Rendille (also known as Rendile, Randile) is an

Afro-Asiatic The Afroasiatic languages (also known as Afro-Asiatic, Afrasian, Hamito-Semitic, or Semito-Hamitic) are a language family (or "phylum") of about 400 languages spoken predominantly in West Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and parts of th ...

language spoken by the Rendille people inhabiting northern

Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...

. It is part of the family's

Cushitic The Cushitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They are spoken primarily in the Horn of Africa, with minorities speaking Cushitic languages to the north in Egypt and Sudan, and to the south in Kenya and Tanzania. As of 2 ...

branch.Ethnologue - Rendille
/ref> The Ariaal sub-group of the Rendille, who are of mixed

Nilotic The Nilotic peoples are peoples Indigenous people of Africa, indigenous to South Sudan and the Nile Valley who speak Nilotic languages. They inhabit South Sudan and the Gambela Region of Ethiopia, while also being a large minority in Kenya, Uga ...

and Cushitic descent, speak the

Nilo-Saharan The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of around 210 African languages spoken by somewhere around 70 million speakers, mainly in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers, including historic Nubia, north of where the two tributari ...

Samburu language Samburu is a Maa language dialect spoken by Samburu pastoralists in northern Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya ...

of the Samburu Nilotes, near whom they live.

Phonology

Consonants

* /tɕ/ can be heard as �by some speakers. * Some speakers always pronounce /x/ as a uvular stop * �can be heard as a free variant of /ħ/, or when /ħ/ is heard in intervocalic position. * Voiced sounds become voiceless when in word-final position. * /b/ can be pronounced as when preceding /ħ/, or as a fricative �in intervocalic position. * /r/ can also freely be devoiced as ̥in word-initial position, and is always heard as devoiced in word-final position. * /d̪/ can freely be heard as an affricate ̪ð and can also be heard as a fricative �in intervocalic position. * /x/ can also be heard as an affricate χwhen following nasal sounds.

Vowels

* Vowels /i, u, e, o/ are commonly heard as lax �, ʊ, ɛ, ɔ

Notes

References

* Harold C. Fleming
"Baiso and Rendille: Somali Outliers"
''Rassegna di Studi Etiopici'', 20 (1964), pp. 35–96. * Antoinette Oomen. 1981. "Gender and Plurality in Rendille," ''Afroasiatic Linguistics'' 8:35-75. * Steve Pillinger & Letiwa Galboran. 1999. ''A Rendille Dictionary, Including a Grammatical Outline and an English-Rendille Index''. Cushitic Language Studies Volume 14. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag. * Heine, Bernd. 1976. ''Notes on the Rendille Language''. In Afrika und Übersee LIX. 176-223 * Günther Schlee. 1978. ''Sprachliche Studien zum Rendille''. Hamburger Philologische Studien 46. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag. * Ronald J. Sim. 1981. "Morphophonemics of the Verb in Rendille," ''Afroasiatic Linguistics'' 8:1-33. Omo–Tana languages Languages of Kenya {{Kenya-stub