| Khoekhoe | |
| Also Known As: | Nama/Damara |
| Nativename: | Khoekhoegowab |
| States: | Namibia, Botswana and South Africa |
| Region: | Orange River, Great Namaland, Damaraland |
| Ethnicity: | Khoikhoi, Nama, Damara, Haiǁom, ǂKhomani |
| Speakers: | 200,000 ± 10,000 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| Ref: | [1] |
| Familycolor: | Khoisan |
| Fam1: | Khoe–Kwadi |
| Fam2: | Khoe |
| Fam3: | Khoekhoe |
| Minority: |  Namibia South Africa[2] |
| Dia1: | Nama–Damara |
| Dia2: | Haiǁom–ǂĀkhoe |
| Lc1: | naq |
| Ld1: | Khoekhoe, Nama |
| Lc2: | hgm |
| Ld2: | Haiǁom |
| Ld3: | Eini |
| Glotto: | nort3245 |
| Glottoname: | Subfamily: North Khoekhoe |
| Glottorefname: | North Khoekhoe |
| Glotto2: | nama1264 |
| Glottoname2: | Language: Nama |
| Glottorefname2: | Nama (Namibia) |
| Glotto3: | haio1238 |
| Glottoname3: | Language: Haiǁom-Akhoe |
| Glottorefname3: | Hai//om-Akhoe |
| Map: | Nama-Damara taalkaartje NL.png |
| Mapcaption: | The distribution of the Nama language in Namibia |
| Notice: | IPA |
| Pronunciation: | pronounced as /[k͡xʰo̜͡ek͡xʰo̜͡egowab]/ |
Khoekhoe (; Khoekhoegowab, pronounced as /naq/), also known by the ethnic terms Nama (; Namagowab),[3] Damara (ǂNūkhoegowab), or Nama/Damara[4] and formerly as Hottentot, is the most widespread of the non-Bantu languages of Southern Africa that make heavy use of click consonants and therefore were formerly classified as Khoisan, a grouping now recognized as obsolete. It belongs to the Khoe language family, and is spoken in Namibia, Botswana, and South Africa primarily by three ethnic groups: Namakhoen, ǂNūkhoen, and Haiǁomkhoen.
The Haiǁom, who had spoken a Juu language, later shifted to Khoekhoe. The name for the speakers, Khoekhoen, is from the word khoe "person", with reduplication and the suffix -n to indicate the general plural. Georg Friedrich Wreede was the first European to study the language, after arriving in ǁHui!gaeb (later Cape Town) in 1659.
Khoekhoe is a national language in Namibia. In Namibia and South Africa, state-owned broadcasting corporations produce and broadcast radio programmes in Khoekhoe.
It is estimated that only around 167,000 speakers of Khoekhoe remain in Africa, which makes it an endangered language. In 2019, the University of Cape Town ran a series of short courses teaching the language, and 21 September 2020 launched its new Khoi and San Centre. An undergraduate degree programme is being planned to be rolled out in coming years.[5]
Modern scholars generally see three dialects:
They are distinct enough that they might be considered two or three distinct languages.
There are 5 vowel qualities, found as oral pronounced as //i e a o u// and nasal pronounced as //ĩ ã ũ//. pronounced as //u// is strongly rounded, pronounced as //o// only slightly so. pronounced as //a// is the only vowel with notable allophony; it is pronounced pronounced as /[ə]/ before pronounced as //i// or pronounced as //u//.
Nama has been described as having three[6] or four[7] [8] [9] tones, pronounced as //á, ā, à// or pronounced as //a̋, á, à, ȁ//, which may occur on each mora (vowels and final nasal consonants). The high tone is higher when it occurs on one of the high vowels (pronounced as //í ú//) or on a nasal (pronounced as //ń ḿ//) than on mid or low vowels (pronounced as //é á ó//).[6]
The tones combine into a limited number of 'tone melodies' (word tones), which have sandhi forms in certain syntactic environments. The most important melodies, in their citation and main sandhi forms, are as follows:[7]
| Citation | Sandhi | Meaning | Melody | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀȍm̀s/ | pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀòm̏s/ | butting, hitting s.t. | low | |
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀȍḿs/ | an udder | low rising | ||
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀòm̀s/ | forcing out of a burrow | mid | ||
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀòm̋s/ | pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀòm̀s/ | a pollard | high rising | |
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀóm̀s/ | pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀóm̏s/ | coagulating, prizing out [a thorn] | low falling | |
| pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀőḿs/ | pronounced as /ǃ̃ˀóm̀s/ | a fist | high falling | |
Within a phrase, lexical words receive greater stress than grammatical words. Within a word, the first syllable receives the most stress. Subsequent syllables receive less and less stress and are spoken more and more quickly.
