Tagdal | |
---|---|
Tagdal-Tabarog | |
Tihishit | |
Native to | Niger |
Ethnicity | Igdalen, Iberogan |
Native speakers | 65,000 (2021)[1] |
Dialects |
|
Tifinagh | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | tda |
Glottolog | tagd1238 |
ELP | Tagdal |
Agdal | |
---|---|
Person | Agdal |
People | Igdalan |
Language | Tagdal |
Abarog | |
---|---|
People | Iberogan |
Language | Tabarog |
Tagdal (Tuareg name: Tagdalt)[3] is a mixed Northern Songhay language of central Niger. Ethnologue considers it a "mixed Berber–Songhay language",[1][4] while other researchers consider it Northern Songhay.[5] Nicolaï (1981) argued that Tagdal was originally derived from the Tuareg languages and adopted characteristics of Songhai rather than vice versa.[6]
There are two dialects: Tagdal proper, spoken by the Igdalen people, pastoralists who inhabit a region to the east along the Niger border to Tahoua in Niger,[4] and Tabarog, spoken by the Iberogan people of the Azawagh valley on the Niger–Mali border. The Iberogan sometimes refer to their language as Tagdal.[citation needed]
Nicolaï (1981) uses the name Tihishit as a cover term. Rueck & Christiansen say that
...the Igdalen and the Iberogan have for many purposes been treated as one group, and their speech forms are closely related. Nicolaï uses "tihishit" as a common designator for these two speech forms...; however, this term is ambiguous. "Tihishit" is a term of Tamajaq origin meaning "the language of the blacks". The Igdalen and Iberogan used it to refer to all Northern Songhay speech forms.[5]