Vagla language

Vagla
RegionGhana
Native speakers
14,000 (2003)
(may include speakers of Siti)
Language codes
ISO 639-3vag
Glottologvagl1239  Vagla

Vagla is a Gurunsi (Gur) language of Ghana with about 14,000 speakers. It is spoken in a number of communities in the Savannah Region (part of the Northern Region before 2018), Ghana. Such communities includes: Bole, Sawla, Tuna, Soma, Gentilpe, and Nakwabi. The people who speak this language are known as Vaglas, one of the indigenous tribes around that part of the Northern Region, which were brought under the Gonja local administration system "Gonjaland" by British Colonial Rulers under their Centralised System of Governance.

Phonology

Consonants

Consonants
LabialAlveolarPalatalVelarLabial-
velar		Glottal
Plosivevoiceless ptckkp
voiced bdɟggb
Nasal mnɲŋŋm
Fricativevoiceless fsh
voiced vz
Approximant ljw

Vowels

Vowels
FrontCentralBack
Close iu
Close-mid ɪʊ
Mid eo
Open-mid ɛ(ʌ)ɔ
Open a

Tones

Vagla has four tones: rising, falling, and two level tones. It also has downstep. Nasals and laterals can also carry tones.

Orthography

Vagla uses ⟨i⟩ to represent both /i/ and /ɪ/, and it uses ⟨u⟩ to represent /u/ and /ʊ/.

Nasalization is represented by a following ⟨h⟩, e.g., sɛɛ 'to agree' and sɛɛh 'to carve'.

Notes

  1. ↑ Vagla at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. 1 2 Blench 2003, p. 18.
  3. ↑ Blench 2003, p. 18, citing Crouch & Naden 1998.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Blench 2003, p. 19.

References

Further reading