| Gǀui | |
| Pronunciation: | pronounced as /[ᶢǀúi]/ |
| States: | Botswana |
| Ethnicity: | Gǀui (2013) |
| Date: | 2013 |
| Ref: | e25 |
| Speakers2: | all Gǁana dialects (2011)[1] |
| Familycolor: | Khoisan |
| Fam1: | Khoe–Kwadi |
| Fam2: | Khoe |
| Fam3: | Kalahari (Tshu–Khwe) |
| Fam4: | West |
| Fam5: | Gǁana |
| Iso3: | gwj |
| Notice: | IPA |
| Glotto: | gwii1239 |
| Glottorefname: | /Gwi |
Gǀui or Gǀwi (pronounced in English, and also spelled ǀGwi, Dcui, Gcwi, or Cgui) is a Khoe dialect of Botswana with 2,500 speakers (2004 Cook). It is part of the Gǁana dialect cluster, and is closely related to Naro. It has a number of loan words from ǂʼAmkoe. Gǀui, ǂʼAmkoe, and Taa form the core of the Kalahari Basin sprachbund, and share a number of characteristic features, including extremely large consonant inventories.
Gǀui has 93 consonants (with 56 clicks) or 52 consonants (and 20 clicks), depending on analysis. There are ten vowels, and two to six tones, again depending on analysis.
Gǀui has 24 simple click consonants, plus complex clicks variously analyzed as consonant clusters or airstream contours. As with many of the Tshu–Khwe languages, clicks have lost some of their importance under the influence of neighboring Bantu languages. Many words which previously began with clicks (as shown by cognates in related languages) have lost them over the past few centuries in Gǀui. Nonetheless, Gǀui has the largest known inventory of clicks of any Khoe language.
Gǀui has been described with a contrast between velar and uvular clicks. However, all Gǀui clicks are uvular (or pharyngeal); the 'uvular' part of the latter is part of an airstream contour, a transition from a click to a non-click release: effectively, the click transitions into a non-click consonant. (See Nǁng language for a similar situation in another language.) Nakagawa proposes that the contour and glottalized clicks are not single sounds, but sequences of a click and a uvular or glottal consonant, though Miller (2011) notes that such an analysis creates problems when extended to other languages with clicks.
Altogether there are thirteen such series, or "accompaniments", and all 52 possible combinations are found. Except for the lack of bilabial clicks, the inventory is nearly identical to that of some speakers of ǂʼAmkoe, which is in intense contact with Gǀui and may have borrowed some of its clicks from Gǀui, and lost others not found in Gǀui.
Miller (2011), in a comparative study with other languages, interprets Nakagawa's description as follows. (Nakagawa's (IPA|kǃʔ) and (IPA|ǃqxʼ) are analyzed as pronounced as /[ᵑǃˀ]/ and pronounced as /[ǃ͡kxʼ]/, respectively.)[2]
| affricated clicks | 'sharp' clicks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| palatal | |||||
| voiced | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| tenuis | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| aspirated | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| glottalized oral | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| voiceless aspirated nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| glottalized nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| (prenasalized) voiced | pronounced as /ᶢǀ͡ɢ/ | pronounced as /ᶢǁ͡ɢ/ | pronounced as /ᶢǃ͡ɢ/ | pronounced as /ᶢǂ͡ɢ/ | |
| tenuis | pronounced as /ǀ͡q/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡q/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡q/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡q/ | |
| aspirated | pronounced as /ǀ͡qʰ/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡qʰ/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡qʰ/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡qʰ/ | |
| pronounced as /ǀ͡χ/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡χ/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡χ/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡χ/ | ||
| pronounced as /ǀ͡qʼ/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡qʼ/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡qʼ/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡qʼ/ | ||
| uvular affricate | pronounced as /ǀ͡qχ/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡qχ/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡qχ/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡qχ/ | |
| uvular ejective affricate | pronounced as /ǀ͡qχʼ/ | pronounced as /ǁ͡qχʼ/ | pronounced as /ǃ͡qχʼ/ | pronounced as /ǂ͡qχʼ/ | |
| Khute Gǀui | other Gǀui | English | |
|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as /[ˀᵑǂúˤrī]/ | pronounced as /[ᵑǂˀúˤrī]/ | "adam's apple" (pharyngealized vowel) | |
| pronounced as /[ᵑǂˀúbī]/ | pronounced as /[ᵑǂˀúbī]/ | "egg" (modal vowel) |
| +Gǀui consonants[4] | Bilabial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | affric. | ||||||||
| Nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /ink/) | ||||||
| Plosive | voiceless | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| voiced | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| aspirated | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| ejective | (pronounced as /ink/) | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/, pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | ||||
| Uvular affrication | plain | pronounced as /tχ/ | pronounced as /tsχ/ | ||||||
| ejective | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |||||||
| Fricative | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | ||||||
| Approximant | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/~pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | ||||||
Most words are of the form CV, CVV, CVCV, CVN, where C stands for a consonant, V for a vowel, and N for a nasal consonant /m, n/. In CVCV words, only a limited set of consonants /pronounced as /b m ɾ n j w// may occur in medial position (the second syllable). Of these, two /pronounced as /n, ɾ// may not occur at the beginning of a word, and due to restrictions with nasal vowels may be argued to be allophonic. The /pronounced as /n, ɾ// is pronounced pronounced as /[l]/ after a lateral click or a pharyngeal vowel. pronounced as //ŋ// only occurs in mimesis. pronounced as //tʼ// occurs in a single word, t'aa 'to carve', which is not widely known.