Nama has 31 consonants: 20 clicks and only 11 non-clicks.
Orthography in brackets.
| Nasal | pronounced as /link/ (m) | pronounced as /link/ (n) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | pronounced as /link/ ~ pronounced as /link/ (b/p) | pronounced as /link/ ~ pronounced as /link/ (t/d/r) | pronounced as /link/ (k/g) | pronounced as /link/ (-) | |
| Affricate | pronounced as /link/ (ts) | pronounced as /link/ (kh) | |||
| Fricative | pronounced as /link/ (s) | pronounced as /link/ (x) | pronounced as /link/ (h) |
Between vowels, pronounced as //p// is pronounced pronounced as /[β]/ and pronounced as //t// is pronounced pronounced as /[ɾ]/. The affricate series is strongly aspirated, and may be analysed phonemically as aspirated stops; in the related Korana they are pronounced as /[tʰ, kʰ]/.
Beach (1938)[10] reported that the Khoekhoe of the time had a velar lateral ejective affricate, pronounced as /[kʟ̝̊ʼ]/, a common realisation or allophone of pronounced as //kxʼ// in languages with clicks. This sound no longer occurs in Khoekhoe but remains in its cousin Korana.
The clicks are doubly articulated consonants. Each click consists of one of four primary articulations or "influxes" and one of five secondary articulation or "effluxes". The combination results in 20 phonemes.[11]
| accompaniment | affricated clicks | 'sharp' clicks | standardised orthography | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| dental clicks | lateral clicks | alveolar clicks | palatal clicks | |||
| pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | |||
| Aspirated | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||
| pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | |||
| Aspirated nasal | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||
| Glottalized nasal | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||
The aspiration on the aspirated clicks is often light but is 'raspier' than the aspirated nasal clicks, with a sound approaching the ch of Scottish loch. The glottalised clicks are clearly voiceless due to the hold before the release, and they are transcribed as simple voiceless clicks in the traditional orthography. The nasal component is not audible in initial position; the voiceless nasal component of the aspirated clicks is also difficult to hear when not between vowels, so to foreign ears, it may sound like a longer but less raspy version of the contour clicks.
Tindall notes that European learners almost invariably pronounce the lateral clicks by placing the tongue against the side teeth and that this articulation is "harsh and foreign to the native ear". The Namaqua instead cover the whole of the palate with the tongue and produce the sound "as far back in the palate as possible".[12]
Lexical root words consist of two or rarely three moras, in the form CVCV(C), CVV(C), or CVN(C). (The initial consonant is required.) The middle consonant may only be w r m n (w is b~p and r is d~t), while the final consonant (C) may only be p, s, ts. Each mora carries tone, but the second may only be high or medium, for six tone "melodies": HH, MH, LH, HM, MM, LM.
Oral vowel sequences in CVV are pronounced as //ii ee aa oo uu ai [əi] ae ao au [əu] oa oe ui//. Due to the reduced number of nasal vowels, nasal sequences are pronounced as //ĩĩ ãã ũũ ãĩ [ə̃ĩ] ãũ [ə̃ũ] õã ũĩ//. Sequences ending in a high vowel (pronounced as //ii uu ai au ui ĩĩ ũũ ãĩ ãũ ũĩ//) are pronounced more quickly than others (pronounced as //ee aa oo ae ao oa oe ãã õã//), more like diphthongs and long vowels than like vowel sequences in hiatus. The tones are realised as contours. CVCV words tend to have the same vowel sequences, though there are many exceptions. The two tones are also more distinct.
Vowel-nasal sequences are restricted to non-front vowels: pronounced as //am an om on um un//. Their tones are also realised as contours.
