Editing Bambara language (section)

== Writing ==
[[File:Delaforge - Grammaire et méthode Bambara - p184.jpg|thumb|Page from Francis Delaforge's ''Grammaire et méthode Bambara'' (1949)]]
Since 1967, Bambara has mostly been written in the [[Latin script]], using some additional phonetic characters from the [[Africa Alphabet]]. The vowels are ''a, e, [[ɛ]]'' (formerly ''[[è]]''<span style="margin-left:3px">)</span>, ''i, o, [[ɔ]]'' (formerly ''[[ò]]''<span style="margin-left:3px">)</span>, ''u''<span style="margin-left:2px">;</span> accents can be used to indicate tonality. The former digraph ''ny'' is now written ''[[ɲ]]'' when it designates a palatal nasal; the ''ny'' spelling is kept for the combination of a nasal vowel with a subsequent oral palatal glide. Following the 1966 Bamako spelling conventions, a velar nasal "[[ŋ]]" is written as "[[ŋ]]", although in early publications it was often transcribed as ''ng'' or ''nk''.

The [[N'Ko script|N'Ko]] ({{langx|nqo|ߒߞߏ}}) alphabet is a script devised by [[Solomana Kante]] in 1949 as a writing system for the Manding languages of West Africa; N’Ko means 'I say' in all Manding languages. Kante created N’Ko in response to what he felt were beliefs that Africans were a "cultureless people" since prior to this time there had been no indigenous African writing system for his language. N'ko first gained a strong user base around the Maninka-speaking area of Kante's hometown of Kankan, Guinea and disseminated from there into other Manding-speaking parts of West Africa. N'ko, and the [[Arabic script]], also known as the [[Ajami script]], are still in use for Bambara, although only the Latin-based orthography is officially recognized in Mali.

Additionally, a script known as [[Masaba script|Masaba]] or Ma-sa-ba<ref>{{cite book |last1=Brock-Utne |first1=Birgit |title=Language and Power. The Implications of Language for Peace and Development: The Implications of Language for Peace and Development |last2=Garbo |first2=Gunnar |date=2009 |publisher=African Books Collective |isbn=9789987081462 |location=Oxford |page=146}}</ref>  was developed for the language beginning in 1930 by [[Woyo Couloubayi]] ({{Circa|1910}}-1982) of [[Assatiémala]].  Named for the first characters in Couloubayi's preferred [[collation]] order, Masaba is a [[syllabary]] which uses diacritics to indicate vowel qualities such as [[Tone (linguistics)|tone]], [[Vowel length|length]], and [[nasalization]].  Though not conclusively demonstrated to be related to other writing systems, Masaba appears to draw on traditional Bambara iconography and shares some similarities with the [[Vai syllabary]] of Liberia and with Arabic-derived secret alphabets used in [[Hodh]] (now [[Hodh El Gharbi Region|Hodh El Gharbi]] and [[Hodh Ech Chargui Region|Hodh Ech Chargui]] [[Regions of Mauritania]]). As of 1978, Masaba was in limited use in several communities in [[Nioro Cercle]] for accounting, personal correspondence, and the recording of Muslim prayers; the script's current status and prevalence is unknown.<ref name="galtier">{{cite journal |last1=Galtier |first1=Gérard |date=1987 |title=Un exemple d'écriture traditionnelle mandingue : le «masaba» des Bambara-Masasi du Mali |url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/jafr_0399-0346_1987_num_57_1_2174 |journal=Journal des Africanistes |volume=57 |issue=1–2 |pages=255–266 |doi=10.3406/jafr.1987.2174 |access-date=18 March 2020}}</ref><ref name="Kelly">{{cite book |last1=Kelly |first1=Piers |url=https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/253vc/ |title=STUDI MICENEI ED EGEO-ANATOLICI NUOVA SERIE SUPPLEMENTO 1 Paths into Script Formation in the Ancient Mediterranean |date=2018 |publisher=CNR – Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche |isbn=978-88-7140-898-9 |editor1-last=Ferrara |editor1-first=Silvia |location=Rome |pages=189–209 |chapter=Chapter 9: The Invention, Transmission, and Evolution of Writing: Insights from the New Scripts of West Africa |doi=10.31235/osf.io/253vc |editor2-last=Valério |editor2-first=Miguel}}</ref>
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There are some or just one? [[User:Guaka|G-u-a-k-@]] hasn't found any yet, after nearly 3 months in Bamako.. :(  newspapers in Bambara. -->

