Talk:Niger–Congo languages

Confusing claims

This page at first claims that Greenberg's Niger-Kordofanian languages (NK) are the same as Bendor-Samuel's Niger-Congo languages (NC) and therefore include the Kordofanian languages (K). But later on it says that NK = NC + K. What is going on? Perhaps Bendor-Samuel included K in NC, but later linguists took K out?
Jorge Stolfi 23:06, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

Nobody's corrected this, so I will. I'm going by memory, however, so please correct me if need be!

I believe Greenberg also used the term NK, but perhaps only after Bendor-Samuel invented it. Also, some linguists do not consider Kordofanian to be the earliest branch, but rather that it diverged strongly under non-NK language influence; it's possible some of them might use the term NC for the whole family. —kwami 01:55, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

That was confusing indeed. I amended your correction a bit, since it was Greenberg himself who introduced Niger-Kordofanian in 1963; Bendor-Samuel (1989) re-introduced Niger-Congo. Niger-Congo is currently the most commonly used term among linguists. — mark ✎ 07:32, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Which family is the biggest?

The Niger-Congo languages are the largest group of the world in terms of different languages.

Any data supporting this claim ?

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Try this one for some fairly exact figures on a whole raft of language families:

http://www.ethnologue.com/family_index.asp

It shows the Niger-Congo family way in front of everything but Austronesian, and ahead of that too. -- Paul Drye

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Difference between language and dialect is quite arbitrary and the difference in numbers isn't that big anyway, so I added "probably". -- Taw

Clutter

I think the links to the countries in which the example languages are spoken make that part of the article disorderly. Would it be OK to remove them, or is there another possibility to reduce the clutter? Strangeloop (talk) 18:14, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Navbox

Niger-Congo languages

• Kordofanian
• Mande
• Atlantic-Congo
  • Atlantic
  • Ijoid
  • Dogon
  • Volta-Congo
    • ? Senufo
    • Gur
    • Adamawa-Ubangi
    • Kru
    • Kwa
    • Benue-Congo
      • Cross River
      • Bantoid
        • North
        • South
          • (Narrow) Bantu
          • Ekoid
          • Jarawan

I've added a navbox to see if we can come up with a nice template to navigate along the major subgroups of Niger-Congo. I've not added it to other articles yet because it needs to be polished a bit first. What do others think? — mark ✎ 14:36, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

The box might be helpful in a later stage. This moment is just adds a third outline which even is not displayed properly in my FireFox browser on a wide screen. Currently I think adding more meat to the arcticle itself is of higher priority. For example which features a common to Niger-Congo languages (noun classes, serial verb constructions etc). Hirzel 08:48, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Fair point. I've parked it here for now. — mark ✎ 07:25, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm slowly expanding the article, having added a classification history and a bit on common features recently. Sections on tone, noun classes, and syntax will follow, and maybe a more detailed map. — mark ✎ 14:34, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

The navbox has been superseded by the {{Infobox Language family}}. — mark ✎ 08:46, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Time since proto-language?

Does anyone have any idea how long ago the proto-Niger-Congo language is believed to have been spoken? This would be an important addition to the article. --Saforrest 17:27, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Is this a valid language family?

Looking at the lanuage families of the world, I find it strang that the Americas, for example, have a lot of small families where Africa, where humans have supposedly lived for much longer, has so few. It should be the other way arround. Geneticists have found that genetic diversity in Africa is far higher than that of the rest of the world. With respect to languages, it should be the same. What is the reason for this? Have the Niger-Congo people replaced everybody else who might have been there bevfore, e.g. because they had agriculture or bronze age or iron age technologies the other peoples did not? Or is it just that the views of Greenberg dominate in African lingusitics and Grennberg is maybe sombody who has a tendency to lump languages together, while in oother parts of the world, the dominating linguists are applying stricter standards (just a question, I am an outsider to the field)? so is the discrepancy an Artefact due to different traditions in different branches of Linguistics? Is Niger Congo or Niger Cordofanian a language family hypothesis comparable in status to Amerindian or [[Nostratic}} or has a protolanguage or important aspects thereof actually been reconstructed and it has been shown that and how the different subfamilies have developed out of this. If anybody has access to material showing evidence for the validity of this family, please include it in the article. If there is a discussion about the validity of this family or of certain subfamilies being attributet to it in the literature, please include information about it in the article. Nannus 00:32, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Even though you're right that the field of African linguistics has known more lumpers than splitters historically, the validity of Niger-Congo isn't really disputed. A starting point if you're looking for evidence is Greenberg's The Languages of Africa, though that is not a reconstruction. Reconstructions for Niger-Congo (or actually only parts of it) have been carried out by Mukarovsky and by Stewart. Stewart has worked mostly on reconstructing Potou-Akanic (Ghana, Ivory Coast) and Bantu, and in a recent article (2002) he argues that his Potou-Akanic-Bantu reconstruction is a good starting-point for a reconstruction of Proto-Niger-Congo, comparable in fact (so he argues) to the 'Proto-Germanic-Latin-Greek-Sanskrit' of the poineers of Indo-European reconstruction (Stewart 2002:198-200).

