Kerewe, or Kerebe, is a
Bantu language
The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀) are a large family of languages spoken by the Bantu people of Central, Southern, Eastern africa and Southeast Africa. They form the largest branch of the Southern Bantoid languages.
The t ...
of
Tanzania
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands and ...
, spoken on
Ukerewe Island in
Lake Victoria
Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. With a surface area of approximately , Lake Victoria is Africa's largest lake by area, the world's largest tropical lake, and the world's second-largest fresh water lake by surface area after ...
, the largest inland island in Africa.
Kerewe phonology prohibits
vowel sequence
In phonology, hiatus, diaeresis (), or dieresis describes the occurrence of two separate vowel sounds in adjacent syllables with no intervening consonant. When two vowel sounds instead occur together as part of a single syllable, the result is c ...
s: if a vowel sequence arises in the
underlying representation of a phrase, the sequence becomes either a
long vowel
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, f ...
or a
glide followed by a long vowel in the surface representation.
Literature
n December 1877 two Anglican missionaries Shergold Smith and Mr. O’Neill were martyred on Ukerewe Island by King Lukonge. In 1868 the Missionaries of Africa, known as the White Fathers (Pères Blancs) arrived at the Lake Victoria region in 1879, and at Ukerewe island in 1880. The first attempts at Bible translation into Kerewe were some Bible stories in 1899, liturgical Gospels in 1921 and 1937 and Gospel harmony in 1930. The New Testament was translated into Kerewe by French Canadian Padri Almas Simard (1907-1954) from the White Fathers, working with several native speakers. The translation received the Imprimatur on 4th October 1945 from Bishop Anton Oomen (1876-1957), Vicar Apostolic of Mwanza. It published as Omulago Muhya, (Kikahindurwa mu Kikerewe) at the White Fathers Mission Press in Bukerewe. It included headings, footnotes and cross-references.
See also
*
Kerewe people
The Kerewe (locally: Wakerewe) are a Bantu ethnolinguistic group based on Ukerewe Island in the Tanzanian section of Lake Victoria. They speak the Kerewe language
Population
In 2012, the population of the Kerewe people was 345,147.
Arts
The Ker ...
References
* See My Language: A History of Bible Translation in East Africa by Aloo Osotsi Mojola published in 1999
Languages of Tanzania
Great Lakes Bantu languages
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