Tikar language

Tikar
Native to Cameroon
Ethnicity Tikar, Bedzan
Native speakers
110,000  (2005)[1]
Niger–Congo
  • Atlantic–Congo

    • Benue–Congo
      • (unclassified)
        • Tikar
Dialects
Ndobo
Bedzan (Medzan)
Language codes
ISO 639-3 tik
Glottolog tika1246[2]

Tikar is a Benue–Congo language of uncertain classification spoken in Cameroon by the Bankim, Ngambe, and related Tikar peoples, as well as by the Bedzan Pygmies. Blench (2011) states that the little evidence available suggests that it is most closely related to the Mambiloid and Dakoid languages.

Variants of the name are Tikali, Tikar-East, Tikari, Tingkala.

A Bandobo variety (Ndobo, Ndob, Ndome) may be a separate language. Less divergent dialects are Twumwu (Tumu) in Bankim, Tige in Ngambe, Nditam, Kong, Mankim, Gambai, and Bedzan.

References

  1. Tikar at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Tikar". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.