Xam language
| ǀXam | |
|---|---|
| Region | South Africa, Lesotho |
| Extinct | 20th century |
|
Tuu
|
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | |
| Glottolog | xamm1241 |
ǀXam (/Kham) (IPA: [|͡xam], English pronunciation /ˈkɑːm/), or ǀXam Kaǃkʼe, is an extinct Khoisan language of South Africa, part of the ǃUi branch of the Tuu languages. It is closely related to the moribund Nǁng language. Much of the scholarly work on ǀXam was performed by Wilhelm Bleek, a German linguist of the 19th century, who studied a variety of ǀXam spoken at Achterveld, and (with Lucy Lloyd) another spoken at Strandberg and Katkop.
The pipe at the beginning of the name "ǀXam" represents a dental click, like the English interjection tsk, tsk! used to express pity or shame. The ⟨x⟩ denotes a voiceless velar fricative click accompaniment.
Compared to other Khoisan languages, there is little variation in rendering the name though it is sometimes seen with the simple orthographic variant ǀKham, as well as a different grammatical form, ǀKhuai.
Compared to other Tuu languages like Taa, ǀXam has a more restricted inventory of consonants particularly the clicks, where there are only 8 series of click accompaniments, far fewer than East !Xoon Taa's 18. A preliminary consonant inventory of ǀXam, including egressive stops, fricatives, and affricates as well as ingressive clicks, is listed below.
Bleek notes that particular animal figures in ǀXam mythology have distinctive speech patterns, including ingressive sounds and changes in click type. For example, the Tortoise speaks with predominantly bilabial clicks, the Ichneumon uses palatal and dental click-sibilant clusters, and the Jackal is even said to use an unusual lateralised bilabial click. The Moon, Hare and Anteater even use an "unpronounceable" click in place of all clicks save the bilabial. Other changes noted include the Blue Crane's speech, who ends the first syllable of almost every word with a /t/.
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