World languages, following Heine and Nurse (2004), are divided into four major groups or phyla. The group Afro-Asiatic or Hamito-Semitic, the group Nilo-Saharan Phylum, the group Khoisan, and the group Niger-Congo languages. The Niger-Congo constitutes one of the largest language family in the world; the third largest language family following Thompson (2015) and the largest language family in Africa following Greenberg (1970) and Williamson and Blench (2000). Niger-Congo languages are the most important in terms of number of speakers and number of distinct languages and also in space; see Greenberg (1949–1954) and Thompson (2015). See also Williamson (1989a:21), Bendor and Rhonda (1989) for the delimitation of the Niger-Congo languages in a region of Africa. Most of the Sub-Saharan Africa languages are from this group of languages; see Stewart (1960–1970).
Varied works have tried to give the possible relations between these languages; see Koelle (1854), Giacinto Brusciotto (1659), Christaller (1875), and Greenberg (1940–1950). The Niger-Congo group contains Bantu, Kwa, Mande, Gur, and Senufo languages. Senufo languages are considered as a group of language on their own at the same level as the Gur languages according to Glottolog. In older classifications, Senufo was part of the Gur family.
Many discussions are going on the classification of the Niger-Congo languages. But the one used for the classification of the languages of this group in this work is the classification of Williamson (1989a:21) as mentioned in (1). The line (iii) in bold at the bottom of the classification is added by us according to Glottolog.
(1) Niger-Congo classification, see Williamson (1989a:21)
A. Kordofanian
B. Mande [2];
C. Atlantic-Congo
1. Ijoid (?) [4h]
2. Atlantic (?) [1]
a. North
b. Bijago
c. South
3. Volta-Congo
a. Kru (?) [4a]
←21 | 22→
b. (New) Kwa [4b]
c. (New) Benue-Congo [4c, 4d, 4e, 4 f, 4g, 5, 6A3]
d. Dogon (?) [3b]
e. North Volta-Congo
i. Gur [3a, 3c, 3d, 3e, 3 f, 3g]
ii. Adamawa-Ubangi [6 (except 6A3)]
iii. Senufo languages
The Gur languages, formerly called and classified into the Voltaïc languages, are the ones that hold our attention. These are spoken in the Southern Mali and Burkina Faso, in the Northern Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana and Togo. More precisely the zone located between the 7° longitude West and the 4° longitude East on the one hand, the 8 ° and the 14 ° latitude North on the other hand according to Mensah and Tchagbale (1983), see Fig. 1.
Fig. 1: The map of West Africa including Côte d´Ivoire
In Côte d’Ivoire the group Gur is composed of several subgroups of languages and among these subgroups are found the Koulango, the Oti-Volta languages, the Gurunsi languages, the Lobi laguages, the Kirma-Tyurama, and the Senufo languages to which the Fròʔò (Tagbana) belongs to; see Mensah and Tchagbale (1983). According to these authors, the Senufo languages are grouped into subgroups namely the subgroup Senari, the subgroup Tagbana-Djimini, and the ←22 | 23→other languages that constitute a group, the ‘others group’ as the authors called it. The language that is about in this book belongs to this group of languages, the Senufo languages.
Located in the North, in the Badaman valley in Côte d´Ivoire, Tagbana dialects cover a linguistic area from Katiola to Tafiré via Fronan, Niakaramandougou, Timbé, and Tortya localities. This area is limited in the north by the towns of Korhogo and Ferkessédougou, in the south by the town of Bouaké, in the East and the West, respectively, by the towns of Dabakala and Mankono. Tagbana is characterized by a strong dialectal differentiation. Each village has its own tonal and melodic structure that slightly distinguishes it from the others. But they are all intelligible with one another. All speakers of these different languages (dialects) identify themselves as Tagbana speakers which has been proposed by Mensah and Tchagbale (1983) to be constituted by three groups of subdialects: the dialect around Katiola very close to that of Fronan (Fròʔò), the dialect of the region of Niakaramandougou known as (takpɛr) and the group of Tafiré. All these dialects contain subgroups as well, and about 180 000 persons speak the language.
1.3 Social and political organization
The Tagbana society is stratified into seven large families. Each family, with the exception of two which share the same surname, has a surname of its own. The Hala and Haragon share the surname Traore. The Tuo have the Touré surname; the Ouattara correspond to Tiré; Koné correspond to Hili and Camara to Ngongon. The Hili would have the mission of maintenance and organization of the seven families. They have the monopoly of political power. The social hierarchy is similar to most of African societies hierarchies. We have the children, grouped in age classes, the fathers, the heads of families, the head of village (village chief), the tribal chiefs/head, and township chiefs. All these personalities except for the children ensure the political and the social activity within the population.
The traditional social and political functions of the locality are distributed as follows: The township chief is at the top level of the hierarchy. He has unlimited powers. He is the guide of the canton, and his authority is not controversial. In other words, he is the first administrative personality of the canton.
At a lower level, roughly equal to that of the chief of the canton, there is the chief of tribe who is also in charge with some important affairs of his tribe. He is helped by the notables but he cannot substitute for the canton chief whose succession is in his descent.
←23 | 24→
Then comes the tráfɔ́lɔ́ ‘the landlord’ or the land manager. His task is to make worships for the tribe and members of the tribe when necessary and also to organize the religious life given the different beliefs.
His level is followed by that of the village chief kàʔàfɔ̀lɔ́. He is assisted in his duties by the notables who constitute the village chiefdom. He plays the role of a judge, he settles disputes, and takes appropriate measures in agreement with its notables for a better social cohesion.
After his level,