Giryama dialect

Giryama is a dialect variety of the Mijikenda language spoken along the southern coast of Kenya, predominantly in the Kilifi district.

Giryama
Native to	Kenya
Region	Kilifi district
Ethnicity	Mijikenda, Giryama
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Volta-Congo Benue–Congo Bantoid Southern Bantoid Bantu Northeast Bantu Northeast Coast Bantu Mijikenda Giryama
Language codes
ISO 639-3	nyf
Glottolog	giry1241

Phonology

Consonants

		Bilabial		Labio- dental	Dental/Alveolar		Post-alv./ Palatal	Velar		Glottal
		plain	lab.		plain	sibilant		plain	lab.
Nasal		m	mʷ		n		ɲ	ŋ
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p			t	t͡s	t͡ʃ	k	kʷ	(ʔ)
	aspirated	pʰ			tʰ	t͡sʰ	tʃʰ	kʰ	kʷʰ
	voiced	b			d	d͡z	d͡ʒ	ɡ	ɡʷ
	prenasal	ᵐb			ⁿd	ⁿd͡z	ᶮd͡ʒ	ᵑɡ	ᵑɡʷ
Fricative	voiceless			f		s	ʃ			h
	voiced	β		v	ð	z	ʒ
Rhotic					ɾ ~ r
Lateral					l
Approximant							j		w

• Labialized sounds /mʷ, kʷ, kʷʰ, ɡʷ, ᵑɡʷ/ can alternatively be pronounced as labio-velar stops [ŋ͡m, k͡p, k͡pʰ, ɡ͡b, ᵑɡ͡b] among speakers in free variation.
• /ɾ/ may have allophones as either [ɾ], [r] or [ɹ], all heard interchangeably.
• [ʔ] is only heard in between vowel sounds, to break up a sequence of two vowels.^[1]
• Taylor (1891), noted two dental stops [t̪, d̪], however they were not easy to identify and therefore are not considered as phonemes.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	e		o
Open		a