Lendu language
Nilo-Saharan language spoken in DR Congo From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lendu language is a Central Sudanic language spoken by the Balendru, an ethno-linguistic agriculturalist group residing in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo in the area west and northwest of Lake Albert, specifically the Ituri Province. It is one of the most populous of the Central Sudanic languages. There are three-quarters of a million Lendu speakers in the DRC. A conflict between the Lendu and the Hema was the basis of the Ituri conflict.[2]
| Lendu | |
|---|---|
| Balendru | |
| Native to | Democratic Republic of Congo |
| Ethnicity | Lendu, Hema, Alur, Okebu |
Native speakers | (760,000, including Ndrulo cited 1996)[1] |
Nilo-Saharan?
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | led |
| Glottolog | lend1245 |
| Linguasphere | 03-BAD |
Besides the Balendru, Lendu is spoken as a native language by a portion of the Hema, Alur, and Okebu. In Uganda, the Lendu tribe live in the districts of Nebbi and Zombo districts, northwest of Lake Albert.[citation needed]
Names
Ethnologue gives Bbadha as an alternate name of Lendu, but Blench (2000) lists Badha as a distinct language. A draft listing of Nilo-Saharan languages, available from his website and dated 2012, lists Lendu/Badha.
Phonology
Vowels
Consonants
| Labial | Dental/ Alveolar |
Post- alveolar |
Palatal | Velar | Labial- velar |
Glottal | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| central | sibilant | ||||||||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | (ŋ) | |||||
| Stop/ Affricate |
voiceless | p | t | t͡s | t͡ʃ | k | k͡p | ʔ | |
| voiced | b | d | d͡z | d͡ʒ | ɟ | ɡ | ɡ͡b | ||
| prenasal | ᵐb | ⁿd | ᶮd͡ʒ | ᵑɡ | ᵑᵐɡ͡b | ||||
| vl. implosive | ɓ̥ | ɗ̥ | ʄ̊ | ||||||
| vd. implosive | ɓ | ɗ | ʄ | ||||||
| Fricative | voiceless | f | θ | s | ʃ | h | |||
| voiced | v | ð | z | ʒ | |||||
| prenasal | ⁿz | ||||||||
| Rhotic | r | ɽ | |||||||
| Approximant | plain | l | j | w | |||||
| glottalized | ʼw | ||||||||
- [ŋ] is mainly heard as an allophone of /n/ when preceding velar consonants.
Implosives
Demolin (1995)[3] posits that Lendu has voiceless implosives, /ɓ̥ ɗ̥ ʄ̊/ (/ƥ ƭ ƈ/). However, Goyvaerts (1988)[4] had described these as creaky-voiced implosives /ɓ̰ ɗ̰ ʄ̰/, as in Hausa, contrasting with a series of modally voiced implosives /ɓ ɗ ʄ/ as in Kalabari, and Ladefoged judges that this seems to be a more accurate description.[5]
References
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