User:Maradeleonm/Chakali language

Lead
Chakali (tʃàkálɪ́ɪ́)[1] is a Gur language of Ghana, spoken by almost 3,500 individuals, in several villages in the Wa East District of the Upper West Region. More specifically, Chakali is spoken by inhabitants of the Tiisa, Sogla, Tousa, Motigu, Ducie, Katua and Gurumbele villages. The majority of Chakali speakers also speak Waali or Bulengi. Some believe that the language of Chakali is soon to be extinct, with Waali and Bulengi becoming the only languages that will be spoken in those villages. [2]

[1 ISO 639-3: cli (Lewis, Simons & Fennig 2016); Glottocode: chak1271 (Hammarström et al. 2016)]

2 Brindle, Jonathan. 2017. A dictionary and grammatical outline of Chakali. (African Language Grammars and Dictionaries 2). Berlin: Language Science Press. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.344813

Tone and Intonation
Chakali is considered a tone language; variations in pitch are used to change the lexical and grammatical meaning of words and phrases. Chakali has two major categories of tone: high and low; mid tones cause no lexical change and are considered to be derived from either high or low tones (such that a mid tone is considered to be either a lowered high tone or a raised low tone). Tones may also be considered as contour tones: either as falling or rising.

Numerals
Chakali’s number system can be separated into atomic numbers and complex. Atomic numbers include 1-8, 10, 20, 100, and 1000. Complex numbers can be obtained through the subtraction, addition and/or multiplication of its units. For example. fɪ́dɪ̀dɪ́gɪ́túò (nineteen) is the addition of fɪ́ (10), dɪ (and), and dɪ́gɪ́tūō (9). Note: In numbers 11-19 /dɪ/ can change to /d/ if the following unit begins with a vowel like in fɪ́dàŋɔ̃ (15).

Numbers 21-99 are formed by multiples of 20; like in the French number system, where 80 is formed by multiplying 4 times 20, quatre-vingt. For example: màtféó álɪ́é ànɪ́ fɪ́dālʊ̄pɛ̀ (57) which translates directly to twenty, two and seventeen.

Numbers 101-999 and 1001+ are formed likewise, but in multiples of 100's and 1000's. For example: 1999 is tʊ́sʊ̀ ànɪ́ kɔ̀sá dɪ́gɪ́tūō ànɪ́ màftéó ànáásɛ̀ àní fɪ́dɪ̀dɪ́gɪ́túò, which translates directly to 1000 and 100's, 9 and 20, 4 and 19. Note: hundred and thousand have plural forms.