===Latin orthography===
It uses seven vowels a, e, ɛ, i, o, ɔ and u, each of which can be nasalized, pharyngealized and murmured, giving a total number of 21 vowels (the letters approximate their [[help:IPA|IPA]] equivalents). {{citation needed|date=June 2018}}
Writing with the Latin alphabet began during the [[French West Africa|French]] colonization, and the first orthography was introduced in 1967. Literacy is limited, especially in rural areas. Although written literature is only slowly evolving (due to the predominance of French as the "language of the educated"), there exists a wealth of [[oral tradition|oral literature]], which is often tales of kings and heroes. This oral literature is mainly passed on by the [[griot]]s (''Jeliw'' in Bambara) who are a mixture of [[storytelling|storyteller]]s, praise singers, and human history books who have studied the trade of singing and reciting for many years. Many of their songs are very old and are said to date back to the old empire of Mali.

===Alphabet===
* A – a – [a]
* B – be – [b]
* C – ce – [t͡ʃ]
* D – de – [d]
* E – e – [e]
* Ɛ – ɛ – [ɛ]
* F – ef – [f]
* G – ge – [g]
* H – ha – [h]
* I – i – [i]
* J – je – [d͡ʒ]
* K – ka – [k]
* L – ɛl – [l]
* M – ɛm – [m]
* N – ɛn – [n]
* Ɲ – ɲe – [ɲ]
* Ŋ – ɛŋ – [ŋ]
* O – o – [o]
* Ɔ – ɔ – [ɔ]
* P – pe – [p]
* R – ɛr – [r]
* S – ɛs – [s]
* T – te – [t]
* U – u – [u]
* W – wa – [w]
* Y – ye – [j]
* Z – ze – [z]

===Other letters===
* kh – [ɣ] (used for loanwords from other African languages)
* -n – nasalises vowel
* sh – she – [ʃ] (regional variant of s)<ref>{{cite web |title=Bambara alphabet, pronunciation, and language |url=https://omniglot.com/writing/bambara.htm |access-date=29 June 2021 |website=Omniglot}}</ref>

===N'ko orthography===
====Vowels====
* ߊ – a – [a]
* ߋ – e – [e]
* ߌ – i – [i]
* ߍ – ɛ – [ɛ]
* ߎ – u – [u]
* ߏ – o – [o]
* ߐ – ɔ – [ɔ]

====Consonants====
* ߓ – ba – [b]
* ߔ – pa – [p]
* ߕ – ta – [t]
* ߖ – ja – [d͡ʒ]
* ߗ – ca – [t͡ʃ]
* ߘ – da – [d]
* ߚ/ߙ – ra – [r]
* ߛ – sa – [s]
* ߜ? – ga – [g/ʀ/ɣ]
* ߜ – gba – [ɡ͡b]
* ߝ – fa – [f]
* ߞ – ka – [k]
* ߟ – la – [l]
* ߡ – ma – [m]
* ߢ – nya or ɲa – [ɲ]
* ߒ – nga or ŋa – [ŋ]
* ߣ – na – [n]
* ߥ – wa – [w]
* ߦ – ya – [j]
* ߤ – ha – [h]
* ߲ – nasal vowel – [-̃]

====Tones====
* ߫ – short high
* ߬ – short low
* ߯ – long high
* ߰ – long low<ref>{{cite web |title=Bambara alphabet, pronunciation, and language |url=https://omniglot.com/writing/bambara.htm |access-date=27 June 2021 |website=Omniglot}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |date=31 May 2019 |title=Bambara Alphabet and Pronunciation (N'ko and Latin) |url=https://www.ankataa.com/blog/bambara-alphabet |access-date=28 June 2021 |website=An ka taa}}</ref>