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Impact of Pular on the Kakabe Language (Futa Jallon, Guinea)

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Impact of Pular on the Kakabe Language (Futa Jallon, Guinea) IMPACT OF PULAR ON THE KAKABE LANGUAGE (FUTA JALLON, GUINEA) Valentin Vydrin Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography, St. Petersburg. Russian Academy of Sciences Alexandra Vydrina St. Petersburg State University 1. Kakabe language: general information1 Kakabe is a minor language belonging to the Mokole group of the Mande family (Niger- Congo phylum). It is spoken by a dispersed ethnic group in the central part of Futa Jallon (Guinea). The closest relative of Kakabe is Mogofin (Mɔ̀gɔfín, lit. “Black person”, also known under its Soso name Mìxìfórɛ̀ ), a language spoken to the south of Boke, in the extreme north-west of Guinea. Speakers of Kakabe sometimes consider their language and Mogofin as dialects of a single language (which has no common name); they have 88% of common vocabulary in the Swadesh 100-word list. Two other languages of the Mokole group, Koranko and Lele, are spoken far to the south, in the Guinea Forestière Region of the Republic of Guinea and in Sierra Leone (see Vydrine et al. 2000-2010 for maps). So Kakabe speakers have no direct contacts with the speakers of closely related languages. Instead, they live in daily contact with the politically and socially dominant Pular language; the influence of the second largest language of Guinea, Maninka, is also very visible. The name “Kakabe” (more precisely, Kakkaɓe) can be translated from Pular as ‘non-Fulbe population of a land governed by Fulbe’. Kakabe translate it into their own language and into Maninka as Fúla jɔ̀n ‘slaves of Fulbe’. They have no other name for themselves or for their language. This circumstance reflects the fact that since the jihad performed by Islamized Fulbe in the 18th century, Kakabe (alongside Jalonke and some Maninka) found themselves in 1 The current study is a part of the project “Elaboration of automatic text glossing for languages with grammatical tones: Mande language family” supported by a grant of the Section of Language and Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences (the program “Text in interaction with the sociocultural milieu: levels of historical, literary, and linguistic interpretation”, 2009-2011).We are thankful to Antonina Koval for her numerous comments and corrections concerning presentation of Pular forms, their origin, and many others. Journal of language contact – THEMA 3 (2010) www. jlc-journal.org Downloaded from Brill.com10/01/2021 12:40:52AM via free access Impact of Pular on the Kakabe language 87 a subordinate position toward the conquerors. Those who refused to become subjugated to the Fulbe migrated to the West; Mogofin are their descendants.2 It is highly probable that the ancestors of Kakabe and Mogofin (and, probably, speakers of other Mokole languages, now extinct) were among the most ancient inhabitants of Futa Jallon, so that today’s Kakabe and Mogofin are just remainders of a much more important language community (or rather a language continuum). Until very recently, Mokole languages, and especially Kakabe, were profoundly neglected by linguists. Only Koranko has a grammar and a dictionary (Kastenholz 1987a, 1987b). There is a M.A. thesis by Jacqueline Janse on Mogofin, Het Mixiforé: een sociolinguistische en grammaticale analyse (1996), and the very first publication on Lele appeared a year ago (Vydrine 2009). The very existence of Kakabe had passed practically unnoticed, seemingly because it was usually taken for Maninka.4 The two languages are relatively close to each other; Kakabe and Maninka villages are often intermingled; Kakabe and Maninka occupy the same social niche in Futa Jallon, etc. Of late, the Kakabe language has attracted some interest from specialists. A couple of years ago, Kakabe language data were collected (but have not yet been published) by Abdourahmane Diallo; his observations concerning Mande influence on Pular were published in Diallo (2008).5 In 2001, Valentin Vydrin visited Sokotoro village for the first time, where he collected some lexical and grammatical data. These data were analyzed by Alexandra Vydrina in 2005- 2007, and in January-February 2008 she made her first field trip to Guinea. As a result, further data for the Sokotoro dialect of Kakabe were collected and analyzed. In January 2009, both authors undertook a field trip to the Saajoya village, in the Kankalabé subdivision, Dalaba district, and Alexandra collected data for this dialect too. During that trip, we also visited the Kuru-Maninka area, which made it possible to clarify the linguistic status of that variety. Some results of Alexandra’s studies are published in her recent paper in Mandenkan (Vydrina 2008); there is also a publication in Russian (Vydrina 2007). 