Sereer Grammar
This is the Wiki page for Sereer.
Sereer a language of the Senegambian branch of Niger–Congo spoken by 1.2 million people in Senegal and 30,000 in The Gambia. It is the principal language of the Sereer people.
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Phonology
Main article: Phonological Inventory
Consonants
A tentative consonant inventory of Sereer Saalum is given below. Working orthography for a given symbol is indicated in parentheses following a symbol if the orthography differs from the IPA.
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stops | V'less | p | t | c~ʧ (c) | k | q | ʔ (') |
| Voiced | b | d | ɟ~ʤ (j) | g | |||
| Implosive | ɓ | ɗ | ʄ | ||||
| Voiceless Implosive | ƥ | ƭ | ƈ | ||||
| Prenasalized | ᵐb (mb) | ⁿd (nd) | ᶮɟ (nj) | ᵑg (ng) | ᶰɢ (nq) | ||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ (ñ) | ŋ | |||
| Fricative | f | s | χ~h (x) | ||||
| Tap/Trill | ɾ~r (r) | ||||||
| Liquid | l | ||||||
| Glide | ʋ~β̞~w (w) | j (y) | |||||
Vowels
A tentative vowel inventory of Sereer Saalum:
| Front | Central | Back | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| High | i ~ ɪ | u ~ ʊ | ||||
| Mid | e ~ ɛ | ɔ ~ o | ||||
| Low | a~ə | |||||
Serer also has diphthongs: aɪ, oɪ, ɔɪ.
Vowel length is contrastive.
Vowels after implosive consonants are sometimes creaky; this does not seem to be contrastive.
Suprasegmentals
Serer makes use of stress. Stress is largely assigned metrically, with a preference for left-anchored iambs (if V-shaped prefixes are taken to be part of the noun's phonological word) or right-anchored trochees (if they are not). Some irregularities, especially concerning the frequent noun plural agreement prefix xa-, are yet to be worked out.
Spectrograms and Audio Samples of Consonants
Loanword Phonology
Borrowed words show phonemes that are not normally present in Serer, like /y/, in the word borrowed from French for 'wall' (etc).
Morphology
Verbal Morphology
Tense (and aspect) Paradigm Table
Inflectional Verbal Morphology
Derivational Verbal Morphology
Syntax
main clause word order and pronominalization
I'm not sure where this stuff really belongs, so I just made a page for it. Feel free to move it. -JM
Sentences with sound files Ignore these for now, I will relocate them. --136.152.188.149 20:36, 23 October 2012 (UTC) Who is "I"? Faytak 23:24, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
Valence patterns and alignment
Copular clauses and other copula-like things
Word Order
Word order in possessive constructions appears to be possessum-possessor, as seen in [muusnɛ noⁿdɛboᵑgɛ] 'a boy's cat' (040).
N-Adj order, as in [ino fop] 'all of us' (054), and [muus fodadaru] 'clumsy cat' (068)
Adpositions
Position in Sereer is mostly indicated with prepositions. Currently, it's not clear if all these prepositions can be used verbally. Some can, i.e. ɟof no taχarkɛ "towards the trees" and mɛhɛ ɟofaa "I am going toward (something)".
| Gloss | Aposition | Position | Source | Notes, Example Sentences | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| at | onga | posposed to N | JM_021, VW_068 | temporal | |||
| behind/after | aciⁿɉ | JM_021, VW_040 | acinᶮɟ ᵐbinɛ "behind the house" | ||||
| amidst/between/surrounded by/inside | ⁿdɛɛr | VW_024 | ⁿdɛɛr taχarkɛ "amidst the trees" | ||||
| between, in the middle between (2 things) | ⁿdɛɛrⁿdɛr | VW_024 | ⁿdɛɛⁿdɛr taχarkɛ "between the (two) trees" | ||||
| in front of | ᵐbaaᵐbir | JM_021, VW_054 | |||||
| over/above/on/up | tok | JM_021, VW_040 | used also as adv. "up" | ||||
| under | ɗoχang | ɗoχaᵑɡ, ɗoχaŋ | JM_021 | ɗoχaᵑɡ ᵐbaɟnɛ "under the blanket" | |||
| in/inside | kam | JM_021, VW_040 | |||||
| near/by/next to | paam | pam | JM_021, VW_040 | pam ⁿdaχarnɛ "by the tree" | |||
| behind | ka'taa | VW_040 | |||||
| around | kɛˈʋidna | VW_040 | |||||
| outside | ˈtafil | VW_040 | also N "outside" | ||||
| inside/in between/in the middle | a'ndeer | JM_012, VW_040 | |||||
| at | non | VW_024 | non ⁿdaχarnɛ "at the tree" | ||||
| toward | ɟof, ɟofin, ɟofna | VW_024 | ɟofna noqololɛ "toward the field" | ||||
| near to | mɛmaʔna | VW_024 | mɛˈmaʔna ⁿdaχarnɛ "close to the tree" | ||||
| far from | mɛgotna | VW_024 | |||||
| to | mɛna, mɛn | VW_054 | |||||
| at | n- | VW_054 | eg. noboχolɛ "at the dog" | ||||
| with | fo | VW_054 | fo ɟapil "with the knife", fo otɛo "with the woman" | ||||
| before | bala | VW_054 | |||||
| from | χatna no- | VW_068 | |||||
| from | inoorna no- | VW_068 | |||||
| during | anaᵑga | VW_068 | |||||
| during | yɛtɛ | VW_068 | |||||
| during/in | na | VW_068 | |||||
| until | botɛ | VW_068 | |||||
| until | bona | VW_068 | |||||
| until | booyaatɛ | VW_068 | |||||
| in front of | adoχ | VW_038 (JH_039) | derived from "leader" N |
Texts
File:121011G 067 Sereer time anecdote.wav
Old Pages
- Bari grammar (old main page) - Recordings and transcriptions (Bari) - Bari lexicon
