Siwi language

Siwi
Siwi, Žlan n Isiwan
Spoken in	Egypt
Region	Siwa Oasis, Gara Oasis
Native speakers	15,000[1] to 30,000[2]  (date missing)
Language family	Afro-Asiatic Berber Eastern? Siwi
Language codes
ISO 639-3	siz

Siwi is a Berber language of Egypt, spoken by about 15,000 to 30,000 people^[1][2] in the oases of Siwa and Gara, near the Libyan border. The language has been heavily influenced by Egyptian Arabic, to a greater degree than most Berber languages.^[3] It continues to be the first language of Siwi children.

Classification

Ethnologue^[2] places Siwi in an Eastern Berber group with the Awjila–Sokna languages of central and eastern Libya. Kossmann (1999)^[4] links it with Sokna and the Nafusi dialect cluster of western Libya and Tunisia, but not with Awjila.

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Grammatical Contact in the Sahara: Arabic, Berber, and Songhay in Tabelbala and Siwa, Lameen Souag, PhD thesis, SOAS, 2010
2. ^ ^{a b c} Ethnologue Report for Siwi
3. ^ Werner Vycichl. 2005. "Jlân n Isîwan: Sketch of the Berber Language of the Oasis of Siwa (Egypt)," Berberstudien & A Sketch of Siwi Berber (Egypt). Ed. Dymitr Ibriszimow & Maarten Kossmann. Berber Studies, vol. 10. Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag. ISBN 3-89645-389-0
4. ^ Kossmann, Maarten. 1999. Essai sur la phonologie du proto-berbère. Köln: Köppe.

External links

• World Atlas of Language Structures entry

Ongoing research on Siwi:

• Christfried Naumann
• Lameen Souag