Dinka language

Dinka (natively Thuɔŋjäŋ, Thuɔŋ ee Jieng or simply Jieng) is a Nilotic dialect cluster spoken by the Dinka people, the major ethnic group of South Sudan. There are several main varieties, Padang, Rek, Agaar, Hol, Twic East, Twic, Athooc and Gok, which are distinct enough (though mutually intelligible) to require separate literary standards. Jaang, Jieng or Monyjieng is used as a general term to cover all Dinka languages.

"Padang language" redirects here. For the language of Phadāng village in NE India, see Phadāng language.
Dinka
Thuɔŋjäŋ
Pronunciation[t̪uɔŋ.ɟa̤ŋ]
Native toSudan, South Sudan
EthnicityDinka people
Native speakers
1.3 million (ca. 2008-2016; some figures undated)[1]
Latin alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-2din
ISO 639-3din – inclusive code
Individual codes:
dip – Northeastern (Padang)
diw – Northwestern (Ruweng)
dib – South Central (Agar)
dks – Southeastern: Bor, which also includes

Nyarweng,

Hol, Twi
dik – Southwestern (Rek & Twic)
Glottologdink1262

The language most closely related to Dinka is the Nuer language. The Luo languages are also closely related. The Dinka vocabulary shows considerable proximity to Nubian, which is probably due to medieval interactions between the Dinka people and the kingdom of Alodia.[2]

The Dinka are found mainly along the Nile, specifically the west bank of the White Nile, a major tributary flowing north from Uganda, north and south of the Sudd marsh in South Kordofan state of Sudan as well as Bahr el Ghazal region and Upper Nile state of South Sudan.

Linguistic features
See also: Dinka alphabet

Consonants

There are 20 consonant phonemes:

Labial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar
Nasal m n̪ n ɲ ŋ
Stop pb t̪d̪ td cɟ kɡ
Fricative ɣ
Approximant
(Lateral)		 j w
l
Rhotic ɾ

Vowels

Dinka has a rich vowel system, with thirteen phonemically contrastive short vowels. There are seven vowel qualities plus a two-way distinction in phonation. The underdots, [◌̤], mark the breathy voice series, represented in Dinka orthography by diaereses, ⟨◌̈⟩. Unmarked vowels are modal or creaky voiced.

Front Back
plain breathy plain breathy
Close ii̤u
Close-mid ee̤oo̤
Open-mid ɛɛ̤ɔɔ̤
Open aa̤

Four phonetic phonations have been described in Dinka vowels: modal voice, breathy voice, faucalized voice, and harsh voice. The modal series has creaky or harsh voice realizations in certain environments, while the breathy vowels are centralized and have been described as being hollow voiced (faucalized). This is independent of tone.[3]

On top of this, there are three phonemically contrastive vowel lengths, a feature found in very few languages.[3] Most Dinka verb roots are single, closed syllables with either a short or a long vowel. Some inflections lengthen that vowel:

  • /lèl/ 'isolate\2sg'
  • /lèːl/ 'isolate\3sg'
  • /léːl/ 'provoke\2sg'
  • /lèːːl/ 'provoke\3sg'
shortràaan ā-lèl"You are isolating a person (ràaan)."
longràaan ā-lèel"He is isolating a person."
overlonglràaan ā-lèeel"He is provoking a person."

Tone

The extensive use of tone and its interaction with morphology is a notable feature of all dialects of Dinka. The Bor dialects all have four tonemes at the syllable level: Low, High, Mid, and Fall.[3]

In Bor proper, falling tone is not found on short vowels except as an inflection for the passive in the present tense. In Nyaarweng and Twïc it is not found at all. In Bor proper, and perhaps in other dialects as well, Fall is only realized as such at the end of a prosodic phrase. Elsewhere it becomes High.

