Mandinka language
The
Mandinka language is a
Mandé language spoken by some 1.2 million
Mandinka people in
Mali,
Senegal,
The Gambia, and
Guinea-Bissau; it is the main language of
The Gambia. It belongs to the
Manding branch of Mandé, and is thus fairly similar to
Bambara.
Latin alphabet and
Arabic alphabet-based orthographies are widely used for Mandinka; the former is official, but the latter is more widely used and older. In addition, the pan-
Mandé writing system
N'ko, invented in 1949, is sometimes used.
In the Latin script, c is pronounced "ch", ŋ "ng", ñ "ny"; the letters v, x, z, and q are not used. Vowels are as in Spanish, and are doubled to indicate length.
The Arabic script uses no extra letters (apart from, rarely, an extra vowel mark for
e), but some of the letters are pronounced differently from in Arabic.
The Latin and Arabic consonants correspond as follows:
| Arabic | ا | ع | ب | ت | ط | ض | ج | ه | ح | خ | د | ر | س | ش | ص | ث | ظ | ڢ | ل | م | ن | و | ي | ك | لا | | Latin | ('), aa, ee | (', with madda ŋ) | b, p | t | t | t | c, j | h | h | d | r | s | s (sh) | s | s | s | f | l | m | n, ñ, ŋ | w | y | k, g | la |
|---|
Letters in italics are not normally used in native Mandinka words. ه (h) may also be used to indicate a final
glottal stop, which is not noted in the Latin script. The letter ŋ of the Latin script is often indicated with vowel signs in the Arabic script; see below.
The vowels correspond as follows (diacritics are placed over or under the consonant in Arabic):
| Arabic | ـَ | ـِ | ـُ | ـْ | ـִ | ـً | ـٍ | ـٌ | ـَا | ـِي | ـُو | | Latin | a, e | i, e, ee | o, u | (no following vowel) | e | aŋ, eŋ | iŋ, eeŋ, eŋ | oŋ, uŋ | aa | ii | oo, uu |
|---|
| Mandinka names of Arabic marks: | sira tilidiŋo; | sira tilidiŋo duuma; | ŋoo biriŋo; | sira murumuruliŋo; | tambi baa duuma; | sira tilindiŋo fula; | sira tilindiŋo duuma fula; | ŋoo biriŋo fula. | | | |
|---|
In addition, a small Arabic 2 (۲) may be used to indicate
reduplication, and the
hamza may be used as in Arabic to indicate glottal stops more precisely.
*R. T. Addis,
A Study on the Writing of Mandinka in Arabic script, 1963.
*
Wolof and Mandinka resources, including a grammar and dictionary
*
Electronic books in Mandinka, freely downloadable in the
PDF format
*
Mande languages*
Manding languages*
Mandinka people*
Mandé*
Malinké
