Somali

So·ma·li

S0554600 (sō-mä′lē)n. pl. Somali or So·ma·lis 1. A native or inhabitant of Somalia.2. A member of a traditionally Muslim people of Somalia and adjacent parts of Ethiopia, Kenya, Eritrea, and Djibouti.3. The Cushitic language of the Somali and an official language of Somalia.

So·ma′li adj.

Somali

(səʊˈmɑːlɪ) npl -lis or -li1. (Peoples) a member of a tall dark-skinned people inhabiting Somalia2. (Languages) the language of this people, belonging to the Cushitic subfamily of the Afro-Asiatic family of languagesadj3. (Placename) of, relating to, or characteristic of Somalia, the Somalis, or their language4. (Peoples) of, relating to, or characteristic of Somalia, the Somalis, or their language5. (Languages) of, relating to, or characteristic of Somalia, the Somalis, or their language

So•ma•li

(soʊˈmɑ li, sə-)

n., pl. -lis, (esp. collectively) -li. 1. a member of a traditionally pastoral people of Somalia, Djibouti, E Ethiopia, and NW Kenya. 2. the Cushitic language of the Somali.

Thesaurus

Noun	1.	Somali - a member of a tall dark (mostly Muslim) people inhabiting SomaliaSomalianSomalia - a republic in extreme eastern Africa on the Somali peninsula; subject to tribal warfareAfrican - a native or inhabitant of Africa
	2.	Somali - the Cushitic language spoken by the SomaliCushitic - a group of languages spoken in Ethiopia and Somalia and northwestern Kenya and adjacent regions
Adj.	1.	Somali - of or relating to the African republic of Somalia or its people or their language and culture; "Somali coffee is excellent"Somalian

Translations

索马里人索马里的索马里语

Somali

→ 索马里人zhCN, 索马里的zhCN, 索马里语zhCN

Somali

1. a member of a tall dark-skinned people inhabiting Somalia 2. the language of this people, belonging to the Cushitic subfamily of the Afro-Asiatic family of languages

Somali

(Somalis), a people living on the Somali Peninsula in Africa, in the Somali Democratic Republic, in neighboring parts of Ethiopia, in Kenya, in Djibouti, and in several other countries. They number about 4.9 million persons (1973, estimate) and speak Somali, a Cushitic language. The Somali are Sunni Muslims.

In the interior regions of the peninsula, elements of clan-tribal life have survived among the Somali. The main occupation is livestock raising (camels and cattle); agriculture is practiced chiefly in the Webi Shebeli and Juba river valleys. As a result of the national liberation struggle of the Somali in British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland, the sovereign Somali Republic was formed in 1960.

REFERENCE

Rait, M. V. “Somaliitsy.” Sovetskaia etnografiia, 1959, no. 1.

Somali

the language of the Somali people. Somali is spoken in the Somali Democratic Republic, southern Djibouti, eastern Ethiopia (Ogaden), and northeastern Kenya by approximately 4.9 million people (1973, estimate). It belongs to the Cushitic group of Hamito-Semitic, or Afrasian, languages. The principal dialects are Isâk, Issa, Darod, and Hawiyya.

In Somali, vowels are opposed to one another on the basis of length, fronting, and tonal-stress pattern, which is also employed as a grammatical marker. There are many postdorsal consonants. Substantives and verbs constitute the basic word classes. Two genders and case forms are distinguished, often only by means of tone. Most substantives change gender in the plural; dependent members of the subject and object type are almost never connected. There are definite and indefinite articles. Government is preverbal; verbs are conjugated to express person, number, and tense. Object, and sometimes subject, pronouns are obligatory for the verb. In a number of archaic verbs, conjugation is of the prefixal-suffixal type, as in the Semitic languages. Inflection and word-formation are mainly suffixal.

The sentence must contain a “predicatizing” phrase particle, which logically accentuates one member of the sentence. Attributes are placed after dependent words. A writing system based on the Latin alphabet was introduced in 1973.

REFERENCES

Zholkovskii, A. K. Sintaksis somali. Moscow, 1971.
Dolgopol’skii, A. B. Sravnitel’no-istoricheskaia fonetika kushitskikh iazykov. Moscow, 1973.
Bell, C. R. V. The Somali Language. London, 1953.
Moreno, M. M. II Somalo della Somalia. Rome, 1955.
Andrzejewski, B. W. The Declensions of Somali Nouns. London, 1964.
Abraham, R. C. Somali-English Dictionary. London, 1964.
Abraham, R. C. English-Somali Dictionary. London, 1967.

A. K. ZHOLKOVSKII and G. L. KAPCHITS

Somali

So·ma·li

Somali

So•ma•li

Somali

Somali

Somali

Somali

REFERENCE

Somali

REFERENCES

Somali

Synonyms for Somali

noun a member of a tall dark (mostly Muslim) people inhabiting Somalia

Synonyms

Related Words

noun the Cushitic language spoken by the Somali

Related Words

adj of or relating to the African republic of Somalia or its people or their language and culture

Synonyms