Bambassi language
Bambassi language
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Bambassi language

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Bambassi language

Bambassi (native name: Màwés Aasʼè) is an Omotic Afroasiatic language spoken in Ethiopia around the towns of Bambasi and Didessa in the area east of Asosa in Benishangul-Gumuz Region. The parent language group is the East Mao group. Alternative names for the language are Bambeshi, Siggoyo, Amam, Fadiro, Northern Mao, Didessa and Kere.

The most current information on the number of Bambassi speakers is not known, as the 2007 census grouped the Mao languages together, despite low lexical similarity. 33,683 mother tongue speakers of Maogna (covering Bambassi, Hozo and Seze) were listed.

Bambassi has a 31% lexical similarity with other Omotic languages.

Bambassi has 5 vowels: /a, e, i, o, u/. The vowels have lengthened forms, and Bambassi has contrastive vowel length.

This section gives information about different word types in the Bambassi language and how they relate to each other. It splits up in nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns and numbers and will give information about tense, aspect and mood.

Nouns in Northern Mao can be marked as singular, plural or dual. Dual and plural number are marked with specific suffixes, dual /-kuw/ and plural /-(w)ol/ (-> segmental morphology). In the singular number nouns have a zero morpheme. Nouns also usually agree with their quantifiers, e.g. numerals. In the citation form nouns, pronouns, demonstratives and verbal infinitives end with the vowel /-e/.

Example:

A separate word class of adjectives in Northern Mao hasn't yet been identified. The speakers use nominalizations, verbs or deverbal nouns to modify nouns. As in other African languages, the Bambassi language only has separate words for four basic colors which are expressed as verbs: black, white, red and blue. Other colors are expressed as metaphors and nominal constructions.

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