Gurara language
| Gurara | |
|---|---|
| تازناتيت (Taznatit) / ⵜⴰⵣⵏⴰⵜⵉⵜ | |
| Native to | Algeria |
| Region | Gourara (wilaya of Adrar) |
Native speakers | 11,000, including Tuwat (2014)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
grr (included) |
Linguist list |
grr-gou |
| Glottolog |
tazn1238[2] |
|
Map of the ksour of Gourara by spoken language | |
Gurara (Gourara) is the Zenati Berber language of the Gourara (Tigurarin) region, an archipelago of oases surrounding Timimoun in southwestern Algeria. Ethnologue gives it the generic name Taznatit ('Zenati'), along with Tuwat to its south; however, Blench (2006) classifies Gurara as a dialect of Mzab–Wargla, and Tuwat as a dialect of the Riff cluster.
Characteristics
Gurara and Tuwat is the only Berber language to change r in certain coda positions to a laryngeal ħ;[3] in other contexts it drops r, turning a preceding schwa into a,[4] and this latter phenomenon exists also in Zenata Rif-Berber in the far northern Morocco.
There is inconclusive evidence for Songhay influence on Gurara.[5]
Ahellil
The local tradition of ahellil poetry and music in Gurara, described in Mouloud Mammeri's L'Ahellil du Gourara,[6] has been listed as part of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO.
References
- ↑ Gurara at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Taznatit". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ René Basset, "Notes de lexicographie berbère", Journal Asiatique, ser. 8, vol. X, 1887: p. 390.
- ↑ Maarten Kossmann, "Cinq notes de linguistique historique berbère", Études et Documents Berbères, 17, 1999 : pp. 131–152
- ↑ Maarten Kossmann, "Is there a Songhay substratum in Gourara Berber?", in ed. Maarten Kossmann, Rainer Vossen, Dymitr Ibriszimow, Nouvelles études berbères: Le verbe et autres articles, Rüdiger Köppe: Köln 2004, pp. 51–66.
- ↑ Mouloud Mammeri, L ‘Ahellil du Gourara, M.S.H.:Paris 1984.