Social:ǁXegwi language

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Short description: Extinct IKwi language of South Africa
ǁXegwi
ǁXʼegwi
giǁkxi꞉gwi
Native toSouth Africa
RegionLake Chrissie
EthnicityTlouʼeʼthle[1]
Extinct1988, with the death of Jopi Mabinda[2]
Tuu
  • ǃKwi
    • Eastern
      • ǁXegwi
Language codes
ISO 639-3xeg
xeg.html
Glottologxegw1238[3]
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

ǁXegwi or ǁXʼegwi (pronounced /ˈzɛɡwiː/ ZEH-gwee; ǁXegwi: giǁkxi꞉gwi), also known as Batwa, is an extinct ǃKwi language spoken at Lake Chrissie in South Africa, near the Swazi border. The last known speaker, Jopi Mabinda (also Jobi Mabinda[4]), was murdered in 1988.[5] However, a reporter for the South African newspaper Mail & Guardian reports that ǁXʼegwi may still be spoken in the Chrissiesmeer district.[1]

The ǁXʼegwi name for their language has been spelled giǁkwi꞉gwi or kiǁkwi꞉gwi. Their name for themselves, Tlouʼeʼthle 'people of rock and water',[1] has been transcribed tlou tle and kxlou-kxle, presumably renderings of [k͡𝼄ouk͡𝼄e]. The Nguni (Zulu and Swazi) called them (a)batwa, amaNkqeshe and amaNgqwigqwi; the Sotho called them Baroa~Barwa.[6]

Phonology

Tone

From Köhler's material, it appears that ǁXʼegwi had a four-tone inventory.

Consonants

ǁXʼegwi lost the abrupt clicks (the various manners of ǂ and ǃ) found in its relatives. It reacquired ǃ from Nguni Bantu languages, but clicks remained relatively infrequent, compared to other Tuu languages. It also had a series of uvular plosives not found in other Tuu languages.[7]

Labialized consonants are recorded, both pulmonic and lingual; Honken (2020) interprets [CʷV] as /CoV/.

Pulmonic and ejective consonants
Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Uvular Glottal
median lateral median lateral
Plosive tenuis p t k q ʔ
aspirated pʰ tʰ kʰ qʰ
voiced b d ɡ ɢ
ejective tʼ qʼ
velarized
Affricate voiceless (ts) tʃ
aspirated kɬʰ tʃʰ
voiced dz dl dʒ
ejective tsʼ kɬʼ tʃʼ kxʼ
velarized tsx tx
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Fricative voiceless f s ɬ ʃ x h
voiced β z ʒ
Sonorant r (l)

/ts/ is a marginal phoneme. /l/ and /f/ are exclusive to loanwords.[8]

Lingual consonants
Labial Dental Alveolar
median lateral
Nasal modal ᵑʘ ᵑǀ ᵑǃ ᵑǁ
glottalized ᵑǀˀ ᵑǃˀ ᵑǁˀ
murmured ᵑʘʱ ᵑǀʱ ᵑǃʱ ᵑǁʱ
Plosive voiced ᶢǀ ᶢǃ ᶢǁ
aspirated ᵏǀʰ ᵏǃʰ ᵏǁʰ
tenuis ᵏʘ ᵏǀ ᵏǃ ᵏǁ
Affricate tenuis ᵏʘx ᵏǀx ᵏǃx ᵏǁx
ejective ᵏʘxʼ ᵏǀxʼ ᵏǃxʼ ᵏǁxʼ

Vowels

There is a great deal of variation between nasal vowels, [Ṽ], and oral vowels with a nasal coda, [Vŋ], so the phonemic status of nasal vowels is unclear. All researchers also transcribe long vowels (not shown):[8]

Modal vowels
Front Back
High i ĩ u ũ
Mid e (ẽ) o (õ)
Low a ã

The non-modal vowels are transcribed by all researchers as glottalized; Traill (1979) interprets them as pharyngealized as in other Tuu languages.[8] We transcribe them here as creaky voice:

Non-modal vowels
Front Back
High ḭ ḭ̃ ṵ ṵ̃
Mid ḛ o̰
Low a̰ ã̰

Syntax

Word order

ǁXʼegwi exhibits subject–verb–object (SVO) word order, as can be seen in the following examples:[4]

ʼi ǀxe tlwa ʼin ʼuye 'we speak a matter now'

ʼn ǀxeya ʼe la giǁkxi꞉gwi 'I speak Bushman'

Sample text

Marriage[4]

Script error: No such module "Interlinear".

Script error: No such module "Interlinear".Script error: No such module "Interlinear".Script error: No such module "Interlinear".Script error: No such module "Interlinear".Script error: No such module "Interlinear".

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Davie, Kevin. "The secret pool of surviving Bushmen at Chrissiesmeer" (in en). The Mail & Guardian. http://mg.co.za/article/2011-06-24-the-secret-pool-of-surviving-bushmen-at-chrissiesmeer. 
  2. ↑ ǁXegwi at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  3. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds (2017). "//Xegwi". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History. http://glottolog.org/resource/languoid/id/xegw1238. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Potgieter, E. F. (1955). The disappearing Bushmen of Lake Chrissie - a preliminary survey. Hidding-Currie publ. of the University of South Africa. 1 (With notes on the language by Dirk Ziervogel ed.). Pretoria, South Africa: J. L. van Schaik. 
  5. ↑ Traill, A. (2002). "The Khoesan languages". in Mesthrie, Rajend. Language in South Africa. Cambridge University Press. p. 42. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511486692.003. ISBN 978-0-521-79105-2. 
  6. ↑ Treis, Yvonne (1998). "Names of Khoisan languages and their variants". in Schladt, Mathias. Language, identity, and conceptualization among the Khoisan. Rüdiger Köppe Verlag. pp. 463–503. ISBN 978-3-89645-143-9. 
  7. ↑ Traill, Anthony (1999). Extinct: South African Khoisan Languages (CD).
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Honken, Henry (2020). "ǁXʼegwi". The Oxford Handbook of African Languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 670–681. 



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