| Khoekhoe | |
|---|---|
| Khoikhoi, Nama, Damara, Nama/Damara | |
| Khoekhoegowab | |
| Pronunciation | [k͡xʰo̜͡ek͡xʰo̜͡egowab] |
| Native to | Namibia,Botswana andSouth Africa |
| Region | Orange River,Great Namaland,Damaraland |
| Ethnicity | Khoikhoi,Nama,Damara,Haiǁom,ǂKhomani |
Native speakers | 200,000 ± 10,000 (2011)[1] |
Khoe–Kwadi
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Official status | |
Recognised minority language in | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Either:naq – Khoekhoe, Namahgm – Haiǁom |
| Glottolog | nort3245 Subfamily: North Khoekhoenama1264 Language: Namahaio1238 Language: Haiǁom-Akhoe |
| ELP | Khoekhoe |
 The distribution of the Nama language inNamibia | |
| This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. | |
| The Khoe language | |
|---|---|
| Person | Khoe-i |
| People | Khoekhoen |
| Language | Khoekhoegowab |
Khoekhoe orKhoikhoi (/ˈkɔɪ.kɔɪ/KOY-koy;Khoekhoegowab,Khoekhoe pronunciation:[k͡xʰo̜͡ek͡xʰo̜͡egowab]), also known by the ethnic termsNama (/ˈnɑː.mə/NAH-mə;Namagowab),[3]Damara (ǂNūkhoegowab), orNama/Damara[4][5] and formerly asHottentot,[b] is the most widespread of the non-Bantu languages of Southern Africa that make heavy use ofclick consonants and therefore were formerly classified asKhoisan, a grouping now recognized as obsolete. It belongs to theKhoe language family, and is spoken inNamibia,Botswana, andSouth Africa primarily by three ethnic groups:Namakhoen,ǂNūkhoen, andHaiǁomkhoen.
TheHaiǁom, who had spoken aJuu language, later shifted to Khoekhoe. The name for the speakers,Khoekhoen, is from the wordkhoe ('person'), withreduplication and the suffix-n to indicate the general plural.Georg Friedrich Wreede was the first European to study the language, after arriving in ǁHui!gaeb (later Cape Town) in 1659.[citation needed]
Khoekhoe is anational language inNamibia. In Namibia and South Africa, state-owned broadcasting corporations produce and broadcast radio programmes in Khoekhoe.
It is estimated that only around 167,000 speakers of Khoekhoe remain in Africa, which makes it anendangered language. In 2019, theUniversity of Cape Town ran a series of short courses teaching the language, and 21 September 2020 launched its new Khoi and San Centre. An undergraduate degree programme is being planned to be rolled out in coming years.[7][when?]
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Modern scholars generally see three dialects:
They are distinct enough that they might be considered two or three distinct languages.[citation needed]
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There are 5 vowel qualities, found as oral/ieaou/ andnasal/ĩãũ/./u/ is strongly rounded,/o/ only slightly so./a/ is the only vowel with notable allophony; it is pronounced[ə] before/i/ or/u/.
Nama has been described as having three[8] or four[9][10][11]tones,/á,ā,à/ or/a̋,á,à,ȁ/, which may occur on eachmora (vowels and finalnasal consonants). The high tone is higher when it occurs on one of the high vowels (/íú/) or on a nasal (/ńḿ/) than on mid or low vowels (/éáó/).[8]
The tones combine into a limited number of 'tone melodies' (word tones), which havesandhi forms in certain syntactic environments. The most important melodies, in their citation and main sandhi forms, are as follows:[9]
| Citation | Sandhi | Meaning | Melody |
|---|---|---|---|
| ǃ̃ˀȍm̀s | ǃ̃ˀòm̏s | butting, hitting s.t. | low |
| ǃ̃ˀȍḿs | an udder | low rising | |
| ǃ̃ˀòm̀s | forcing out of a burrow | mid | |
| ǃ̃ˀòm̋s | ǃ̃ˀòm̀s | a pollard | high rising |
| ǃ̃ˀóm̀s | ǃ̃ˀòm̏s | coagulating, prizing out [a thorn] | low falling |
| ǃ̃ˀőḿs | ǃ̃ˀóm̀s | a fist | high falling |
Within a phrase,lexical words receive greater stress thangrammatical words. Within a word, the first syllable receives the most stress. Subsequent syllables receive less and less stress and are spoken more and more quickly.
