000_JLC3_debut_FL - SOAS Research Online

20 G. Tucker Childs
Figure 2: Niger-Congo (Blench 2006:118)
The Mande languages are spoken in a large area covering much of the western Sudan. To
the west, Mande languages are spoken right up to the Atlantic Ocean, where they surround
pockets of Atlantic speakers. With regard to the group, however, the question has often
arisen, “Does Mande really belong in Niger-Kordofanian, and if so, why does it look so
different from other languages in the phylum?” (Newman 2000:271; see note 5). Although
this question cannot be answered here, that it has been posed indicates the group’s
distinctiveness. Mande has undergone no major changes since Greenberg’s classification, and
most scholars accept as Mande the languages included in the genetic tree proposed below.
Journal of language contact – THEMA 3 (2010)
www. jlc-journal.org