The palatals, which are unique among Khoisan languages to Gǁana-Gǀui, derive historically from the alveolars before non-pharyngealized vowels. In Gǁana this shift has only partly occurred.
pronounced as //tqχʼ// and pronounced as //tsqχʼ// have also been analyzed as pronounced as //tχʼ// and pronounced as //tsχʼ//, the ejective homologues of pronounced as //tχ// and pronounced as //tsχ//. However, their pronunciation is pronounced as /[tqχʼ]/ and pronounced as /[tsqχʼ]/.
Gǀui has five modal vowels, pronounced as //a e i o u//, three nasal vowels, pronounced as //ã ẽ õ//, and two pharyngeal vowels, pronounced as //aˤ oˤ//. There are diphthongs pronounced as /[o͜a]/ and pronounced as /[o͜aˤ]/, but they are allophones of pronounced as //o//. Gǀui also has breathy-voice vowels, but they are described as part of the tone system.
Only the five modal vowels pronounced as //a e i o u// occur in monomoraic (CV or V) roots, which except for the noun χò 'thing, place, case' are all grammatical morphemes. These are reduced to three nasal vowels pronounced as //ã ẽ õ// after nasal consonants, including the glottalized nasal clicks.
The modal vowels and the pharyngeal vowels, pronounced as //aˤ oˤ/o͜aˤ//, occur as the first vowel (V1) of bimoraic roots, CVCV, CVV, and CVN, though the modal vowels are reduced to pronounced as //a e i o͜a// before a nasal coda, CVN. This pronounced as /[o͜a]/ corresponds to pronounced as //o// in Gǁana. Pharyngeal pronounced as //oˤ// and pronounced as /[o͜aˤ]/ are also in complementary distribution: pronounced as /[oˤ]/ in CVV words and pronounced as /[o͜aˤ]/ in CVCV and CVN words; some speakers use pronounced as /[o͜aˤ]/ in CVV roots too, so that their pharyngeal vowels are reduced to pronounced as /[aˤ o͜aˤ]/.
The modal and nasal vowels (but not the pharyngeals) occur as the second vowel (V2) of bimoraic roots, CVCV or CVV, though only modal vowels may follow the medial consonants pronounced as //b ɾ//, and only nasal vowels follow the medial consonants pronounced as //m n//. Either oral or nasal vowels may follow pronounced as //j w// or null (CVV roots). That is, medial pronounced as //m n// may be seen as allophones of pronounced as //b ɾ//.
The initial consonant (C1) may be any but pronounced as //n ɾ//. The medial consonant (C2) may be pronounced as //b ɾ m n j w//. N may be pronounced as //m n//.
There are other vowel restrictions. V1 is always pronounced as //i// in CVCV words when C1 is non-click palatal, for example. (This is because those sounds arose historically from alveolars followed by pronounced as //i//, which are still found in Naro.) Uvular(ized) consonants cause vowel lowering.
Gǀui may be analyzed as having two abstract phonemic tones, plus breathy voice, which is covered here rather than under vowels.
Monosyllabic morphemes carry one of two tones, high and low. Bimoraic roots carry one of six tones: high-level, high-mid (or "high falling"), mid-low (or "mid"), low-mid dipping/rising, high falling (or "falling"), and low falling (or "low"). Low falling and low-mid are accompanied by a breathy voice phonation, the other four with a clear phonation. The high and low falling tones form a natural class, triggering for example a high tone on the suffix -si, whereas the other four root tones trigger a low tone on -si.
That is, there are two tones on CV and V roots; two tones on bimoraic roots with breathy vowels, one of them falling; and four tones on bimoraic roots with other vowels, one of them falling. Thus there are four phonemic tones on CVCV, CVV, and CVN roots, the number expected if there are two possible tones on each mora, with moraic N carrying tone, though their contours are not simple juxtapositions of high/low + high/low.