Urhobo | |
States: | Nigeria |
Region: | Delta State, Edo State |
Ethnicity: | Urhobo people |
Speakers: | million |
Date: | 2020 |
Ref: | e25 |
Familycolor: | Niger-Congo |
Fam2: | Atlantic–Congo |
Fam3: | Volta–Niger |
Fam5: | Edoid |
Fam6: | Southwestern |
Iso3: | urh |
Glotto: | urho1239 |
Glottorefname: | Urhobo |
Notice: | IPA |
Urhobo is a South-Western Edoid language[1] spoken by the Urhobo people of southern Nigeria.[2] [3] It is from the Delta and Bayelsa States.[4]
Urhobo has a rather reduced system of sound inventory compared to proto-Edoid. The inventory of Urhobo consists of seven vowels; which form two harmonic sets, pronounced as //i e ɛ a o ɔ u// and pronounced as //ĩ ẽ ɛ̃ ã ɔ̃ õ ũ//.[5]
It has a conservative consonant inventory for an Edoid language. It maintains three nasals, and only five oral consonants, pronounced as //ɾ, l, β̞, j, w//, have nasal allophones before nasal vowels.[6]
Labial | Labiodental | Alveolar | Post-alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labio-velar | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nasal | align=center | pronounced as /m/ | align=center | (pronounced as /n/) | align=center | pronounced as /ɲ/ | align=center | pronounced as /ŋ͡m/ | |||||
Plosive | align=center | pronounced as /p b/ | align=center | pronounced as /t d/ | align=center | pronounced as /d͡ʒ/ | align=center | pronounced as /kʲ ɡʲ/ | align=center | pronounced as /k ɡ/ | align=center | pronounced as /k͡p ɡ͡b/ | |
Fricative | align=center | pronounced as /ɸ / | align=center | pronounced as /f v/ | align=center | pronounced as /s/ | align=center | pronounced as /ʃ/ | (pronounced as /ç ʝ/) | pronounced as /x ɣ/ | |||
Trill | align=center | pronounced as /r̥ r/ | |||||||||||
Flap | align=center | pronounced as /(ɾ̥ ɾ)/ | |||||||||||
Lateral | align=center | pronounced as /l ~ n/ | |||||||||||
Approximant | pronounced as /β̞ [β̞̃ ]/ | (pronounced as /ɹ̥ ɹ/) [{{IPA|ɹ̃}}] | pronounced as /j [j̃]/ | (pronounced as /ɰ ɰ̥/) | pronounced as /w [w̃]/ |
According to Anthony Ukere, Urhobo has two tones, a high tone and a low tone. These can also combine to form rising and falling tones.[7]
Urhobo has the SVO constituent order type as illustrated with the example below: