Kera language

Kera is an East Chadic language spoken by 45,000 people in Southwest Chad and 6,000 people in North Cameroon.

Kera
Native toChad, Cameroon
Native speakers
(50,000 cited 1993)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3ker
Glottologkera1255

It was called "Tuburi" by Greenberg, a name shared with Tupuri.

Grammar

Kera is a subject–verb–object language, using prepositions. It uses exclusively borderline case-marking.

Phonology

The phonetic symbols and charts used are from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)

Consonants[2]
Bilabial Labio- dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive p b t d c k ɡ
Nasal m n ŋ
Trill r
Fricative f v s z h
Approximant j
Lateral

 approximant

 l

Vowels[3][4]

Kera's vowels are, including allophones:

front central back
close i ɨ u
mid e / ɛ o / ɔ
open a / ə

But can also be expressed as:

  • High The tongue is positioned near the top of the mouth.
  • Round The lips are rounded while the vowel is pronounced.
  • Front The tongue is positioned at the front of the mouth.
not round

front

 not round

central

 round

back

high i ɨ u
not high e / ɛ a / ə o / ɔ

Kera has vowel harmony.

In Kera, many words are required to only have vowels in the high or not high vowel class. For example, a word may have any of the vowels i ə u or any of the vowels e a o, but words containing both, e.g. words with i and o, are prohibited.

References
  1. Kera at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. Atanga, Lilian Lem; Ellece, Sibonile Edith; Litosseliti, Lia; Sunderland, Jane (2013). Gender and Language in Sub-Saharan Africa: Tradition, Struggle and Change. John Benjamins Publishing. p. 82. ISBN 9789027218742.
  3. "Vowels in harmony - Kera". SIL International. 2013-02-08. Retrieved 2019-06-02.
  4. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/3aa8/052c008ef2d5b38f0146cf59c5d2641b8795.pdf ATR allophones or undershoot in Kera? Retrieved 2019-06-02.


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