Nyimang language

Nyimang, also known as Ama, is an East Sudanic language spoken in the Nuba Mountains by the Nyimang people who are a sub-group of the Nuba people.

Nyimang
Ama
Native toSudan
RegionNuba Hills
EthnicityNyimang people
Native speakers
160,000 (2017)[1]
Dialects
  • Ama
  • Mandal
Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3nyi
Glottologamas1236

It is spoken in Al Fous, Fuony, Hajar Sultan, Kakara, Kalara, Koromiti, Nitil, Salara, Tundia, and other villages (Ethnologue, 22nd edition).

Rilly (2010:182) lists two mutually unintelligible varieties, Ama and Mandal.[2] Blench lists the Mandal dialect separately.

Phonology

Consonants
Labial Dental Alveolar Palatal/
Retroflex		 Velar
Plosive voiceless t̪ t k
voiced b d̪ d ɟ ɡ
Fricative f s (ʃ)
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Trill r ɽ
Approximant w l j
  • /s/ is heard as [ʃ] when before front vowels.
  • /l/ can be heard as a retroflex [ɭ] when before front vowels.
  • /f/ can also be heard as bilabial [ɸ] in free variation.[3]

Vowels
Front Central Back
Close i u
Close-mid e o
Open-mid ɛ ɔ
Open a
  • /i, u/ can be heard as [ɪ, ʊ] in lax position.
  • /o/ can have an allophone of [ɵ] when in the position of /ɽ/.[4]

References
  1. Nyimang at Ethnologue (26th ed., 2023) closed access
  2. Rilly, Claude. 2010. Le méroïtique et sa famille linguistique. Leuven: Peeters Publishers. ISBN 978-9042922372
  3. Stevenson, Roland C. (1938). A grammar of the Nyimang language (Nuba Mountains).
  4. Tucker, Archibald N.; Bryan, Margaret A. (2017). Linguistic Analyses: The Non-Bantu Languages of North-Eastern Africa, 2nd edn. London: Oxford University Press. pp. 312–313.


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