Berta language

Berta proper, a.k.a. Gebeto, is spoken by the Berta (also Bertha, Barta, Burta) in Sudan and Ethiopia. As of 2006 Berta had approximately 180,000 speakers in Sudan.^[2]

Berta
Gebeto
Native to	Sudan and Ethiopia
Region	Benishangul-Gumuz
Ethnicity	Berta people, Wetawit
Native speakers	380,000 all Berta languages (2006–2007)[1] 100,000 monolinguals in Ethiopia[1]
Language family	Nilo-Saharan? Berta languages Berta
Dialects	Shuru Bake Undu Mayu Fadashi Dabuso Beleje Gonfoye
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	wti (all Berta languages)
Glottolog	bert1248

The three Berta languages, Gebeto, Fadashi and Undu, are often considered dialects of a single language. Berta proper includes the dialects Bake, Dabuso, Gebeto, Mayu, and Shuru; the dialect name Gebeto may be extended to all of Berta proper.^[3]

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Stop	voiced	b		d	ɟ	g
	ejective	pʼ		tʼ	(cʼ)	kʼ	(ʔ)
	implosive			ɗ
Fricative	voiceless	f	θ	s	ʃ		h
	ejective			sʼ
Nasal		m		n	(ɲ)	ŋ
Rhotic				r
Lateral				l
Approximant					j	w

• Voiced plosives /b, d, ɡ/ may be heard as voiceless [p, t, k] in free variation, word-initially or word-finally.
• A glottal stop [ʔ] mainly occurs between vowels, and may also be heard before word-initial vowel sounds.
• Nasal-stop sequences may occur morpheme-initially as [mb, nd, ŋɡ, ŋkʼ].
• /ŋ/ is heard as [ɲ] when preceding a front vowel /i/ or /e/.
• /kʼ/ is heard as a palatal [cʼ] when before front vowels.
• /ɡ/ can be heard as voiced palatal [ɟ] or as a voiceless palatal [c] when before front vowels.
• /h/ in word-final position can be heard as a fricative [x].
• /s, θ/ may sometimes occur as slightly voiced [z, ð] in vocalic or nasal environments.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i iː		u uː
Mid	ɛ ɛː		ɔ ɔː
Open		a aː

• If a non-closed vowel sound, /ɛ/ or /ɔ/, are adjacent to a closed vowel sound like /i/ or /u/ within vowel harmony, they are then heard as more closed [e, o].^[4]

Phoneme	Allophone
/i/	[i], [ɨ~ɘ], [ɨ], [ɪ]
/a/	[a], [ə], [æ], [ɜ], [ɐ]
/u/	[u], [ʉ], [ʊ]

Pronouns

The pronouns of Berta are as follows:

	Topic	Postverbal subject	Postverbal object
I	àl(ì)	-lɪ́ɪ̀	-ɟì
you (sg.)	(à)ŋɡó	-ŋó	-ŋɡó
he, she, it	ɲìnè	-né	ɲìnè, -né
we	χàtâŋ	-ŋàa	χàtâŋ
you (pl.)	χàtú	χátú	χàtú
they	mèrée	mérée	mèrée

See also

• Berta word lists (Wiktionary)