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Naba
Naba
Tar Melbene
Native to	Chad
Region	Batha, Chari-Baguirmi prefectures
Ethnicity	Lisi
Native speakers	510,000 (2019)
Language family	Nilo-Saharan? Central Sudanic Bongo–Bagirmi Bagirmi Naba; ; ; ;
Dialects	Bilala; Kuka; Mendogo;
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mne
Glottolog	naba1253

Naba is a Nilo-Saharan language spoken by approximately 500,000 people in Chad.^[1] Those who speak this language are called Lisi, a collective name for three closely associated ethnic groups, the Bilala, the Kuka and the Medogo, that represent the three dialects in which Naba is subdivided. They live mainly in the Batha Prefecture, but the Kuka also reside in Chari-Baguirmi. Ethnologue estimates the lexical similarity among the three dialects to be no less than 99%.^[1] Arabic is often spoken as a second language.^[1]

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive/ Affricate	plain	(p) b	t d	tʃ dʒ	k ɡ
	prenasal	ᵐb	ⁿd	ⁿdʒ	ᵑɡ
	implosive	ɓ	ɗ
Fricative		f	s z			h
Nasal		m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Rhotic			r / ɻ
Approximant		w	l	j

/f/ can also be heard as [p] in initial position, in free variation.
/tʃ/ can also be heard as [ʃ] when in intervocalic positions.
Affricate sounds /tʃ, dʒ/ are heard as palatal stop sounds [c, ɟ] when affected by fortition in pre-consonantal positions.
/r/ may be heard as approximants [ɻ, ɹ] in intervocalic positions. It may also be pronounced as a uvular trill [ʀ] when before back vowels in intervocalic positions.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	e		o
Open		a

Vowels /i, u, e, o/ have allophones [ɪ, ʊ, ɛ, ɔ] when in closed syllables.
A central [ə] may be heard in fast speech and in vowel epenthesis.^[2]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Naba at Ethnologue (27th ed., 2024)
^ Scherrer, Elaine Marie (2022). A phonological description of Naba. Afrika und Übersee 95. pp. 76–134.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link) CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)