Mende /?m?ndi/[2] (M?nde yia) is a major language of Sierra Leone, with some speakers in neighboring Liberia and Guinea. It is spoken by the Mende people and by other ethnic groups as a regional lingua franca in southern Sierra Leone.[3]
| Mende | |
|---|---|
| M?nde yia ???? ???? | |
 | |
| Native to | Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea |
| Region | South central Sierra Leone |
| Ethnicity | Mende people |
Native speakers | 2.5 million (2020–2021)[1] |
| Dialects |
|
| Latin Mende Kikakui script | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | men |
| ISO 639-3 | men |
| Glottolog | mend1266 |
Mende is a tonal language belonging to the Mande language family. Early systematic descriptions of Mende were by F. W. Migeod[4] and Kenneth Crosby.[5] Ethel Aginsky decoded the language in her doctoral work.[6]
Phonology
editConsonants
edit| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labiovelar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | plain | p | t | k | k?p | ||
| voiced | b | d | ɡ | ɡ?b | |||
| prenasalized | m?b | n?d | ??ɡ | ?ɡ?b | |||
| Fricative | plain | f | s | h | |||
| voiced | v | ||||||
| Affricate | voiced | d?? | |||||
| prenasalized | ?d?? | ||||||
| Lateral | l | ||||||
| Nasal | m | n | ? | ? | |||
| Approximant | w | j | |||||
Vowels
edit| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Close-mid | e | o | |
| Open-mid | ? | ? | |
| Open | a |
Written forms
editIn 1921, Kisimi Kamara invented a syllabary for Mende he called Kikakui (??????? / 
). The script achieved widespread use for a time, but has largely been replaced with an alphabet based on the Latin script, and the Mende script is considered a "failed script".[8] The Bible was translated into Mende and published in 1959, in Latin script.[9]
The Latin-based alphabet is: a, b, d, e, ?, f, g, gb, h, i, j, k, kp, l, m, n, ny, o, ?, p, s, t, u, v, w, y. [10][11]
Media
editFilm
editMende was used extensively in the films Amistad and Blood Diamond and was the subject of the documentary film The Language You Cry In about the connections between the Gullah people of present-day Georgia and their ancestors from Sierra Leone, beginning with the work of Lorenzo Dow Turner who documented Gullah memories of the Mende language.[14]
Oral literature
editIn 1908, F.W.H. Migeod, a British civil servant,[15] published The Mende Language, which contains 17 stories in Mende with facing-text English translations, along with 13 Mende songs (lyrics only, no music).[16]
Ralph Eberl-Elber, an Austrian ethnologist,[17] published two Mende tales with English translations as he heard them in Sierra Leone in the 1935.[18]
The American anthropologist Marion Dusser de Barenne Kilson worked with Mende storytellers in Sierra Leone as a graduate student in 1959 and 1960 (her husband, the political scientist Martin Kilson, was also conducting research in Sierra Leone at the time). Marion Kilson then returned to Sierra Leone in 1972 for further research and in 1976 she published Royal Antelope and Spider: West African Mende Tales,[19] which contains 100 Mende folktales in both the original Mende and in English translation. The introduction provides an overview of Mende culture along with detailed information about Mende storytelling traditions.[20]
For Mende proverbs in Mende and English translation, see "Some Mεnde Proverbs," an article published by M. Mary Senior in 1947.[21]
Sample text
editNumuvuisia Kp?l?? ta ti le t? y? nduw? ya hu, tao ti nuvuu yei k?? ti l?nyi maa h?wung?. Kiiya k?? hindaluahu g??la a y?l? ti hun. Fale mahoung? ti ti ny?ny?hu hoi kia ndeegaa.
Translation
editAll human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)
References
edit- ^ Mende at Ethnologue (27th ed., 2024)
- ^ Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
- ^ Sengova, Joko (1987). "The national languages of Sierra Leone: A decade of policy experimentation". Africa. 57 (4): 521–522. doi:10.2307/1159897. ISSN 0001-9720.
- ^ Migeod, F. W. 1908. The Mende language. London
- ^ Crosby, Kenneth. 1944. An Introduction to the Study of Mende. Cambridge University Press.
- ^ Murphy, Patricia (2025-08-06). "Meeting of science, society". The Los Angeles Times. p. 70. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ Dwyer, David James (1969). Consonant Mutation in Mende (MA). East Lansing, Michigan: Michigan State University. doi:10.25335/e7tq-gp12.
- ^ Unseth, Peter (2011). "Invention of Scripts in West Africa for Ethnic Revitalization". In Fishman, Joshua A.; García, Ofelia (eds.). The Success–Failure Continuum in Language and Ethnic Identity Efforts. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 23–32.
- ^ Tuchscherer, Konrad (1995). "African Script and Scripture: The History of the Kikakui (Mende) Writing System for Bible Translations". African Languages and Cultures. 8 (2): 169–188. ISSN 0954-416X.
- ^ Coble, Scott. n.d. "Mende." AboutWorldLanguages.com (accessed 8 October 2014)
- ^ "Langue : mende". Systèmes alphabétiques des langues africaines. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ A Mende Orthography Workshop: Ministry of Education, Freetown, January 21-25, 1980
- ^ Pemagbi, Joe. 1991. "A guide to Mende orthography." SLADEA.
- ^ "THE LANGUAGE YOU CRY IN". California Newsreel. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ "F. W. H. Migeod". Horniman Museum and Gardens. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ Migeod, Frederick William Hugh (1908). The Mende Language, Containing Useful Phrases, Elementary Grammar, Short Vocabularies, Reading Materials. pp. 200-271.
- ^ "Ralph Eberl-EIber". Wien Geschichte Wiki (in German). Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ Eberl-Elber, Ralph (1939). "Two Mende Tales". Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies, University of London. 10 (1). Cambridge University Press: 223–234. ISSN 1356-1898. JSTOR 607935. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
- ^ Kilson, Marion (1976). Royal Antelope and Spider: West African Mende Tales.
- ^ Gibbs, Laura (25 March 2022). Reader's Guide to African Folktales at the Internet Archive.
This article incorporates text from this source, which is available under the CC BY 4.0 license.
- ^ Senior, M. Mary (1947). "Some Mεnde Proverbs". Africa: Journal of the International African Institute. 17 (3). [Cambridge University Press, International African Institute]: 202–205. ISSN 0001-9720. JSTOR 1156011. Retrieved 2025-08-06.