Ethnicity Soninke people ISO 639-3 snk | ISO 639-2 snk | |
Native speakers 2.1 million (2006–2011) Language family Niger–CongoMandeWestern MandeNorthwesternSoninke–BoboSoninke–BozoSoninke | ||
The Soninke language (Soninke: Sooninkanxanne) is a Mande language spoken by the Soninke people of West Africa. The language has an estimated 1,096,795 speakers, primarily located in Mali, and also (in order of numerical importance of the communities) in Senegal, Ivory Coast, The Gambia, Mauritania, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea and Ghana. It enjoys the status of a national language in Mali, Senegal, and Mauritania.
The language is relatively homogeneous, with only slight phonological, lexical, and grammatical variations.
Linguistically, its nearest relatives is the Bozo language, which is centered on the Inner Niger Delta.
It is possible that the language of the Imraguen people and the Nemadi dialect are dialects of Soninke.
References
Soninke language Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA