Kemezung language

Kemezung
Kemezung
Native to	Cameroon
Region	Northwest Province, Donga-Mantung Division, Southwest corner of Ako Subdivision, Northwest of Nkambé, town of Dumbu and village of Kwei.
Native speakers	3,540 (2008)
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Benue–Congo Southern Bantoid Eastern Beboid Kemezung; ; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	dmo
Glottolog	keme1240

Kemezung (Dumbo, Dumbu, Dzumbo, Kumaju) is a Southern Bantoid (Eastern Beboid) language of Cameroon. According to Ethnologue, it's 85% lexically similar to Bebe.^[1]

Consonants

Kemezung has 19 "unmodified" consonants.^[2] Cox also claims Kemezung has labialized, palatalized, and prenasalized consonants but does not list all of them.^[3]

		Labial	Coronal	Palatal	Velar	Labial–velar	Glottalic
Plosive	voiceless		t		k	k͡p
Plosive	voiced	b	d		g	g͡b
Affricate	voiceless		t͡s^[a]
Affricate	voiced		d͡z^[b]
Fricative		f	s^[c]				h
Nasal		m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Approximant			l^[d]	j^[e]		w

^ /t͡s/ becomes [t͡ʃ] before /i/.
^ /d͡z/ becomes [d͡ʒ] before /i/.
^ /s/ becomes [ʃ] before /i/. It becomes [s̬] or [ɾ] between vowels root-medially.
^ /l/ optionally becomes [d] in many words before /i/ root-medially.
^ /j/ optionally becomes [ʒ] before /i/ root-medially.

Vowels

Kemezung has 9 phonemic vowels.^[4]

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Close-mid	e	ɘ^[a]	o
Open-mid	ɛ	ɜ^[b]	ɔ
Open		ä

^ Cox uses ⟨ɨ⟩, which normally represents the close central unrounded vowel /ɨ/.
^ Cox uses ⟨ə⟩, which normally represents the mid central unrounded vowel /ə/.

Tone

Kemezung also has 7 (or possibly 8) tones.^[5] There are three level tones (high, mid, and low), three falling tones (high-low, mid-low, and long mid-low), and one or two rising tones (low-mid and possibly mid-high).

Notes

^ ^a ^b Kemezung at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^ Cox (2005:2)
^ Cox (2005:2–4)
^ Cox (2005:5)
^ Cox (2005:7–8)

References

Blench, Roger (2011). The membership and internal structure of Bantoid and the border with Bantu (PDF). Bantu IV, Humboldt University, Berlin.
Brye, Edward; Brye, Elizabeth (2004). "Intelligibility testing survey of Bebe and Kemezung and synthesis of sociolinguistic research of the Eastern Beboid cluster" (PDF). SIL. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-09-07.
Cox, Bruce (2005). "Notes on the Phonology of Kemezung" (PDF). Yaoundé: SIL. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2023-11-06.
Smoes, Christopher L. "A Sketch Grammar of the Kemezung language" (PDF). SIL. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2023-12-08.

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[4] /t͡s/ becomes [t͡ʃ] before /i/.

[5] /d͡z/ becomes [d͡ʒ] before /i/.

[6] /s/ becomes [ʃ] before /i/. It becomes [s̬] or [ɾ] between vowels root-medially.

[7] /l/ optionally becomes [d] in many words before /i/ root-medially.

[8] /j/ optionally becomes [ʒ] before /i/ root-medially.

[10] Cox uses ⟨ɨ⟩, which normally represents the close central unrounded vowel /ɨ/.

[11] Cox uses ⟨ə⟩, which normally represents the mid central unrounded vowel /ə/.

[e18-1] Kemezung at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

[2] Cox (2005:2)

[3] Cox (2005:2–4)

[9] Cox (2005:5)

[12] Cox (2005:7–8)

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[b]

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v t e Beboid languages
Eastern	Chung Bebe Kemezung Naki Saari Noni Fio Mbuk
Western	Mungbam Missong Mundabli Buu Mbu’ Lung Fang Koshin