Afenmai language

Yekhee
Afenmai
Kukuruku (outdated)
Etsako
Native toNigeria
RegionEdo State
EthnicityAfenmai
Native speakers
510,000 (2020)[1]
Niger–Congo?
  • Atlantic–Congo
    • Volta–Niger
      • yeai
        • Edoid
          • North-Central
            • Yekhee–Ghotuo
              • Yekhee
Language codes
ISO 639-3ets
Glottologyekh1238

Afenmai (Afemai), Yekhee, or Iyekhe, is an Edoid language spoken in Edo State, Nigeria by Afenmai people. Not all speakers recognize the name Yekhee; some use the district name Etsako.

Previously the name used by British colonial administration was Kukuruku, supposedly after a battle cry "ku-ku-ruku",[2] now considered derogatory.[1]

Afenmai is unusual in reportedly having a voiceless tapped fricative as the "tense" equivalent of the "lax" voiced tap /ɾ/ (compare [aɾ̞̊u] 'hat' and [aɾu] 'louse'[3]), though is other descriptions it is described simply as a fricative and analyzed as the "lax" equivalent of the "tense" voiceless stop /t/.[4]

Etsako, a dialect of Edo itself, has its own dialects which are broadly divided into the Iyekhe and Agbelọ dialects, with the Iyekhe dialect being the more widely spoken.

  1. ^ a b Yekhee at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022) Closed access icon
  2. ^ Udo, Reuben K. (1970). Geographical Regions of Nigeria. University of California Press. p. 109.
  3. ^ Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics, p. 263.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference WPP was invoked but never defined (see the help page).