Kw'adza language

Kw'adza
Ngomvia
Native to Tanzania
Region Mbulu District
Extinct late 20th century
Afro-Asiatic?
Language codes
ISO 639-3 wka
Glottolog kwad1248[1]

Kw'adza (Qwadza) is an extinct Afroasiatic language formerly spoken in Tanzania in the Mbulu District. The last speaker died sometime between 1976 and 1999.[2] It is poorly attested, and apart from perhaps being close to Aasax, its classification is not certain; although it has a large number of identifiably Cushitic roots, the numerals itame 'one' and be'a ~ mbɛa 'two', for example, suggest a connection with Hadza.

Phonology

The phonology is not certain, but the following has been suggested (Ehret 1980):

mn ɲŋ
bd ɡɡʷ
pt kʔ
tsʼtɬʼtʃʼkʼʷ
fsɬ xh
β̞dzlj

/ɡ/ and /l/ have the allophones [dʒ] and [ɽ] before front vowels. /tʃʼ/ is 'mildly' ejective. Ehret reports that /kʼ/ and /kʼʷ/ are voiced [ɡ, ɡʷ] if a preceding consonant is voiced.

Vowels are /a e i o u/.

Notes

  1. Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Kw'adza". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
  2. Raymond G. Gordon, Jr, ed. 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.

References

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