Pharyngealization and the Vowel System of Tasawaq (Northern Songhay)

In this article, it is argued that Tasawaq, a Northern Songhay language in Niger, has two different dialects. One dialect has pharyngealized consonants as phonemes, while the other dialect lacks them, but has a binary opposition between /a/ and /æ/. It is shown that the two phenomena are correlated: wherever the first dialect has a pharyngealized consonant, the other has /a/, while otherwise /æ/ is found. Two historical scenario’s are studied, one in which pharyngealization is a recent contact-induced feature in Tasawaq, the other in which the variety without pharyngealization is innovative.