2. Current situation of the Kakabe language The number of Kakabe speakers is unknown: being bilingual in Pular, they are very often taken by outsiders for Fulbe and not taken into account in population censuses as a separate community. According to our field data, Kakabe villages form two relatively compact areas: one is to the east of Timbo (it is represented on the SIL map, Vydrine et al. (2000-2010); the map is based on the information provided to Valentin Vydrin by elders of the Sokotoro village in 2001), the other one is about 100 km to the north-west from the former area, in the Kankalabé subdivision of the Dalaba district.6 2 For the Mogofin side of that story, see N’Daou (1999). 4 See for instance Voeltz (1996: 14): “Kakabe: argot de pular et maninkakan parlé à Mamou”. In the same publication, about Mogofin (p. 23): “Mɔ̀xɔ̀ fíɲɛ̀… est parlée dans deux régions, i.e. Boké … et Timbo (à Sokotoro). La langue semble être un dialecte du maninkakan”. 5 We are grateful to Abdourahmane Diallo for sharing information concerning Kakabe villages in the Kankalabé sousprefecture, which proved to be very helpful in our field trip of 2009. 6 Here is the list of the Kakabe villages of that area: Bóorìyá, Fítàdalá 2, Gúnbànbé, Mànsaya, Mìngiya, Modiya, Nasurullayi, Sàajoya, Sangarare, Sèlibaya, Wánsàn. The villages of Sàmayá and Kàrúngàyá have mixed Fulbe and Kakabe population. There are also several villages further to the East, on the left bank of the Donbele river, which are considered as populated by ethnic Kakabe who have lost their language and speak only Pular: Jataya, Kokkoya, Kɔnkɔrɛn, Niga, Sanbaya, Wɛndu. Journal of language contact – THEMA 3 (2010) www. jlc-journal.org Downloaded from Brill.com10/01/2021 12:40:52AM via free access 88 Vydrin and Vydrina Between these two zones, there is a pocket of Kuru-Maninka population.7 In January 2009, we briefly visited the Julala village and collected Maurice Swadesh’s 100-word list (plus some phrases), which made us sure that the “Kuru-Maninka language” should be considered as a variety of Kakabe, intermediate between the dialects of Kankalabé (Saajoya) and Sokotoro. The fourth Kakabe zone is that of “Wure-Maninka”. Its center is the village of Kaba (or Wure-Kaba) on the road Mamou-Faranah, 65 km to the east of Mamou.8 We visited Kaba shortly in January 2010 and found out that, despite their autoethnonyme, Wure-Maninka speak a variety of Kakabe. Although bilingualism in Pular is omnipresent among the Kakabe, its impact seems to be uneven. In the Kankalabé and Wure-Kaba areas, the Kakabe language holds its position and is widely used by both younger and older generations, hence the better integrity of the original vocabulary.9 In Sokotoro, the Pular impact on Kakabe is much stronger: Pular is considered a more prestigious language here, and many ethnic Kakabe (especially young people) speak Pular better than their own language. In this case, a language shift is under way. Consequently, the amount of borrowing from Pular is greater in the dialect of Sokotoro than in the dialect of Saajoya. Another factor that should be taken into consideration is a wide distribution of Kakabe- Maninka bilingualism. Although much less fluent in Maninka than in Pular (especially in the Kankalabè area), the majority of Kakabe, according to our observations, can speak some Maninka. Let us try to single out the features of the Kakabe language which may have resulted from Pular influence.10 3. Phonology 3.1 Consonants The influence of Pular is especially strong in the consonantal system of Kakabe. There are consonants and types of combinations of consonants that have established in the system or have consolidated their phonological status as a result of lexical borrowings from Pular. Among these are implosives, geminates and the affricate c. 3.1.1 Implosives Implosives occur only in Pular loans. Here is the list of words from Alexandra Vydrina`s 1700-word dictionary containing implosives; the Pular source words are also provided: Kakabe Pular ɓáy, ɓá ‘when’ ɓay / ɓaa ‘when’ ɓúurɛ ‘swelling’ ɓuure ‘swelling’ bíriƴɛ ‘rib’ birɗe ‘rib’ ɗóoki ‘a plant’ ɗooki-hi ‘a wild plant’ 7 Kuru-Maninka villages are: Jùlala, Kɛnkɛɲɛba, Bɔ̀ɣɔkɔ́, Jàabilafátà, Kuren, Pɛllari, Kurabasi, Dántaatɔ, Kàtibaya, Fárafɛ̀, Kɔ̀ɛ́fɛ̀. Of these, only Jùlala, Kɛnkɛɲɛba, Bɔ̀ɣɔkɔ́ and Jàabilafátà can be found on the 1:200,000 standard map. 8 Wure-Maninka villages are: Báanɛkɔ̀rɔ, Bántàmayá, Bɔ́gɔritɔ̀, Càkanɔkɔla, Dánjan, Jánjan, Júmaya Linban, Kàbá, Nínagbɛ̀, Pɔ̀rtɔfíta, Sándankɔ̀rɔ, Séeliyà, Sɛ́bɛkɔ̀tɔ, Sìtákɔ̀tɔ́, Sɔ̀kɔrɛyá. Only Báanɛkɔ̀rɔ, Jánjan, Kàbá, Pɔ̀rtɔfíta, Sìtákɔ̀tɔ́ appear on the 1:200,000 standard map. 9 Wure-Maninka seems to be even less influenced by Pular. 10 For the comparative lexical data, the main source for the Pular data is Bettison (2005); Zoubko (1996) is also used. Journal of language contact – THEMA 3 (2010) www. jlc-journal.org Downloaded from Brill.com10/01/2021 12:40:52AM via free access Impact of Pular on the Kakabe language 89 géeƴe ‘evening prayer’ geeƴe ‘evening prayer’ kírɗɛ ‘be funny’ kirɗe ‘be funny’ sáɗɛ ‘dress up’ saɗ-a ‘dress up’ sáɗɗɔndirɛ ‘get entangled’ saddindir-a11 ‘get tangled up’ sɛ́ɛɗa ‘small’ seeɗa ‘small’ hɔ́ɗe ‘village’ hoɗo ‘village’ hɔ́ɗi ‘to live’ hoɗ-a ‘to live, to reside’ ŋálɗɛ ‘be surprised’ ŋalɗ-a ‘be surprised’ Some of the words containing implosives in our dictionary are attested only in the dialect of Sokotoro and not in the Saajoya variety.
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