Episode 9 Languages of the Fertile Crescent and Beyond Part 2

Language Families of the World

Dr John McWhorter

Film Review

In this lecture, McWhorter delves more deeply into the Afro-Asiatic languages

• Akkadian:  language of the ancient Babylonians and Assyrians, once the lingua franca of the entire Near East
• Aramaic: Ancient language used for much of the Old and New Testament, still spoken in some areas of the Middle East
• Phoenician (sub-family of language)
• Canaanite – (sub-family) of Semitic languages originating in Middle East, rather than Africa
• Berber (from Greek word “babbling” for barbarian) – Afro-Asiatic languages spokes in North Africa, containing many words with no vowels at all
• Egyptian – survives as language used in Coptic religious rituals
• Chadic (sub-family) – mainly spoken in Niger, Nigeria,* Cameroons and Chad
• Hausa – has 40 million modern native speakers in Niger, Chad, Cameroons, Benin, Togo and Ghana and and written in Arabic script. Became language of trade in 19th century thanks to Sokoto Caliphate .
• Osmotic languages – spoken in southern Ethiopia, has retroflex consonants,** in addition to six or seven linguistic tones.
• Cushitic (subfamily) – comprising about 40 languages spoken mainly in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia, and northwestern Kenya
• Somali – spoken in Somalia, became written language in 1970s.

*Two other major Nigerian languages, Yoruba and Igbo, aren’t Afro-Asiatic.

**Retroflexed consonants are produced by placing underside of tongue touches roof of mouth.

Film can be viewed free with a library card on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/6120000/6120018