User:JohnWoods1025/Tagdal

Tagdal is spoken in the North African country of Niger. It is classified{Citation needed|reason=By whom?|date=May 2021}} as a mixed language, drawing influence from Berber, Tuareg, and Songhay languages. With estimates ranging from 10,000 to 20,000 native speakers, this language is considered to be vulnerable in terms of its endangerment status. It is spoken by the Igdalen and Iberogen peoples in the central and Western parts of the country, which is to the east of the country's capital Niamey.

Agadez, Nigerien Province Where Tagdal is Spoken

Iberogen and Igdalen

The Igdalen people are of Berber descent and were some of the first Berber people to migrate to the Northwestern African countries of Niger and Mali. Today, the Igdalen are considered{Citation needed|reason=By whom?|date=May 2021}} to be a faction of the nomadic Tuareg tribes that occupy the Northern parts of the country. The Igdalen people are predominantly Muslim, having been heavily influenced by the Northern African country Morocco. Their economy is heavily reliant on livestock and farming. However, the recent desertification of Africa has put a tremendous strain on their ability to find food and water in the region. The Igdalen do not have any formal government or political tribes, but there are two sub-tribes to the Igdalen people, the Kel Amdit and Kel Tofey.

Tagdal Language

Tagdal Distribution

The Tagdal language is considered to be a mix of Berber and Songhay languages. There are also many similarities to the Tuareg language Tamasheq. It is believed that up to half of the daily Tagdal vocabulary is borrowed from Tamasheq. Tagdal is considered to be an agglutinative language, which refers to the languages' morphological structure. Tagdal borrows its pronoun system from the nearby Northern Songhay languages. The language also has two separate prefixes to indicate negation. The first is used to describe what might have happened in the past, but did not. The second form is used in order to negate events in the present tense and the future tense.

Related Languages

Traditional Dress For a Songhay Woman

Tagdal shares many similarities to other languages focused along the Niger River and in West Africa. Tasawaq is another language that is spoken in Northern Niger and shares many similarities to Tagdal. Both of the languages are spoken by people who are closely related to the Tuareg tribes and can trace their descent back to the Berber people of Northern Africa. The Tuareg languages are a group of languages that have been heavily influential on Tagdal. This group of languages includes Tamahaq, Tawellemet, and Tin Sert. These languages represent the linguistic diversity and intertwined history of the people who have occupied this region for thousands of years. There is another language that is very similar to Tagdal, which is Tabarog. This language is spoken by the sedentary Ibarogan tribe that is located in the Southwest of Niger in the Agadez province. There is a high degree of intelligibility between Tagdal and Tabarog, which is why many believe them to be dialects of the same language.

History of the Berber People

The Berber people trace their roots back to the North African countries of Morocco and Algeria. The Berber people can now be found all over Africa in countries such as Libya, Tunisia, Mali, Niger, and Egypt. The Berber people are now predominantly Muslim, having received a strong Arab influence during the wars of the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries. There have been several notable Berber kingdoms, of which the Numidia being the most famous. The Berber people began to spread throughout the Northern part of Africa with the Trans-Saharan trade routes that included items such as gold, slaves, and salt. The supply of camels and the demand for gold to produce coinage is what drove the initial boom in the Trans-Saharan trade routes. The erected trade routes connected the Mediterranean economies to the countries in the Sub-Saharan African region. These commercial transactions are what also led to many Berbers converting to Abrahamic religions such as Islam or Christianity.

Bibliography

1. "Did you know Tagdal is vulnerable?". Endangered Languages. Retrieved 2021-05-03.
2. Project, Joshua. "Iberogen, Igdalen in Niger". joshuaproject.net. Retrieved 2021-05-03.
3. "About: Tagdal language". dbpedia.org. Retrieved 2021-05-03
4. Benitez-Torres, Carlos (2009). "Inflectional vs. Derivational Morphology in Tagdal: A Mixed Language". SIL, International..
5. "Berber | Definition, People, Languages, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2021-05-03.
6. "The Trans Saharan Gold Trade (7th-14th century)".www.metmuseum.org https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/gold/hd_gold.htm. Retrieved 2021-05-03.