Bambara

What Bambara shares with Manding

Bambara is one variety of Manding, a group of closely related languages whose speakers trace their history to the medieval Mali Empire. Speakers of the different varieties generally understand one another, depending on exposure, and Manding is spoken in Burkina Faso, Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, Ivory Coast and the Gambia. Bambara is very close to Dyula of Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso, whose name means trader. Its heartland lies east, south and north of Bamako, with Ségou as the historic centre.

Which alphabet Mali recognises

Writing in Latin letters began under French rule, and the first orthography came in 1967, following the Bamako spelling conventions of 1966. It uses seven vowels, including ɛ and ɔ, and writes the palatal nasal as ɲ. Solomana Kante created N'Ko in 1949 for all Manding languages; the name means "I say". N'Ko and Ajami remain in use, but only the Latin orthography is officially recognised. A fourth script, the Masaba syllabary, was devised from 1930 by Woyo Couloubayi and was still used in 1978 in parts of Nioro Cercle.

How French words enter Bambara

Arabic loans cluster in religion and trade, some of them passed on through Soninke. French supplies many more, usually with an i added: neige, snow, becomes niegei, for a thing Mali has never seen. In Bamako speech French conjunctions often mark a switch into French mid-sentence. Oral literature is carried by griots, the jeliw.