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Ki-ka-ku
The Mende Kikakui script is a syllabary used for writing the Mende language of Sierra Leone. History It was devised by Mohamed Turay (born ca. 1850), an Islamic scholar, at a town called Maka (Barri Chiefdom, southern Sierra Leone). One of Turay's Quranic students was a young Kuranko man named Kisimi Kamara. Kamara was the grandson of Turay's sister. Kamara also married Turay's daughter, Mariama. Turay devised a form of writing called 'Mende Abajada' (meaning 'Mende alphabet'), which was inspired in part by the Arabic abjad and in part by the Vai syllabary. Some scholars have also suggested that some of the characters were inspired by certain indigenous Mende pictograms and cryptographic characters that are widely known to the Mende people. Turay's "Mende Abajada" was adjusted a bit (order of characters) by Kamara and probably corresponds to the first 42 characters of the script, which is an abugida. Kamara developed the script further with help from his brothers, adding mor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mende People
The Mende are one of the two largest ethnic groups in Sierra Leone; their neighbours, the Temne people, constitute the largest ethnic group at 35.5% of the total population, which is slightly larger than the Mende at 31.2%. The Mende are predominantly found in the Southern Province and the Eastern Province. The Mende are mostly farmers and hunters. Some of the major cities with significant Mende populations include Bo, Kenema, Kailahun, and Moyamba. Like a majority of African nations, Sierra Leone's political parties are often tied to specific ethnic groups and have been dominated by the Mende, on the one hand, and the Temne and their long-time political allies, the Limba people (Sierra Leone), Limba, on the other. The Mende are known to typically support the Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP), while the Temnes and Limbas are associated with the All People's Congress party (APC). History Regional warfare throughout the 19th century led to the capture and sale of many M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kisimi Kamara
Kisimi Kamara (1890–1962) was a simple village tailor from Sierra Leone who gave his people the gift of writing. He invented the Mende syllabary in 1921. Early life Kisimi Kamara was born in 1890 in the village of Vaama, Pujehun District in the Southern Province of Sierra Leone to a Kuranko father and a Mandingo mother. His parents had long lived in the Pujehun District, a Mende predominant district. As a child Kisimi had no access to Western education, where he could have learned English. Instead his parents sent him Arabic language school under the local Karamoko, but his fellow villagers knew him as a man of unusual intelligence and energy. Kisimi had seen how the British had taken over the country and subjected the chiefs to their will. He felt that the white man's power derived, to some extent, from his ability to read and write, and he vowed that his own people should have the same ability. In 1921, Kisimi was inspired by a dream or vision. He shut himself up alone ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Writing Systems Of Africa
The writing systems of Africa refer to the current and historical practice of writing systems on the African continent, both indigenous and those introduced. Today, the Latin script is commonly encountered across Africa, especially in the Western, Central and Southern Africa regions. Arabic script is mainly used in North Africa and Ge'ez script is widely used in the Horn of Africa. Regionally and in some localities, other scripts may be of significant importance. Indigenous writing systems Ancient African orthographies Ancient Egyptian Perhaps the most famous African writing system is ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. These developed later into forms known as Hieratic, Demotic and, through Phoenician and Greek, Coptic. The Coptic language is still used today as the liturgical language in the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria and the Coptic Catholic Church of Alexandria. As mentioned above, the Bohairic dialect of Coptic is used currently in the Coptic Orthodox Church. Other ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mende Language
Mende (''Mɛnde yia'') is a major language of Sierra Leone, with some speakers in neighboring Liberia and Guinea. It is spoken by the Mende people and by other ethnic groups as a regional lingua franca in southern Sierra Leone. In southern Sierra Leone, it is the regional lingua franca that allows all tribes to communicate. Mende is a tonal language belonging to the Mande language family. Early systematic descriptions of Mende were by F. W. Migeod and Kenneth Crosby. Written forms In 1921, Kisimi Kamara invented a syllabary for Mende he called Kikakui (𞠂𞠁𞠀 / ). The script achieved widespread use for a time, but has largely been replaced with an alphabet based on the Latin script, and the Mende script is considered a "failed script". The Bible was translated into Mende and published in 1959, in Latin script. The Latin-based alphabet is: a, b, d, e, ɛ, f, g, gb, h, i, j, k, kp, l, m, n, ny, o, ɔ, p, s, t, u, v, w, y. Mende has seven ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone,)]. officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered by Liberia to the southeast and Guinea surrounds the northern half of the nation. Covering a total area of , Sierra Leone has a tropical climate, with diverse environments ranging from savanna to rainforests. The country has a population of 7,092,113 as of the 2015 census. The capital and largest city is Freetown. The country is divided into five administrative regions, which are subdivided into Districts of Sierra Leone, 16 districts. Sierra Leone is a constitutional republic with a unicameral parliament and a directly elected executive president, president serving a five-year term with a maximum of two terms. The current president is Julius Maada Bio. Sierra Leone is a Secular state, secular nation with Constitution of Sierra Leone, the constitution providing for the separation of state and religion and freedom of conscience (which includes freedom of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quran
