Afade (Afaɗə) is an
Afro-Asiatic
The Afroasiatic languages (or Afro-Asiatic), also known as Hamito-Semitic, or Semito-Hamitic, and sometimes also as Afrasian, Erythraean or Lisramic, are a language family of about 300 languages that are spoken predominantly in the geographic su ...
language spoken in eastern
Nigeria
Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...
and northwestern
Cameroon
Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the C ...
.
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Classification
Afade is a member of the Biu-Mandara group of the Afro-Asiatic family of languages. It is related to the Cameroonian languages Mpade, Maslam, Malgbe, Mser, and Lagwan.
Geographic distribution
''Ethnologue''
The speakers of Afade are the indigenous Kotoko people of Cameroon and Nigeria. According to ''Ethnologue
''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensiv ...
'', in Cameroon, it is spoken in the far North region: Logone-and-Chari division, south Makari subdivision, Afade area. The language is spoken by 6,700 Cameroon speakers. In Nigeria, Afade is spoken by 40,000 speakers in Borno State
Borno State is a state in the North-East geopolitical zone of Nigeria, bordered by Yobe to the west, Gombe to the southwest, and Adamawa to the south while its eastern border forms part of the national border with Cameroon, its northern border ...
, Ngala
Ngala is a local government area of Borno State, Nigeria, adjacent to the border with Cameroon. Its headquarters are in the town of Gamboru Ngala.
It has an area of 1,465 km and a population of 237,071 at the 2006 census.
The postal code ...
LGA, 12 villages. There are no known dialects.
''ALCAM'' (2012)
In Cameroon, Afade is spoken in the southern part of Makari commune, centered on the town of Afade and extending into Logone-Birni
Logone-Birni is a town and commune in Cameroon. The town lies on the left (west) bank of the Logone River which at this point forms the state boundary between Cameroon and Chad. It is the capital of the Kotoko people, whose two other principal cit ...
(Logone-et-Chari
Logone-et-Chari is a department of Extreme-Nord Province in Cameroon. The department covers an area of 12,133 km and at the 2005 Census had a total population of 486,997. The capital of the department is at Kousséri. Most inhabitants of t ...
department, Far North region). It is spoken mainly in Nigeria.
Phonology
Afade has a large inventory of consonants, including ejectives, implosives, and labial-velar stops. The vowels of Afade are /i u e ɤ o ɛ ɔ a ɑ/. /a/ is front, rather than central.[Bouny, P. 1977. Inventaire phonetique d'un parler Kotoko: le Mandagué de Mara. In Caprile, Jean-Pierre (ed.), Etudes Phonologiques Tschadiennes, 59–77. Paris: Société d'Études linguistiques et anthropologiques de France.]
Notes
References
* P. Bouny. 1977. "Inventaire phonetique d'un parler Kotoko: le Mandagué de Mara," ''Etudes Phonologiques Tschadiennes''. Ed. Jean-Pierre Caprile. Paris: SELAF. Pages 59–77.
Biu-Mandara languages
Languages of Nigeria
Languages of Cameroon
{{Cameroon-stub