the university of chicago the phonology and ... - SIL International

APPENDIX C
AN EVALUATION OF NIGER-CONGO CLASSIFICATION
The Niger-Congo language family is the largest language family in Africa,
comprising about 1,400 languages found in Sub-Saharan Africa. Its northern border
stretches along a relatively straight line between Senegal and Kenya. In the south, in
present-day Namibia, Botswana and South Africa, Niger-Congo languages are intermixed
with Khoisan and some Indo-European languages. The other major families to be found
in Africa are Nilo-Saharan, Afro-Asiatic, and Khoisan (see Figure C.1).
Figure C.1: Classification of African languages. Data from Greenberg (1970) and
Williamson & Blench (2000).
241