Nama has 31 consonants: 20 clicks and only 11 non-clicks.[9]
Orthography in brackets.
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m⟨m⟩ | n⟨n⟩ | ||
| Plosive | p ~β⟨b/p⟩ | t ~ɾ⟨t/d/r⟩ | k⟨k/g⟩ | ʔ⟨-⟩ |
| Affricate | t͜sʰ⟨ts⟩ | k͜xʰ⟨kh⟩ | ||
| Fricative | s⟨s⟩ | x⟨x⟩ | h⟨h⟩ |
Between vowels,/p/ is pronounced[β] and/t/ is pronounced[ɾ]. The affricate series is strongly aspirated, and may be analysed phonemically as aspirated stops; in the relatedKorana they are[tʰ,kʰ].
Beach (1938)[12] reported that the Khoekhoe of the time had avelar lateral ejective affricate,[k𝼄ʼ], a common realisation or allophone of/kxʼ/ in languages with clicks. This sound no longer occurs in Khoekhoe but remains in its cousin Korana.
Theclicks aredoubly articulated consonants. Each click consists of one of four primary articulations or "influxes" and one of five secondary articulation or "effluxes". The combination results in 20 phonemes.[13]
| accompaniment | affricated clicks | 'sharp' clicks | standardised orthography | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| dental clicks | lateral clicks | alveolar clicks | palatal clicks | ||
| Tenuis | ᵏǀ | ᵏǁ | ᵏǃ | ᵏǂ | ⟨ǃg⟩ |
| Aspirated | ᵏǀʰ | ᵏǁʰ | ᵏǃʰ | ᵏǂʰ | ⟨ǃkh⟩ |
| Nasal | ᵑǀ | ᵑǁ | ᵑǃ | ᵑǂ | ⟨ǃn⟩ |
| Aspirated nasal | ᵑ̊ǀʰ | ᵑ̊ǁʰ | ᵑ̊ǃʰ | ᵑ̊ǂʰ | ⟨ǃh⟩ |
| Glottalized nasal | ᵑ̊ǀˀ | ᵑ̊ǁˀ | ᵑ̊ǃˀ | ᵑ̊ǂˀ | ⟨ǃ⟩ |
The aspiration on the aspirated clicks is often light but is 'raspier' than the aspirated nasal clicks, with a sound approaching thech of Scottishloch. The glottalized clicks are clearly voiceless due to the hold before the release, and they are transcribed as simple voiceless clicks in the traditional orthography. The nasal component is not audible in initial position; the voiceless nasal component of the aspirated clicks is also difficult to hear when not between vowels, so to foreign ears, it may sound like a longer but less raspy version of the contour clicks.
Tindall notes that European learners almost invariably pronounce the lateral clicks by placing the tongue against the side teeth and that this articulation is "harsh and foreign to the native ear". The Nama instead cover the whole of the palate with the tongue and produce the sound "as far back in the palate as possible".[14]
Lexical root words consist of two or rarely threemoras, in the form CVCV(C), CVV(C), or CVN(C). (The initial consonant is required.) The middle consonant may only bew r m n (w isb~p andr isd~t), while the final consonant (C) may only bep, s, ts. Each mora carries tone, but the second may only be high or medium, for six tone "melodies": HH, MH, LH, HM, MM, LM.
Oral vowel sequences in CVV are/iieeaaoouuai[əi]aeaoau[əu]oaoeui/. Due to the reduced number of nasal vowels, nasal sequences are/ĩĩããũũãĩ[ə̃ĩ]ãũ[ə̃ũ]õãũĩ/. Sequences ending in a high vowel (/iiuuaiauuiĩĩũũãĩãũũĩ/) are pronounced more quickly than others (/eeaaooaeaooaoeããõã/), more like diphthongs and long vowels than like vowel sequences in hiatus. The tones are realised as contours. CVCV words tend to have the same vowel sequences, though there are many exceptions. The two tones are also more distinct.
