Mandingo language

The Mandinka language (Mandi'nka kango), or Mandingo, is a Mandé language spoken by the Mandinka people of the Casamance region of Senegal, the Gambia, and northern Guinea-Bissau. It is the principal language of the Gambia.

Mandinka belongs to the Manding branch of Mandé, and is thus similar to Bambara and Maninka/Malinké. In a majority of areas, it is a tonal language with two tones: low and high, although the particular variety spoken in the Gambia and Senegal borders on a pitch accent due to its proximity with non-tonal neighboring languages like Wolof.

Mandinka is here represented by the variety spoken in Casamance. There is little dialectical diversity.

Mandinka has two tones, high and low. Unmodified nouns are either high tone on all syllables or low tone on all syllables. The definite suffix -o takes a low tone on high-tone nouns and a falling tone on low-tone nouns. It also assimilates any preceding short vowel, resulting in a long /oo/ with either low or falling tone. It shortens a preceding long high vowel (ii > io, uu > uo; ee optionally > either eo or ee) or assimilates itself (aa remains aa) leaving only its tone:

In Senegal and Gambia, Mandinka is approaching a system of pitch accent under the influence of local non-tonal languages such as Wolof. The tonal system is more robust in Guinea-Bisau.

Vowel qualities are /i e a o u/. All may be long or short. There are no nasal vowels; instead, there is a coda consonant /ŋ/.

The following table gives the consonants in the latin orthography, and their IPA equivalent when they differ.

⟨j⟩ and ⟨c⟩ are pronounced approximately /dj/ and /tj/. /p/ is found in French loans. /r/ is only found initially in loans and onomatopoeia. Otherwise it is the intervocalic allophone of /d/.