- The conclusions presented in this paper are based on my own observations and on information gathered from other European sources, written and oral. The following is a bibliography of the literature on Sango and on its mother-language, including the latter's related dialects: G. H. Brachiel, Vocabulaire Sangho (Haut Oubangui), Paris: Boyard, 1909, pp. 173; Georges Bruel, Noms donnés par des populations de l'Oubangui et du Chari à des planètes, à des étoiles et á des constellations, Journal de la Société des Africanistes, tome 2, fase. I (1932), pp. 49–53; Burssens, De Klinkerphonemen in het Gbandi, Kongo Overzee, pp. 257–270 (1936); J. Calloc'h, Vocabulaire Français-Sango el Sango-Fran¸ais (langue commerciale de l'Oubangui-Chari) précédé d'un abrégé grammatical, Paris: Geuthner, 1911, pp. 86; M. Clerc, Glossaire Sango, Bulletin de la Société d'Anthropologie de Paris, 2.306–319 (1911); M. Clerc, Grammaire Sango, BS A P 2.303–306 (1911); A. F. Eboué, Langues Sango, Banda, Baya, Mandjia (Notes grammaticales, mois groupés d'après le sens, phrases usuelles, vocabulaire), Paris: Larousse, 1918, pp. 109; M. Gaudefroy-Demombynes, Documents sur les langues de l'Oubangui-Chari (Actes du XIVe Congrès International des Orientalistes), Paris: Leroux, 1906 or 1907, pp. 116; M. Gérard, Langue Commerciale de l'Oubangui-Chari, 1930; G. Giraud, Vocabulaires sango, mandjia, banda, bakongo, et azande, Revue Coloniale (Paris), pp. 263–291, 332–354 (1908); G. Giraud, Vocabulaire des dialectes Sango, Bakongo et A'Zandé (Congo Français), Paris: Challamel, 1908, pp. 58 (others say pp. 49–58); Joseph Greenberg, review of Lekens (1952) in Language 29. 576–577 (1953); P. Heese, Die Sango-Sprache, Zeitschrift fur Eingeborenen Sprachen, vol. 10, num. 2 (1920); E. Kêrux et San-youen, Sango, Bangui: Mission Catholique, 1950, pp. 151 (grammar and French-Sango dictionary); Benjamin Lekens, Dictionnaire ngbandi (Ubangi-Congo Belge) (Annales du Musée Royal du Congo Belge; Sciences de l'Homme: Linguistique, vol. 1), Anvers: Éditions de Sikkel, 1952, pp. XII, 348; Lekens, Nota over het Ngbandi als voertaal in Ubangi, Kongo Overzee 17.162–164 (1951); Lekens, Spraakkunst der Ngbanditaal, Brugge, 1923; Quentin D. Nelson, Linguistic Problems in Ngbandi, The Bible Translator 3.39–45 (1952); William J. Samarin, Learning Sango: A Pedagogical Grammar, Bozoum (F. E. A.): Mission Évangélique de l'Oubangui-Chari, mimeographed, 1953, pp. xi, 123; B. Tanghe, La langue ngbandi, Aequaloria, vol. 3, p. 104; B. Tanghe, Les langues zande et ngbandi, notes cursives, Congo, num. 2, pp. 203–217 (1926); Charles Tisscrant, Catalogue de la Flore de l'Oubangui-Chari (Mémoires de l'Institut d'Études Centrafricaines, num. 2), Brazzaville: I. E. C., 1950, pp. 166; Tisserant, Sango: véhiculaire de l'Oubangui-Chari, Issy-les-Moulineaux (France): Les Presses Missionnaires, 1950, pp. 272; William Welmers, review of Lekens (1952) in Word 10.115–116 (1954).
- In this paper most of the references are to the lingua franca. Where confusion might arise, the terms lingua franca vs. vernacular are used. Other terms are carelessly used to describe languages with little prestige, namely, trade language, dialect, patois, langue véhiculaire, langue commerciale, sabir, volapük, etc. Many linguistically naïve persons call any language other than a standard language a dialect. Thus, people refer to the dialects of Africa, meaning the languages of Africa. There are those, even among linguists, who find it very difficult to call the pidgin languages veritable languages and show little respect for them, even as fit subjects for linguistic analysis. (See the comments on Bangala by Malcolm Guthrie, Grammaire et Dictionnaire de Lingala, Lépoldville: La Librairie Évangélique au Congo, 1951, pp. x, 190) Some recent descriptions of creolized languages demonstrate how untenable this view is. See Douglas Taylor, Phonemes of Caribbean Creole, Word 3.173–179; Structural Outline of Caribbean Creole 7.43–59 (1951); Robert A. Hall, Jr., Haitian Creole (Grammar, Texts, Vocabulary), American Anthropological Society (vol. 55, memoir 74), 1953, pp. 309.