In Bor proper and perhaps other dialects, a Low tone is only phonetically low after another low tone. Elsewhere it is falling, but not identical to Fall: It does not become High in the middle of a phrase, and speakers can distinguish the two falling tones despite the fact that they have the same range of pitch. The difference appears to be in the timing: with Fall one hears a high level tone that then falls, whereas the falling allophone of Low starts falling and then levels out. (That is, one falls on the first mora of the vowel, whereas the other falls on the second mora.) This is unusual because it has been theorized that such timing differences are never phonemic.[4]

Morphology

This language exhibits vowel ablaut or apophony, the change of internal vowels (similar to English goose/geese):[5]

Singular Plural gloss vowel alternation
dom dum 'field/fields' (o–u)
kat kɛt 'frame/frames' (a–ɛ)

Dialects

Linguists divide Dinka into five languages or dialect clusters corresponding to their geographic location with respect to each other:

Northeastern and western: Padang da Ayuel jiel (Abarlang, Nyiël, Ageer, Dongjol). Luäc da (Akook, Wieu, Aguer), Ngok de Jok (Upper Nile), Rut, Thoi, Western: Ngók de Jok Athuorkok (Abiei), Ngok de Jok da Awet and Kuel of Ruweeng (Panaru, Aloor and Paweny)

South Central: Aliap, Ciëc (Jang), Gok, and Agar

Southeastern: Bor, Twic (Twi), Nyarweng, and Hol

Southwestern: Rek, Abiëm, Aguók, Apuk, Awan, Kuac, Lóu, Luäc/Luänyjang, Malual (Malualgiėrnyang), Paliët, Paliëupiny, Twïc

These would be largely mutually intelligible if it were not for the importance of tone in grammatical inflection, as the grammatical function of tone differs from one variety to another.

See Ethnologue online map of Sudan for locations of dialects.

Writing system
Main article: Dinka alphabet

Dinka has been written with several Latin alphabets since the early 20th century. The current alphabet is:

a ä b c d dh e ë ɛ ɛ̈ g ɣ i ï j k l m n nh ny ŋ t th u w o ö ɔ ɔ̈ p r y

Variants in other alphabets include:

Current letterAlternatives
ɛ
ė ("e" with a dot on top)
ɣ
h, x, q
ŋ
ng
ɔ
ȯ ("o" with a dot on top)

See also

References
  1. Dinka at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    Northeastern (Padang) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    Northwestern (Ruweng) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    South Central (Agar) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    Southeastern: Bor, which also includes Nyarweng, Hol, Twi at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    Southwestern (Rek & Twic) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. Beswick 2004, p. 21.
  3. Remijsen, Bert (2013). "Tonal alignment is contrastive in falling contours in Dinka" (PDF). Language. 89 (2): 297–327. doi:10.1353/lan.2013.0023.
  4. Silverman, Daniel (1997). "Tone sandhi in Comaltepec Chinantec". Language. 73 (3): 473–92. doi:10.2307/415881. JSTOR 415881.
  5. After Bauer 2003:35

Other resources
  • Andersen, Torben (1987). "The phonemic system of Agar Dinka". Journal of African Languages and Linguistics. 9: 1–27.
  • Andersen, Torben (1990). "Vowel length in Western Nilotic languages". Acta Linguistica Hafniensia. 22 (1): 5–26. doi:10.1080/03740463.1990.10411520.
  • Andersen, Torben (1991). "Subject and topic in Dinka". Studies in Language. 15 (2): 265–294. doi:10.1075/sl.15.2.02and.
  • Andersen, Torben (1993). "Vowel quality alternation in Dinka verb inflection". Phonology. 10 (1): 1–42. JSTOR 4615426.
  • Beltrame, G. (1870). Grammatica della lingua denka. Firenze: G. Civelli.
  • Beswick, Stephanie (2004). Sudan's Blood Memory. University of Rochester. ISBN 1580462316.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Malou, Job (1988). Dinka Vowel System. Summer Institute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington Publications in Linguistics. 82. ISBN 0-88312-008-9.
  • Mitterrutzner, J. C. (1866). Die Dinka-Sprache in Central-Afrika; Kurze Grammatik, Text und Worterbuch. Brixen: A. Weger.
  • Nebel, A. (1979). Dinka–English, English–Dinka dictionary (2nd ed.). Bologna: Editrice Missionaria Italiana.
  • Nebel, A. (1948). Dinka Grammar (Rek-Malual dialect) with texts and vocabulary. Verona: Instituto Missioni Africane.
  • Trudinger, R. (1942–44). English-Dinka Dictionary. Sudan Interior Mission.
  • Turhan, Sedat; Hagin, Sally (2005). Milet Picture Dictionary English-Dinka. Milet.
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