• Mukarovsky, Hands (1976077). A Study of Western Nigritic. 2 vols. Vienna: Veröffentlichungen des Institus für Ägyptologie und Afrikanstik der Universität Wien.
• Stewart, John. 2002. 'The potential of Proto-Potou-Akanic-Bantu as a pilot Proto-Niger-Congo', in Journal of African languages and linguistics, 197-224.

— mark ✎ 16:18, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

the yoruba language is listed under bantu

the yoruba language is incorrectly listed as a bantu language it should be listed under benue congo which is a part of the larger volta congo family —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.203.33.225 (talk) 11:22, 12 January 2007 (UTC).

Actually, it is listed under Benue-Congo and I couldn't find anyplace in the article suggesting that it is a Bantu language. — mark ✎ 12:42, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Bantu

Mel, is it really your argument that I have to source the statement that the Bantu languages include most of the languages of central, eastern, and southern Africa, or you will remove it? This is trivially verifiable. john k 20:26, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

So why exactly do you not provide a source? Is your claim that editors don't have to provide sources for what they say (or even explanations of their edits in edit summaries), but that it's up to others to do it for them? --Mel Etitis (Talk) 22:50, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

BUt u dont remove it if it isnt a disputed fact, add a fact tag, but it could b considered a WP:POINT if someone said the sky is blue and u said prove it. The map of Africa shows the distribution of Bantu languages, i dont c the problem. also watch the language thing, if an editor feels someone is being unreasonable just explain it on the talk page. the bad languages weakens your case. I think the cursing editors changes are allowable, esp due to the fact the many things have no --Halqحَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 23:45, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for my inappropriate language earlier. As to the rest, like Halaqah says - not everything has to be cited, and the basic claim in my statement is about as close to "common knowledge" as one can get. Columbia says, for instance, that the Bantu "inhabit most of the continent S of the Congo River except the extreme southwest." The map in this article shows more or less my point. The revert was clearly a WP:POINT violation because I was arguing with Mel on another talk page. Would Mel revert me if I made an unsourced edit that George W. Bush is President of the United States, or that the Earth is the third planet from the sun, too? john k 05:21, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I will be 100% honest, when i saw that edit dispute i knew it had personal roots. It happens to me, where people dont like you disrupt all your edits. It is sad, but what the revert was about was a WP:POINT and yes we should cite references, dont get me wrong but just add fact tags and allows the user to reply, esp if the addition isnt crazy stuff. We need to edit wiki not attack each other.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 11:23, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

written forms?

This page lacks any discussion of written forms for the languages under examination. It may be obvious to experts that no written forms exist, but non-experts like myself may find themselves here.

If there are written forms, they should be discussed here.

If there aren't written forms, that fact should be clearly stated.

72.207.90.34 02:08, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Well it's not that obvious that no written forms would exist — Swahili for example has been written for more than a millenium, and in the last few hundred years lots of Niger-Congo languages have been 'reduced to writing', as the experts call it. I do agree that this is an important topic, but perhaps this particular article is not the right place for it. Niger-Congo is a huge language family, and no simple generalizations can be made about written forms of the languages that belong to it. Compare the article on Indo-European language, which like this article focuses mainly on linguistic and historical issues and consequently doesn't mention the issue you raise at all. — mark ✎ 21:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Niger-Congo A? B?

The map shows 2 separate shaded areas: Niger-Congo A and Niger-Congo B (Bantu), but I cannot find anything in the article which even mentions, let alone explains, this division. Can anyone help me here? Shanoman 13:54, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I was wondering the same thing. I find it peculiar that these language families can be so arbitrarily grouped together when many of the peoples in question have little to do with one another. This may be the reason why the "language family" is so very broad. I am sure Greenberg and Westermann is not the only person to study these languages, why is there not more sources? Is he your preferred source??

I happen to study Cultural Anthropology and I know that I would not base my conclusions on the testimony of a single author or researcher. Cross-referencing and then cross-referencing again until you have hodge-podge of several names sources from different Universities and backgrounds who generally agree on the matter is the only way to satisfy objectivity. Otherwise, it (this) is simply one man's opinion.

The section on classification history makes sufficiently clear that the hypothesis is not simply the idea of one man. Also, I believe ample sources are cited, at least in that section. — mark ✎ 18:30, 29 August 2007 (UTC)