| Bala | |
|---|---|
| Lobala | |
| Native to | Democratic Republic of the Congo |
Native speakers | (60,000 Lobala cited 2000)[1] 21,000 Boko (no date)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Either:loq – Lobalabkp – Iboko |
| Glottolog | loba1239 Lobalaboko1263 Boko |
C16[2] | |
Bala (Lobala) is aBantu language of theDemocratic Republic of the Congo. According to Maho (2009), it includesBoko (Iboko).[2]
Bala is spoken in the northwest corner of the Democratic Republic of the Congo west of theCongo River by about 60,000 people. Most of these are not monolingual, but the language is being passed on to the next generation, especially in more remote areas.Ethnologue classifies the language as "vigorous", meaning that it is sustainable.[3]
There are four dialects of Bala: Likoka, Poko (Iboko), South Lobala, and Tanda.[3]
Like many languages in theBenue-Congo group, Bala forms negatives by adding an affix to theverbal phrase. However, Bala is unusual in that it adds two affixes to form negatives. These are added as a prefix and a suffix to thesubject affix. For example,
Here thete and theik elements are the double affixes indicating negation, attached to theba affix indicating third party plural. Thetub element is the verb "to sing" and theaka affix indicates thepast tense.[4]
In a similar way thet andiká negation elements are affixed to the verbal affix elementa (indicating third person singular).[5]
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