Berber Latin alphabet
The Berber Latin alphabet is the version of the Latin alphabet used to write the Berber languages. It was adopted in the 19th century, using varieties of letters.
History
The Berber languages were originally transcribed using the ancient Libyco-Berber script, of which the Neo-Tifinagh alphabet is the modern representative.The use of a Latin script for Berber has its roots in French colonialist expeditions to North Africa. Berber texts written with Latin letters began to appear in print in the 19th century when French, Italian, and Spanish colonial expeditionaries and military officers began surveying North Africa. The French attempted to use Romanization schemes for North African Arabic dialects and for Berber. The attempts for Arabic were unsuccessful, but Berber was more susceptible, having little established literature to stand in the way.
In the colonial era a French-based system was used. Though it has now fallen partly out of favor, it is still used for transcription of names into French. More recently the French institute of languages, INALCO, has proposed its own writing standard which now is the primary system used in mainly Kabyle-Berber writings in Kabylie, Algeria.
Other, slightly different, varieties of Latin-based standards have been used since the beginning of the 20th century by Berber linguists in North Africa, France, and recently at the University of Barcelona, Spain.
Northern-Berber Latin alphabet
The Berber Latin alphabet of Northern-Berber usually consists of 34 letters:- 23 standard Latin letters.
- 11 additional modified Latin letters: Č Ḍ Ɛ Ǧ Ɣ Ḥ Ř Ṛ Ṣ Ṭ Ẓ
- The labialization mark "ʷ" is added to some letters in some Berber dialects, producing: gʷ, kʷ, ɣʷ, nʷ, qʷ, and xʷ. However, these are usually not considered as independent letters of the Berber Latin alphabet.
In Northern-Berber texts, foreign words and names are written in their original form even if they contain the letters: O, P, V, or any other non-Berber letter. According to SIL, the letter P is used in Kabyle.
Berber Latin alphabet and the Tifinagh Berber alphabet
The following table shows the Northern-Berber Latin alphabet with its Neo-Tifinagh and Arabic equivalents:The Latin letter "O" does occur occasionally in Tuareg-Berber orthography. In Northern-Berber orthography it corresponds to the letter "U".
In the interest of pan-dialectal legibility, the Berber Latin alphabet omits the partly phonemic contrasts found in some Berber language varieties between stops and fricatives.
Phonemic labiovelarization of consonants is widespread in Berber varieties, but there are rarely minimal pairs and it is unstable. The INALCO standard uses the diacritic for labiovelarization only when needed to distinguish words, e.g. ireggel vs. iregg°el.
| North-Berber Latin letter | Tifinagh equivalent | IPA equivalent |
| Bʷ bʷ / B° b° | ⴱⵯ | |
| Gʷ gʷ / G° g° | ⴳⵯ | |
| Ɣʷ ɣʷ / Ɣ° ɣ° | ⵖⵯ | |
| Kʷ kʷ / K° k° | ⴽⵯ | |
| Qʷ qʷ / Q° q° | ⵇⵯ | |
| Xʷ xʷ / X° x° | ⵅⵯ |
The letter is used for only when it contrasts with . In all other cases is used, e.g. tarakna "carpet". This is because is often an allophone of in the environment of other emphatics, and it rarely contrasts with otherwise. Exceptional cases of other emphatics, e.g. "hound", are ignored.
Rif-Berber usages
In most Riffian areas, the letter "L" in the word alɣem is pronounced . "Ř" is pronounced as something between "L" and "R".Riffian Berbers pronounce the "LL" like "dj" or "ǧǧ". Depending on the author's whim, this might be represented in writing as "ll", "dj", a single "ǧ", or "ǧǧ".
Souss-Berber local usage
In Souss, Berber writers either rarely use the neutral vowel "e", or they use it inconsistently. Elsewhere in the Berber world, the neutral vowel "e" is used to represent the non-phonemic. Tuareg-Berber uses "ə" for this purpose.Kabyle-Berber local usages
In Kabyle-Berber, the affricates have traditionally been notated as for over thirty years. However these affricates are uncommon in other dialects and they are morphologically conditioned, so for the sake of pan-dialectal legibility the INALCO standard omits them. In Kabyle the affricate may derive from underlying or. In the former case the INALCO standard uses, and in the second it uses .| Character | INALCO equivalent | IRCAM Tifinagh equivalent | IPA equivalent | Pronunciation |
| Ţ ţ | Tt tt | ⵜⵙ | ts like in "Tsetse fly" | |
| Ţ ţ | Ss ss | ⵜⵙ | ts like in "Tsetse fly" | |
| Z̧ z̧ | Zz zz | ⴷⵣ | dz / the English "ds" in words |
Labiovelarization is indicated with the superscript letter , or with the "degree sign": "°", or simply by using the letter. may represent spirantization.
On the internet, it is common to replace the Latinized Greek epsilon and gamma, and, with actual Greek letters:
- , Greek upper case sigma, since Greek upper case epsilon "Ε" is visually indistinguishable from Latin upper case E
- , Greek small letter epsilon
- Greek capital and small letter gamma
| Character | INALCO equivalent |
| Â â | Ɛ ɛ |
| Ġ ġ | Ɣ ɣ |
| Gh gh | Ɣ ɣ |
| dj | Ǧ ǧ |
Controversy
There has been a long and fierce debate on whether to use the Latin alphabet, the Tifinagh alphabet, or the Arabic alphabet, as the official alphabet for Berber in Algeria and Morocco, between Berber activists and the anti-Berber establishments, mainly those with Arab-Islamic agendas or orientations. The Berber activists overwhelmingly favor the use of the Latin alphabet in order to ensure a quick development and proliferation of the Berber language in schools, in public institutions, and on the internet. A small number of them prefer the neo-Tifinagh alphabet. The states of Morocco and Algeria usually distance themselves from Latin-based Berber writing, fearing that it would strengthen the position of Berber against Arabic and French, and thus leading to a stronger Berber political activism. The Arab-Islamic establishments and political parties often reject the Latin alphabet as a Berber alphabet for the same reasons, and they usually brand it as a tool to westernize and Christianize Berbers.In 2003, king Mohammed VI of Morocco approved the Royal Institute of the Amazigh Culture Berber Institute's decision of using neo-Tifinagh as the sole official alphabet for the Berber language in Morocco. The IRCAM's decision was met with much disapproval among independent Berber activists and they saw it as a way of neutralizing Berber and preventing it from quick flourishing and development.
Southern-Berber Latin alphabet (Tuareg)
The Southern-Berber Latin alphabet is made of 36 letters. They are mostly Latin letters with one IPA character and one Greek letter incorporated.The vowel O is used only in the Latin alphabet of Southern Berber, not in Northern-Berber. The vowel "O" in Tuareg words mostly corresponds to "U" in Northern Berber words.
Tawellemet and Tamajaq also use Ââ Êê F̣f̣ G̣g̣ Îî J̣j̣ Ḳḳ Ṃṃ Ṇṇ Ôô Ṛṛ Ṣṣ Ṣ̌ṣ̌ Ûû Ẉẉ
The Malian national literacy program DNAFLA has proposed a standard for the Latin alphabet, which is used with modifications in Karl G. Prasse's Tuareg French Dictionary and the government literacy program in Burkina. In Niger a slightly different system was used. There is also some variation in Tifinagh and in the Arabic script.
The DNAFLA system is a somewhat morphophonemic orthography, not indicating initial vowel shortening, always writing the directional particle as, and not indication all assimilations (e.g. for tămašăq.
In Burkina Faso the emphatics are denoted by "hooked" letters, as in Fula, e.g..