Grammatical particles have the form CV or CN, with any vowel or tone, where C may be any consonant but a click, and the latter cannot be NN. Suffixes and a third mora of a root, may have the form CV, CN, V, N, with any vowel or tone; there are also three C-only suffixes, -p 1m.sg, -ts 2m.sg, -s 2/3f.sg.
There have been several orthographies used for Nama. A Khoekhoegowab dictionary (Haacke 2000) uses the modern standard.
In standard orthography, the consonants b d g are used for words with one of the lower tone melodies and p t k for one of the higher tone melodies; they are otherwise pronounced the same. W is only used between vowels, though it may be replaced with b or p according to tone. Overt tone marking is otherwise generally omitted.
| Orthography | Transcription | Melody | Meaning | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| gao | pronounced as //kȁó// | low rising | 'rule' | |
| kao | pronounced as //kàő// | high rising | 'be dumbfounded' | |
| ǀhubu (or ǀhuwu) | pronounced as //ǀʰȕwú// | low rising | 'to stop hurting' | |
| ǀhupu (or ǀhuwu) | pronounced as //ǀʰùwű// | high rising | 'to get out of breath' |
Nasal vowels are written with a circumflex. All nasal vowels are long, as in hû pronounced as //hũ̀ṹ// 'seven'. Long (double) vowels are otherwise written with a macron, as in ā pronounced as //ʔàa̋// 'to cry, weep'; these constitute two moras (two tone-bearing units).
A glottal stop is not written at the beginning of a word (where it is predictable), but it is transcribed with a hyphen in compound words, such as gao-aob pronounced as //kȁòʔòȁp// 'chief'.
The clicks are written using the IPA symbols:
Sometimes other characters are substituted, e.g. the hash (#) in place of ǂ.[13]
Nama has a subject–object–verb word order, three nouns classes (masculine/gu-class, feminine/di-class and neuter/n-class) and three grammatical numbers (singular, dual and plural). Pronominal enclitics are used to mark person, gender, and number on the noun phrases.
| Singular | Dual | Plural | Gloss | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feminine/Di-class | Piris | Pirira | Piridi | goat | |
| Masculine/Gu-class | Arib | Arikha | Arigu | dog | |
| Neutral/N-class | Khoe-i | Khoera | Khoen | people |
The PGN (person-gender-number) markers are enclitic pronouns that attach to noun phrases.[14] The PGN markers distinguish first, second, and third person, masculine, feminine, and neuter gender, and singular, dual, and plural number. The PGN markers can be divided into nominative, object, and oblique paradigms.
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Singular | ta | ts | b/mi/ni | ta | s | s | — | — | -i | |
| Dual | khom | kho | kha | m | ro | ra | m | ro | ra | |
| Plural | ge | go | gu | se | so | di | da | du | n | |
(PGN + i)
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Singular | te | tsi | bi/mi/ni | te | si | si | — | — | -i | |
| Dual | khom | kho | kha | mi/im | ro | ra | mi/im | ro | ra | |
| Plural | ge | go | gu | se | so | di | da | du | ni/in | |
(PGN + a)
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Singular | ta | tsa | ba/ma/na | ta | sa | sa | — | — | -e | |
| Dual | khoma | kho | kha | ma | ro | ra | mo | ro | ra | |
| Plural | ge | go | ga | se | so | de | da | do | na | |
Khoekhoe has four definite articles: ti, si, sa, ǁî. These definite articles can be combined with PGN markers.
Examples from Haacke (2013):
| ti | si | sa | ǁî | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| +definite | +definite | +definite | +definite | |
| +speaker | +speaker | +addressee | +discussed | |
| +human | -addressee | +human | ||
| +singular | +human | |||
| -singular |
There are three clause markers, ge (declarative), kha (interrogative), and ko/km (assertive). These markers appear in matrix clauses, and appear after the subject.[15]
Following is a sample text in the Khoekhoe language.[16]
Nē ǀkharib ǃnâ da ge ǁGûn tsî ǀGaen tsî doan tsîn; tsî ǀNopodi tsî ǀKhenadi tsî ǀhuigu tsî ǀAmin tsîn; tsî !kharagagu ǀaon tsîna ra hō.
In this region, we find springbuck, oryx, and duiker; francolin, guinea fowl, bustard, and ostrich; and also various kinds of snake.