Overview

This handbook provides a comprehensive account of the languages spoken in Ethiopia, exploring both their structures and features and their function and use in society. The first part of the volume provides background and general information relating to Ethiopian languages, including their demographic distribution and classification, language policy, scripts and writing, and language endangerment. Subsequent parts are dedicated to the four major language families in Ethiopia - Cushitic, Ethiosemitic, Nilo-Saharan, and Omotic - and contain studies of individual languages, with an initial introductory overview chapter in each part. Both major and less-documented languages are included, ranging from Amharic and Oromo to Zay, Gawwada, and Yemsa. The final part explores languages that are outside of those four families, namely Ethiopian Sign Language, Ethiopian English, and Arabic. With its international team of senior researchers and junior scholars, The Oxford Handbook of Ethiopian Languages will appeal to anyone interested in the languages of the region and in African linguistics more broadly.

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9780198728542

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Ronny Meyer teaches Amharic at the Institut National de Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO) and carries out research on Ethiosemitic languages at the Langage, Langues et Cultures d'Afrique (LLACAN) laboratory. He previously held positions at the Universities of Mainz and Addis Ababa, and his publications include Language Use in Ethiopia from a Network Perspective (with Renate Richter; Peter Lang, 2003) and Language Contact and Language Change in Ethiopia (co-edited with Joachim Crass; Rüdiger Köppe, 2009). Bedilu Wakjira is Assistant Professor of Linguistics at Addis Ababa University, where he specializes in Ethiosemitic languages with particular focus on Kistane. His many academic publications include the textbook Literature in Language Teaching, used in many Ethiopian universities. He has also published several collections of poetry and other literary work in Amharic. Zelealem Leyew is Professor of Linguistics at Addis Ababa University, where he was previously Chair of the Department of Linguistics (2001-2002) and Dean of the College of Humanities, Language Studies, Journalism, and Communication (2015-2019). He has also held positions at the Universities of Cologne, Frankfurt, and Hamburg. His many publications on descriptive, sociolinguistic, and anthropological issues include The Kemantney Language: A Sociolinguistic and Grammatical Study of Language Replacement (Rüdiger Köppe, 2003).

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