The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Classical Arabic, Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation in Islam, revelation from God in Islam, God. It is organized in 114 surah, chapters (pl.: , sing.: ), which consist of āyah, verses (pl.: , sing.: , construct case, cons.: ). In addition to its religious significance, it is widely regarded as the finest work in Arabic literature, and has significantly influenced the Arabic language. Muslims believe that the Quran was orally revealed by God to the Khatam an-Nabiyyin, final prophet, Muhammad in Islam, Muhammad, through the archangel Gabriel incrementally over a period of some 23 years, beginning in the month of Ramadan, when Muhammad was 40; and concluding in 632, the year of his death. Muslims regard the Quran as Muhammad's most important miracle; a proof of his prophethood; and the culmination of a series of divine message ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kuranko
The Kuranko, also called Koranko, Kolanko, Kooranko, Koronko, Kouranko, Kulanko, Kurako, Kuronko, Kuranké, or Karanko, are a Mande people living in Guinea and Sierra Leone. The Koranko occupy a large section in a mountainous region within northeastern Sierra Leone and southern Guinea. Within this geographical region, different dialects, as well as distinct social groupings can be found. In general, the Koranko are a peaceful people who have maintained a separate ethnic identity, despite years of tribal mixings. Each Kuranko village is led by a chief and a group of elders. The Koranko speak the Kuranko language (or Koranko), a dialect of the Mande branch of the Niger–Congo language family. The Kuranko are nominally an Islamic people, but many people in this isolated area still follow traditional religious beliefs, identifying as Muslim without adhering to all the strict protocols of that religion. The Kuranko speak a language similar to the Manding languages, and their language ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Syllabary
In the linguistic study of written languages, a syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent the syllables or (more frequently) moras which make up words. A symbol in a syllabary, called a syllabogram, typically represents an (optional) consonant sound (simple onset) followed by a vowel sound (nucleus)—that is, a CV or V syllable—but other phonographic mappings, such as CVC, CV- tone, and C (normally nasals at the end of syllables), are also found in syllabaries. Types A writing system using a syllabary is ''complete'' when it covers all syllables in the corresponding spoken language without requiring complex orthographic / graphemic rules, like implicit codas ( ⇒ /C1VC2/) silent vowels ( ⇒ /C1V1C2/) or echo vowels ( ⇒ /C1V1C2/). This loosely corresponds to ''shallow'' orthographies in alphabetic writing systems. ''True'' syllabograms are those that encompass all parts of a syllable, i.e. initial onset, medial nucleus and final coda, but since onset and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abjad
An abjad (, ar, أبجد; also abgad) is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with other alphabets, which provide graphemes for both consonants and vowels. The term was introduced in 1990 by Peter T. Daniels. Other terms for the same concept include: partial phonemic script, segmentally linear defective phonographic script, consonantary, consonant writing, and consonantal alphabet.Amalia E. Gnanadesikan (2017) Towards a typology of phonemic scripts, Writing Systems Research, 9:1, 14-35, DOI: 10.1080/17586801.2017.1308239 "Daniels (1990, 1996a) proposes the name abjad for these scripts, and this term has gained considerable popularity. Other terms include partial phonemic script (Hill, 1967), segmentally linear defective phonographic script (Faber, 1992), consonantary (Trigger, 2004), consonant writing (Coulmas, 1989) and consonantal alphabet (Gnanadesikan, 2009; Healey, 1990). " Impure abja ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vai Syllabary
The Vai syllabary is a syllabary, syllabic writing system devised for the Vai language by Momolu Duwalu Bukele of Jondu, in what is now Grand Cape Mount County, Liberia. Bukele is regarded within the Vai (ethnic group), Vai community, as well as by most scholars, as the syllabary's inventor and chief promoter when it was first documented in the 1830s. It is one of the two most successful indigenous scripts in West Africa in terms of the number of current users and the availability of literature written in the script, the other being N'Ko script, N'Ko. Structure of the script Vai is a syllabic script written from left to right that represents CV syllables; a final nasal is written with the same glyph as the Vai syllabic nasal. Originally there were separate glyphs for syllables ending in a nasal, such as ''don,'' with a long vowel, such as ''soo,'' with a diphthong, such as ''bai,'' as well as ''bili'' and ''sɛli.'' However, these have been dropped from the modern script. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Syllabary
In the linguistic study of written languages, a syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent the syllables or (more frequently) moras which make up words. A symbol in a syllabary, called a syllabogram, typically represents an (optional) consonant sound (simple onset) followed by a vowel sound (nucleus)—that is, a CV or V syllable—but other phonographic mappings, such as CVC, CV- tone, and C (normally nasals at the end of syllables), are also found in syllabaries. Types A writing system using a syllabary is ''complete'' when it covers all syllables in the corresponding spoken language without requiring complex orthographic / graphemic rules, like implicit codas ( ⇒ /C1VC2/) silent vowels ( ⇒ /C1V1C2/) or echo vowels ( ⇒ /C1V1C2/). This loosely corresponds to ''shallow'' orthographies in alphabetic writing systems. ''True'' syllabograms are those that encompass all parts of a syllable, i.e. initial onset, medial nucleus and final coda, but since onset and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abugida
An abugida (, from Ge'ez language, Ge'ez: ), sometimes known as alphasyllabary, neosyllabary or pseudo-alphabet, is a segmental Writing systems#Segmental writing system, writing system in which consonant-vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel notation is secondary. This contrasts with a full alphabet, in which vowels have status equal to consonants, and with an abjad, in which vowel marking is absent, Abjad#Impure abjads, partial, or optional (although in less formal contexts, all three types of script may be termed alphabets). The terms also contrast them with a syllabary, in which the symbols cannot be split into separate consonants and vowels. Related concepts were introduced independently in 1948 by James Germain Février (using the term ) and David Diringer (using the term ''semisyllabary''), then in 1959 by Fred Householder (introducing the term ''pseudo-alphabet''). The Ethiopian Semitic languages, Ethiopic term "abugi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