- André Teuillières, L'Oubangui Face à l'Avenir, Paris: Éditions de l'Union Française, 1953, pp. 128 with maps. Page 97 cited.
- Leonard Bloomfield, Language (New York, 1933), pp. 471–475. Other works are cited by Uriel Weinreich in Languages in Contact, Linguistic Circle of New York, Publication no. 1, 1953, pp. XII, 148.
- First published by the British and Foreign Bible Society in 1933. It depends a great deal on the Sango dialect found near Bangassou for words that do not exist in the lingua franca.
- Georges Bruel, La France Équatoriale Africaine, Paris: Larousse, 1935, pp. VI, 558. See pp. 165–166.
- Their occupation of Oubangui-Chari is reviewed with these dates: Posts from Bangui to Rafai were established between 1890–1894, Ft. Sibut 1896, Ft. Crampel 1897. Most of Oubangui-Chari was occupied and pacified by 1910. Teuillières, op. cil.
- Some of the Sango people have therefore called the trade language Sango ti tùlùgù ‘Sango of soldiers’. It is also known as Sango ti sàlàwisi (<Fr. service) ‘Sango of those who go away from the village to work for money’.
- Languages in Contact.
- H. Baumann and D. Westermann (translated by L. Homburger) Les Peuples el Les Civilisations de l'Afrique suivi de Les Langues et l'Éducation, Paris: Payot, 1948, pp. 605. See p. 294.
- Teuillières (op. cit., p. 88), without the benefit of documentation to substantiate his statements, clearly distinguishes what he calls the Oubanguian races (Sango, Yakoma, Buraka, Gbanziri) from the other neighboring peoples. « Leur activité essentielle ètait la pêche et le commerce et, de plus, on rencontrait chez certaines d'entre elles de nombreux forgerons; les populations terriennes voisines du fleuve cultivaient le sol pour leur compte et leur fournissaient les aliments ».
- Op. cil., p. 451.
- David L. Olmstead reviews this subject in the article Achumawi-Atsugewi Non-Reciprocal Intelligibility, IJAL 20.181–184 (1954). « If two languages A and B are such that certain morphemes of high text frequency in A characteristically have only one allomorph, while parallel ones in B characteristically have four allomorphs, including one identical (or nearly so) with the corresponding single allomorph of A, and there are few other differences between them, there might exist a case of nonreciprocal intelligibility, i.ˆ., speakers of B might also understand A, but not vice versa. »
- G. Hulstaert, Carle Linguistique du Congo Belge, Bruxelles: Institut Royal Colonial Belge, 1950. Page 48 cited.
- G. Hulstaert, Les langues indigènes et les Européens au Congo Belge, African Studies 5.126–135 (1946). Page 128 referred to.
- Julien Maigret, Afrique Équatoriale Française, Paris: Société d'Éditions Géographiques, Maritimes et Coloniales, 1931, pp. 218. Page 78 cited.
- Nelson, Linguistic Problems in Ngbandi.
- This is true of the Isungu, but not so true of the Gbaya, who tend to use Banda words more than they do their own.
- The posts are those large villages where reside, at the minimum, a chef de district who is a European administrator. The « bush » is all the area outside of the posts.
- The dictionary of Sango, excluding the little-used French words and those imposed on the language in the religious literature, includes hardly more than 800 words. Because too many are prone to underestimate the lexical wealth of the so-called « primitive languages », I must reassure the reader that I have not.
- It therefore constitutes an example of an otherwise inferior language serving as a means to social advance, a case not apparently envisaged by Weinreich, who cites only standard languages (op. cit. 78, 95).
- Compare the situation in the Belgian Congo, where literate Africans are advocating the more extensive use of French to the loss of the indigenous languages (e.g. Emmanuel Birhashirwa, Le problème des langues au Congo, Voix du Congolais 8.323–325, June, 1952).
- Results of the Conference of Anthropologists and Linguists (supplement to IJAL vol. 19, memoir 8), 1953. Page 16 cited.
- Yet Sango may be responsible for the apparent merging of Gbea /ǐ/ and /ř/ which apparently are for some speakers separate phonemes, the allophones of /ř/ being [l] and [ř]. The adults say that the children especially use [ř] where they would use [ǐ]. The Sango literature may somehow be responsible for this merging of phonemes, for it inconsistently uses both l and r in the orthography.
- Although Sango is not officially recognized, I have been told by unofficial sources that French administrators are encouraged to learn it and are rewarded for their achievement upon passing an examination with some kind of monetary bonus.
- This statement should not be interpreted as an endorsement for the development of the language.
- There are numerous other differences between the Protestant and Roman Catholic Sango literatures, namely, with respect to punctuation, syntax, and vocabulary. Kêrux helpfully indicates in his dictionary all words that are typically Protestant and Catholic. In actual speech, however, there is virtually no difference between the speech of the members of the two religious groups.
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