Tera language

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Tera
Region Nigeria
Native speakers
101,000  (2000)[1]
Afro-Asiatic
Dialects
Pidlimdi (Hinna)
Language codes
ISO 639-3 ttr

Tera is a Chadic dialect cluster spoken in north-eastern Nigeria in the north and eastern parts of Gombe State and Borno State.[2] Blench (2006) believes Pidlimdi (Hinna) dialect is a separate language.[3]

Phonology

Consonants[4]
Labial Alveolar Palatal or
postalveolar
Velar Glottal
Plain Palatalized Central Lateral Plain Labialized
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Stop Voiceless1 p t2 2 k
Voiced b d2 2 ɡ ɡʷ
Prenasalized ᵐb ⁿd ᶮdʒ ᵑɡ ᵑɡʷ
Implosive ɓ ɓʲ ɗ ɠ
Fricative Voiceless f s ɬ ʃ x h3
Voiced v z ɮ ʒ ɣ ɣʷ
Trill r
Approximant Plain l j w
Glottalized 4
  1. Voiceless plosives are lightly aspirated but unreleased before another consonant.[5]
  2. /t/ and /d/ formally had /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ respectively as allophones but the two pairs have split; however, the alveolar plosives never precede front vowels and the postalveolar affricates rarely precede anything but front vowels.[5]
  3. /h/ is a relatively new phoneme, appearing in loanwords from English and Hausa.[5]
  4. /jˀ/ derives from a /ɗʲ/ that has lost its alveolar contact while retaining the palatal and glottal action.[5]
Vowels[6]
Front Central Back
High i iː ɨ u uː
Mid e eː o oː
Low a aː

Vowel length contrasts are neutralized in monosyllabic words with no coda consonants.[6]

All vowels but /a/ and /aː/ are more open in closed syllables such as in [ɮɛp] ('to plait') and [xʊ́r] ('to cook soup'). /a/ and /aː/ are more open when following palatalized consonants.[7]

Diphthongs, which have the same length as long vowels, consist of a non-high vowel and a high vowel:[7]

Diphthong Example Orthography Gloss
/eu/ /ɓeu/ ɓeu 'sour'
/au/ /ɮàu/ dlau 'sickle'
/ai/ /ɣài/ ghai 'town'
/oi/ /woi/ woi 'child'

Tone

Tera is a tonal language, distinguishing high, mid and low tone. Tone is not indicated orthographically since no minimal trios exist; minimal pairs can be distinguished by context.[8]

Orthography

The first publication in Tera was Labar Mbarkandu nu Yohanna Bula Ki, a translation of the Gospel of John, which established an orthographic system. In 2004, this orthographic system was revised.[2]

References

  1. Tera reference at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
  2. 2.0 2.1 Tench (2007:227)
  3. Blench, 2006. The Afro-Asiatic Languages: Classification and Reference List (ms)
  4. Tench (2007:228)
  5. 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Tench (2007:229)
  6. 6.0 6.1 Tench (2007:230)
  7. 7.0 7.1 Tench (2007:231)
  8. Tench (2007:232)

Bibliography

  • Tench, Paul (2007), "Tera", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 37 (1): 228–234 


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