Mmuock, also called Mmock in some regions, is the language of the Mmuock (Mmock) people of western

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 ...

. A

writing system A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable fo ...

is based on the

Latin script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern I ...

. Mmuock is a

tonal language Tone is the use of pitch in language to distinguish lexical or grammatical meaning – that is, to distinguish or to inflect words. All verbal languages use pitch to express emotional and other paralinguistic information and to convey emph ...

: the phrase ''a fa lèlā'' can mean at least four different things depending on the tone on the second ⟨a⟩: * a fǎ lèlā. ''she has been wrong to cry'' * a fâ lèlā. ''she will be wrong to cry'' * a fȧ lèlā. ''she hen she wants, or has, tomakes the mistake of crying'' * a fă lèlā. ''she s is in her naturemakes the mistake of crying''.

Orthography

The Mmuock

alphabet An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syllab ...

referenced herein has

notations ''Notations'' is a book that was edited and compiled by American avant-garde composer John Cage (1912–1992) with Alison Knowles and first published in 1969 by Something Else Press. The book is made up of a large collection of graphical scores, ...

for fifteen tones and forty letters.

Keyboard layouts

Some

Unix-like A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X or *nix) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, although not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Unix-li ...

operating systems such as

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, w ...

provide a
XKB
keyboard layout for the Mmuock alphabet. The keyboard layout is a variant of the layout for Cameroon English. Mmuock keyboard layout

Under Microsoft Windows, Android, the iPhone and iPad, a keyboard layout is available that use
Keyman
keyboard layouts.

Sample phrases

; Welcome : Zàlèsǣh (''to one person'') : Peì zàlèsǣh (''to more than one person'') ; Enjoy your stay : Zàlènáng (''to one person'') : Peì zàlènáng (''to more than one person'') ; How do you do? : À la ká? (''to a non-elder'') ; What’s up? (''casual'') : Ǹgálé? ; Bon appetit / Have a nice meal : À tsá Ńtsēr ; Bon voyage / Have a good journey : Qei lènda (''to one person'') : Peì qéí lènda (''to more than one person'') ; Thank you : M nkongtè wúó (''to one person'') : M nkongtè wéí (''to more than one person'') ; Thanks! : M nkongte̋

References

{{Reflist

External links

Languages of Cameroon