Day language
Adamawa language spoken in southern Chad
title: "Day language" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["languages-of-chad", "mbum–day-languages"] description: "Adamawa language spoken in southern Chad" topic_path: "linguistics" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_language" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Adamawa language spoken in southern Chad ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox language"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Day |
| states | southern Chad |
| speakers | |
| date | 1993 census |
| ref | e18 |
| familycolor | Niger-Congo |
| fam2 | Atlantic–Congo |
| fam3 | Volta-Congo |
| fam4 | Savannas |
| fam5 | Mbum–Day |
| iso3 | dai |
| glotto | dayy1236 |
| glottorefname | Day |
| :: |
|name=Day |states=southern Chad |speakers= |date=1993 census |ref=e18 |familycolor=Niger-Congo |fam2=Atlantic–Congo |fam3=Volta-Congo |fam4=Savannas |fam5=Mbum–Day |iso3=dai |glotto=dayy1236 |glottorefname=Day
Day (also spelled Daye) is an Adamawa language of southern Chad, spoken by 50,000 or so people southeast of Sarh. Ethnologue reports that its dialects are mutually intelligible, but Blench (2004) lists Ndanga, Njira, Yani, Takawa as apparently separate languages.
Pierre Nougayrol's publications and field notes of Day from the 1970s constitute almost all of the available materials on the Day language.
Güldemann (2018) notes that Day has few morphological and lexical features that are typical of Niger-Congo, and hence cannot be classified with certainty.
Phonology
::data[format=table title="Consonants"]
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | Plosive | Implosive | Prenasalized | Fricative | Nasal | Approximant |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| :: |
::data[format=table title="Vowels"]
| Front | Central | Back | High | Mid-high | Mid-low | Low |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| :: |
There are three tones: high, low, and mid.
Lexicon
Some fish names in Day:
::data[format=table]
| Day (Bouna) | Scientific name |
|---|---|
| gàgà | Chrysichthys auratus |
| jí yēē | Hepsetus odoe |
| gūrú | Heterobranchus bidorsalis |
| bɔ́gɔ̀ | Heterotis niloticus |
| sɔ̄rɔ̄ŋ | Ophiocephalus obscurus |
| jīɲ | Protopterus annectens |
| kɔ̀tɔ̀kúnɔ̀ | Tetraodon fahaka |
| :: |
Other animal names:
- kòŋní ʔólò (Pila wernei), a gastropod
Plant names in Day:
::data[format=table]
References
- Roger Blench, 2004. List of Adamawa languages (ms)
References
- Nougayrol, Pierre. 1979. Le day de Bouna (Tchad), I: phonologie, syntagmatique nominale, synthématique. (Bibl. de la SELAF (Société des Etudes Linguistiques et Anthropologiques de France), 71-72.) Paris: Paris. 174pp.
- Nougayrol, Pierre. 1980. Le Day de Bouna (Tchad), II: Lexique Day-Français, Index Français-Day. (Société d'Études Linguistiques et Anthropologiques de France, 77-78.) Paris: Centre National de la Récherche Sciéntifique. 176pp.
- Nougayrol, P. 1977. Éléments de phonologie du day de Bouna. In Caprile, J.-P. (ed.), Études phonologiques tchadiennes, 213-231. Paris: SELAF.
- Güldemann, Tom. (2018). "The Languages and Linguistics of Africa". De Gruyter Mouton.
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