Vowel-nasal sequences are restricted to non-front vowels:/amanomonumun/. Their tones are also realised as contours.
Grammatical particles have the form CV or CN, with any vowel or tone, where C may be any consonant but a click, and the latter cannot be NN. Suffixes and a third mora of a root, may have the form CV, CN, V, N, with any vowel or tone; there are also three C-only suffixes,-p 1m.sg,-ts 2m.sg,-s 2/3f.sg.
There have been several orthographies used for Nama.A Khoekhoegowab dictionary (Haacke 2000) uses the modern standard.
In standard orthography, the consonantsb d g are used for words with one of the lower tone melodies andp t k for one of the higher tone melodies; they are otherwise pronounced the same.W is only used between vowels, though it may be replaced withb orp according to tone. Overt tone marking is otherwise generally omitted.
| Orthography | Transcription | Melody | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| gao | /kȁó/ | low rising | 'rule' |
| kao | /kàő/ | high rising | 'be dumbfounded' |
| ǀhubu (orǀhuwu) | /ǀʰȕwú/ | low rising | 'to stop hurting' |
| ǀhupu (orǀhuwu) | /ǀʰùwű/ | high rising | 'to get out of breath' |
Nasal vowels are written with a circumflex. All nasal vowels are long, as inhû/hũ̀ṹ/ 'seven'. Long (double) vowels are otherwise written with a macron, as inā/ʔàa̋/ 'to cry, weep'; these constitute two moras (two tone-bearing units).
A glottal stop is not written at the beginning of a word (where it is predictable), but it is transcribed with a hyphen in compound words, such asgao-aob/kȁòʔòȁp/ 'chief'.
The clicks are written with theLepsius letters that were later adopted as IPA symbols. The basic (tenuis) clicks are:
Sometimes ASCII characters are substituted, e.g. thehash (#) in place of ǂ.[15]
Nama has asubject–object–verb word order, threenouns classes (masculine/gu-class, feminine/di-class andneuter/n-class) and threegrammatical numbers (singular, dual andplural). Pronominalenclitics are used to mark person, gender, and number on thenoun phrases.
| Singular | Dual | Plural | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feminine/Di-class | Piris | Pirira | Piridi | goat |
| Masculine/Gu-class | Arib | Arikha | Arigu | dog |
| Neutral/N-class | Khoe-i | Khoera | Khoen | people |
The PGN (person-gender-number) markers areencliticpronouns that attach tonoun phrases.[16] The PGN markers distinguish first, second, and thirdperson, masculine, feminine, and neutergender, and singular, dual, and pluralnumber. The PGN markers can be divided intonominative,object, andoblique paradigms.
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Singular | ta | ts | b/mi/ni | ta | s | s | — | — | -i |
| Dual | khom | kho | kha | m | ro | ra | m | ro | ra |
| Plural | ge | go | gu | se | so | di | da | du | n |
(PGN +i)
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Singular | te | tsi | bi/mi/ni | te | si | si | — | — | -i |
| Dual | khom | kho | kha | mi/im | ro | ra | mi/im | ro | ra |
| Plural | ge | go | gu | se | so | di | da | du | ni/in |
(PGN +a)
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Singular | ta | tsa | ba/ma/na | ta | sa | sa | — | — | -e |
| Dual | khoma | kho | kha | ma | ro | ra | mo | ro | ra |
| Plural | ge | go | ga | se | so | de | da | do | na |
Khoekhoe has fourdefinite articles:[16]ti,si,sa,ǁî. These definite articles can be combined with PGN markers.
Examples from Haacke (2013):
| ti | si | sa | ǁî |
|---|---|---|---|
| +definite | +definite | +definite | +definite |
| +speaker | +speaker | +addressee | +discussed |
| +human | -addressee | +human | |
| +singular | +human | ||
| -singular |
There are three clause markers, ge (declarative), kha (interrogative), and ko/km (assertive). These markers appear inmatrix clauses, and appear after the subject.[17]
Following is a sample text in the Khoekhoe language.[18]
Media related toKhoekhoe language at Wikimedia Commons| International | |
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| Other | |
