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Iyive language

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Iyive
Uive
Yiive
Native toCameroon, Nigeria
RegionManyu in Cameroon, Benue State in Nigeria[1]
EthnicityNdir[1]
Native speakers
(2,000 cited 1996)[2]
Language codes
ISO 639-3uiv Iyive
Glottologiyiv1238  Iyive
ELPIyive

Iyive, also referred to as Uive, Yiive, Ndir, Asumbo[a] is a severely endangered Bantoid language spoken in Nigeria and Cameroon.[3] The ethnic group defined by use of this language is the Ndir.[1][2]

General information

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Iyive is an indigenous Tivoid language of Cameroon.[4] It is spoken in the Southwest Region in the Manyu division, northeast of Akwaya town on the Nigeria border, Yive village.[2] Although they live in Cameroon, the majority of Iyive's linguistic population had been forced to relocate to Nigeria due to a tribal conflict; as of 2012, the Cameroonian government was helping the speakers return to Manyu.[5]

Estimates of the number of Iyive speakers are generally around 2,000, but its level of language endangerment is somewhat unsettled. UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger lists Iyive as "severely endangered" in the 2010 edition. This corresponds to a language that is only used by the older generations, and rarely, if ever spoken to children.[6] SIL International, on the other hand, lists the language as "vigorous".[7] Guthrie's 1967 book classified it as moribund.[8][failed verification]

Phonology

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Consonants

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Consonant phonemes (from Foster 2012)[5]
  Bilabial Labio-
dental 		Alveolar Post-
alveolar 		Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive p b     t d         k ɡ    
Double plosive kp gb                        
Affricate         ts dz tʃ dʒ            
Fricative     f v s   ʃ           h  
Nasal   m       n       ɲ   ŋ    
Approximant                   j   w    
Lateral approximant           l                

In addition, each of the voiced plosives can be pre-nasalized: /ᵐb/, /ⁿd/, and /ᵑɡ/. Some Iyive affricates/fricatives can also be prenasalized: /ⁿd/, /ⁿdz/, and /ⁿdʒ/. Labialization and palatalization also occur, sometimes contrastively.[5]

Vowels

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There are seven vowel phonemes in Iyive, with four height values and three backness values.

Vowel phonemes (from Foster 2012)[5]
  Front Central Back
Close i u
Close-mid o
Open-mid ɛ ə ɔ
Open   a

Length is not distinctive on the vowels. Long vowels exist in situations where there is a contour tone on the vowel; all other vowels are short.[5]

Tone

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Iyive has a four-way contour tone system: high, low, falling, and rising. Tone can be contrastive for lexical and morphosyntactic features. For example, ìhɔ́ (knife) and íhɔ́ (day) are a minimal pair that differ only on the first syllable's tone. Tone can also be used to differentiate singular and plural forms, and as a question marker.[5]: 23–25 [9]

Phonotactics

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Iyive has four phonotactically valid syllable templates: V, CV, CVC, and CCV. VC is also attested, but may result from phonological processes rather than an underlying VC structure.[5]: 21 

Phonological processes

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Iyive has vowel harmony, which Blench classifies as ATR harmony. This is a feature it shares with its fellow Tivoid languages Ugare (Mesaka) and Esimbi.[10]

The vowel harmony process groups the Iyive vowels into two classes:

Harmony generally spreads from the root to prefixes, right-to-left. Suffixes or particles that occur after the root do not appear to have harmony.[5]

Morphology

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Iyive is one of the few Niger-Congo languages to use both prefixes and suffixes, a feature shared with some other Tivoid languages. Its pluralization morphology is particularly complex; Iyive plurals can be marked at least six different morphological processes:

  • prefix alternation
  • prefix addition
  • affix copying
  • affix deletion (kә́válә́k → ávál; bamboo → bamboos)
  • tonal alternation (ìtʃɛ́ → ítʃɛ́; hair → hairs)
  • morphophonemic consonant alternation (kímómúnùkú → vímómúv; bell → bells)[9]

Writing system

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Iyive is written using Latin script.[2]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ Blench 2020 lists Uive as an alternate spelling, Yiive as the native name, Ndir as the ethnicity of the language's speakers, and Asumbo as a Cameroonian name for the language[1]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d Blench, Roger (11 September 2020). An Atlas of Nigerian Languages (PDF). p. 47. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  2. ^ a b c d Iyive at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
  3. ^ "Iyive". Endangered Languages Project. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  4. ^ Kouega, Jean-Paul (2008). "Minority language use in Cameroon and educated indigenes' attitude to their languages". International Journal of the Sociology of Language (189): 85–113. doi:10.1515/IJSL.2008.004. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Foster, Suzanne (2012). The Phonology Sketch of the Iyive Language. SIL International. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  6. ^ Moseley, Christopher, ed. (2010). Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger. Memory of Peoples (3rd ed.). Paris: UNESCO Publishing. ISBN 978-92-3-104096-2. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  7. ^ Atindogbe, Gratien G. (2025). "Language Endangerment in Cameroon: State of Affairs and Prospect". The Handbook of Multilingualism, Identity, and Language Endangerment in Africa. pp. 3–22. doi:10.1007/978-981-96-4729-3_1. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  8. ^ Guthrie, Malcolm (1967). The classification of the Bantu languages. London: Published for the International African Institute by Dawsons of Pall Mall. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  9. ^ a b Blench, Roger (22 June 2016). "New research on Tivoid and its place within Bantoid" (PDF). pp. 16–18. Retrieved 9 December 2025.
  10. ^ Blench, Roger (20 December 2024). "An overview of the Bantoid languages". Afrika und Übersee: 1–46. doi:10.15460/auue.2024.97.1.288. Retrieved 9 December 2025.

Further reading

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  • William, F. R. (2003). Tivoid Languages. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press
  • Alan S. & Regnier, C. (2008). Tivoid Survey. Cameroon: SIL
  • Brenzinger, M. (Eds.). (2007). Language Diversity Endangered. New York, NY: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co
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