Talodi–Heiban languages
Talodi-Heiban | |
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Geographic distribution | Nuba Hills, Sudan |
Linguistic classification | Niger–Congo?
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The Talodi-Heiban languages are two relatively closely related[1] language families of the erstwhile Kordofanian branch of Niger Congo posited by Joseph Greenberg (1963): Talodi, also called Talodi-Masakin, and Heiban, also called Koalib or Koalib-Moro.
Roger Blench notes that the Talodi and Heiban families have the noun-class systems characteristic of the Atlantic-Congo core of Niger-Congo, but that the Katla languages (another putative branch of Kordofanian) have no trace of ever having had such a system, whereas the Kadu languages and some of the Rashad languages appear to have acquired noun classes as part of a Sprachbund rather than having inherited them. He concludes that the Kordofanian languages do not form a genealogical group, but that Talodi-Heiban is core Niger-Congo whereas Katla and Rashad form a peripheral branch (or perhaps branches) along the lines of Mande. The Kadu languages may be Nilo-Saharan.
Talodi-Heiban
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Notes
- ^ Gerrit Dimmendaal, 2008. "Language Ecology and Linguistic Diversity on the African Continent", Language and Linguistics Compass 2/5:842.