically contrastive vowels. The underdots ([◌̤]) indicate "breathy" vowels, represented in Dinka orthography by diaereses (⟨◌̈⟩):

Front Back
plain breathy plain breathy
Close i i̤ u
Close-mid e e̤ o o̤
Open-mid ɛ ɛ̤ ɔ ɔ̤
Open a a̤

There may be other distinctions. The Dinka southeastern dialect is known to contrast modal voice, breathy voice, faucalized voice, and harsh voice in its vowels, in addition to its three tones. The ad hoc diacritics employed in the literature are a subscript double quotation mark for faucalized voice, [a͈], and an underline for harsh voice, [a].[2] Examples are:

Voicemodalbreathyharshfaucalized
Bor Dinka tɕìt̪tɕì̤t̪tɕìt̪tɕì͈t̪
Meaning diarrheago aheadscorpionsto swallow

Morphology

This language exhibits vowel ablaut or apophony, the change of internal vowels (similar to English goose/geese, though this is historically an umlaut):[3]

Singular Plural gloss vowel alternation
dom dum 'field/fields' (o–u)
kat kɛt 'frame/frames' (a–ɛ)

Tones

Dinka is a tonal language.

Dialects of Dinka

Linguists divide Dinka into five languages or dialect clusters corresponding to their geographic location with respect to each other:

Northeastern and western: Abiliang, Nyiël, Dongjol, Luäc, Ngok Lual Yak, Ageer, Rut, Thoi, Alor, Ngók Deng Kuol, Panaru, and Paweny. South Central: Aliap, Ciëc, Gok, and Agar Southeastern: Bor, Hol, Nyaarweng, and Twïc

Southwestern: Rek, Abiëm, Aguók, Apuk, Awan, Kuac, Lóu, Luäc/Luänyjang, Malual (Malualgiėrnyang), Paliët, Paliëupiny, Twïc

See Ethnologue online map of Sudan for locations of dialects.

Writing Dinka

Main article: Dinka alphabet

Dinka has been written with several Latin alphabets since the early 20th century. The current alphabet is:

a ä b c d dh e ë ɛ ɛ̈ g ɣ i ï j k l m n nh ny ŋ t th u w o ö ɔ ɔ̈ p r y

Variants in other alphabets include:

Current letter Alternatives
ɛ
 ė ("e" with a dot on top)
ɣ
 h, x, q
ŋ
 ng
ɔ
 ȯ ("o" with a dot on top)

See also

References

  1. ↑ Dinka reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
    Northeastern (Padang) reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
    Northwestern (Ruweng) reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
    South Central (Agar) reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
    Southeastern (Bor, Twic, Nyarweng & Hol) reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
    Southwestern (Rek & Twic) reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
  2. ↑ Edmondson, Jerold A.; John H. Esling (2005). The valves of the throat and their functioning in tone, vocal register, and stress: laryngoscopic case studies. 
  3. ↑ After Bauer 2003:35

Other resources

  • Andersen T. (1987). "The phonemic system of Agar Dinka". Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 9, 1–27.
  • Andersen T. (1990). "Vowel length in Western Nilotic languages". Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 22, 5–26.
  • Andersen T. (1991). "Subject and topic in Dinka". Studies in Language 15, 265–294.
  • Andersen T. (1993). "Vowel quality alternation in Dinka verb inflection". Phonology 10, 1–42.
  • Beltrame, G. (1870). Grammatica della lingua denka. Firenze: G. Civelli.
  • Deng, Makwei Mabioor (2010). Piööcku Thuoŋjäŋ: The Elementary Modern Standard Dinka (Multilingual Edition), Xlibris, ISBN 1-4500-5240-1.
  • Malou, Job. (1988) Dinka Vowel System. Summer Institute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington Publications in Linguistics. ISBN 0-88312-008-9.
  • Mitterrutzner, J. C. (1866). Die Dinka-Sprache in Central-Afrika; Kurze Grammatik, Text und Worterbuch. Brixen: A. Weger.
  • Nebel, A. (1979). Dinka–English, English–Dinka dictionary. 2nd. ed. Editrice Missionaria Italiana, Bologna.
  • Nebel, A. (1948). Dinka Grammar (Rek-Malual dialect) with texts and vocabulary. Instituto Missioni Africane, Verona.
  • Trudinger. R. (1942–44). English-Dinka Dictionary. Sudan Interior Mission
  • Tuttle. Milet Picture Dictionary English-Dinka. (at WorldLanguage.com)

External links

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