Pinyin language

Pinyin is a Grassfields language spoken by some 27,000 people in the Northwest Region of Cameroon.

For the Chinese romanisation system and other uses, see Pinyin (disambiguation).
Pinyin
RegionNorthwest Region, Cameroon
Native speakers
25,000 (2001)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3pny
Glottologpiny1238[2]

Phonology

Consonants
Consonants
PhonemeAllophonesEnvironmentOrthography
pp⟨p⟩
pʰBefore /u/ in an open syllable.
bAfter /ɴ̩/.⟨b⟩
βBetween vowels within a root.
tt⟨t⟩
kkBeginning of words and of roots within words, and after /ɴ̩/.⟨k⟩
ʔOnly C found at ends of words.⟨’⟩
kʷkʷ⟨kw⟩
llIn roots.⟨l⟩
ɾIn suffixes.⟨r⟩
dAfter /ɴ̩/.⟨d⟩
ɣɣ⟨ɡh⟩
ɡAfter /ɴ̩/.⟨ɡ⟩
ɣʷɡʷAfter /ɴ̩/.⟨ɡw⟩
ff⟨f⟩
ss/ts/ after /ɴ̩/.⟨s⟩
tsts⟨ts⟩
zz⟨z⟩
dzAfter /ɴ̩/.
ʃʃ/tʃ/ after /ɴ̩/.⟨sh⟩
tʃtʃ⟨ch⟩
ʒʒ⟨zh⟩
dʒAfter /ɴ̩/.⟨j⟩
mm⟨m⟩
nn⟨n⟩
ɲɲ⟨ny⟩
ŋŋ⟨ŋ⟩
N̩m̩ n̩ ŋ̍Homorganic with following C. Carries tone.⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩
ww⟨w⟩
ɥɥ⟨ẅ⟩
jj⟨y⟩

Sequences are:

py (mby), ly (ndy), ty, ky, ngy, my, kẅ, ngẅ (= /kʷj, ɡʷj/)
pw (mbw), lw (ndw), tw, tsw, chw, shw, sw, zw, zhw, nw, nyw, ŋw

All noun and verb roots begin with a consonant; initial vowels are necessarily prefixes. Only /a, ɨ/ occur in prefixes or at the beginning of words, and only /ə/ occurs in suffixes. /ɨ, y/ do not occur at the ends of words.

Vowels
Vowels
PhonemeOrthography
ii
yʉ
ɛe
aa
ɔo
uu
əə
ɨɨ

All known long vowels may occur medially or at ends of words, none at the beginning, though long /ɛ, y/ are not attested. Long vowels are written double: aa, əə, ii, ‿ɨɨ, oo, uu. Diphthongs ie, iə, ʉə, ɨə, uə take a single tone.

Tones are high, mid, low, rising, falling. They are written as in IPA, apart from low, which is not written: á ā a ǎ â. Falling tone is largely confined to suffixes, and rising tone is rare, found only on a few nouns such as tǎ 'father'.

gollark: This does, however, require a particle accelerator and detector very near the gay source.
gollark: Detection of mass anomalies in certain gauge bosons. They couple with the gay field, so high-energy disturbances in it can be measured.
gollark: You have a bot, you implement it.
gollark: It would need to scan embeds too, and bee you arcane.
gollark: Yes, I know, I can't be bothered to add that to ABR.

References
  1. Pinyin at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Pinyin". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  • The Pinyin Orthography Guide (Njeck Mathaus Mbah & Stephen C. Anderson, 2005)
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