Malagasy language

The Malagasy language is the westernmost (Hesperonesian) member of the Austronesian language family,^[8] a grouping that is closely related to the Western Indonesian languages.

Similarities between Malagasy and Eastern Sumatran (Malay) had been observed since the 17th century^[9] and Malagasy's relation with other Austronesian languages had already been noted by early scholars, such as the Dutch scholar Adriaan Reland in 1708.^[10][11]

Among all Austronesian languages, Dahl (1951) demonstrated that Malagasy and Maʼanyan Dayak – an East Barito language natively spoken in Central Kalimantan (Indonesia) on the island of Kalimantan – were particularly closely related.^[12] Furthermore, there appears to be a Bantu influence or substratum in Malagasy phonotactics (Dahl 1988). There are some Sanskrit loanwords in Malagasy, which are said to have been borrowed via Javanese (mainly).^[5]

Adelaar (1995) suggested that the vocabulary of Malagasy also contains many words that are of South Sulawesi-origin (especially Makassar) .^[13] Further evidence for this suggestion was presented by Blench (2018).^[14]

However, the diversity of Malagasy dialects does not correspond to the genetic diversity of the populations. For example, the Merina, who often show a relatively high proportion of Austronesian ancestry (more than 50–60% according to several studies), nevertheless use certain words of African origin such as mamba 'crocodile' or osy 'goat'. Conversely, several coastal populations, whose proportion of Asian ancestry is generally lower (around 30–40%), do not always use these terms and instead retain Austronesian words absent from the Merina vocabulary, such as voay or bengy.^[15]

Malagasy is the demonym of Madagascar, from which it is taken to refer to the people of Madagascar in addition to their language.

Madagascar was first settled by Austronesian peoples from Maritime Southeast Asia from the Sunda Islands (Malay archipelago).^[16] As for their route, one possibility is that the Indonesian Austronesian came directly across the Indian Ocean from Java to Madagascar. It is likely that they went through the Maldives, where evidence of old Indonesian boat design and fishing technology persists until the present.^[17] The migrations continued along the first millennium, as confirmed by linguistic researchers who showed the close relationship between the Malagasy language and Old Malay and Old Javanese languages of this period.^[18][19] The Malagasy language originates from the Southeast Barito languages, and the Ma'anyan language is its closest relative, with numerous Malay and Javanese loanwords.^[7][20] It is known that Ma'anyan people were brought as labourers and slaves by Malay and Javanese people in their trading fleets, which reached Madagascar by c. 50–500 AD.^[21][22] Later, c. 1000, the original Austronesian settlers mixed with Bantus and Arabs, amongst others.^[23] There is evidence that the predecessors of the Malagasy dialects first arrived in the southern stretch of the east coast of Madagascar.^[24] Adelaar (2017) proposes that a distinct Malagasy speech community had already been established in South Borneo before the early Malagasy speakers migrated to East Africa.^[25]

Malagasy has a tradition of oratory arts and poetic histories and legends. The most well-known is the national epic, Ibonia, about a Malagasy folk hero of the same name.^[26]

Malagasy is the principal language spoken on the island of Madagascar. It is also spoken by Malagasy communities on neighboring Indian Ocean islands such as Réunion, Mayotte and Mauritius. Expatriate Malagasy communities speaking the language also exist in Europe and North America.

The Merina dialect of Malagasy is considered the national language of Madagascar. It is one of two official languages alongside French in the 2010 constitution put in place the Fourth Republic. Previously, under the 2007 constitution, Malagasy was one of three official languages alongside French and English. Malagasy is the language of instruction in all public schools through grade five for all subjects, and remains the language of instruction through high school for the subjects of history and Malagasy language.

In his 1658 work Histoire de la grande isle Madagascar, Étienne de Flacourt provided one of the earliest known attempts to classify the Malagasy language into dialectal regions. He divided Malagasy into two main dialect groups: northern and southern. He noted significant lexical differences between them — for instance, the word ampela was used in the south to mean "woman" or "girl", while vaiavy was used in the north. Similarly, baba was a northern term for "father", whereas ray was used in the south.^[27]

Flacourt also observed phonological variations. He noted similarities between the Tanosy and Antemoro dialects, especially their shared use of the [ts] sound in words like fotsy 'white'. In contrast, in the Masikoro and Mahafaly dialects, the [ts] sound is often replaced by [t], producing foty for the same meaning.

Malagasy dialects can be divided between Northern dialects,^{[28][obsolete source]} Central-Eastern malagasy, and Southern dialects. Northern malagasy dialects (Kibushi, Northern sakalava, Antakarana, Tsimihety, Northern betsimisaraka)^[29] are heavily influenced by Swahili and French.^[30] Northern Malagasy speakers pronounce the vowel o like the English vowel in "cold," orthographically written ô. Examples include Vôalôhagny ("first"), Nôsy ("island"), Talôha ("before"), Mitôndra ("to carry"), Vôlagna ("moon; month"), and Sôla ("bald").

Non-Northern Malagasy speakers pronounce the same vowel o like the English "oo" in "food", as in voalohany, Nosy, mitondra, volana, and sola. ^{[31] [32]}

Southern Malagasy dialects, including Tandroy, Southern Sakalava, Tanosy, and Bara, reflect conservative phonology and can phonetically resemble Polynesian languages. They also use a progressive or ascending numeral system, where the smaller unit is added after the base (e.g., folo raik’amby → literally "10 + 1"), in contrast with other Malagasy dialects that use a retrograde or descending system (e.g., iraika ambin’ny folo → literally "1 over 10"). ^[33]

For example, the word linta ("leech") corresponds to Malay lintah, taly ("rope") corresponds to Malay tali, and limy ("five") corresponds to Malay lima, whereas in other dialects it appears as dinta, tady, and dimy.

Central-Eastern subgroup which contains Antesaka, Sahafatra, Southern Betsimisaraka and Plateau dialects like Antefasy, Antambahoaka, Vakinankaratra, Sihanaka, Merina (basis of Standard Malagasy) constitutes an intermediate group, with a structure and vocabulary largely close to standard Malagasy, and with influence sometimes coming from either the northern or southern branches.^[34]

Although considered a single ethnic group, the Sakalava speak at least two distinct dialects. The Southern Sakalava dialect is more closely related to Masikoro, while the Northern Sakalava dialect shares linguistic features with the Tsimihety dialect. The Betsimisaraka also demonstrate internal dialectal variation: the Northern Betsimisaraka dialect is closer to Tsimihety, whereas the Southern variant is more similar to Antambahoaka.^[35]

The language has a written literature going back presumably to the 15th century. When the French established Fort-Dauphin in the 17th century, they found an Arabico-Malagasy script in use, known as Sorabe ("large writings"). This Arabic-derived Sorabe alphabet was mainly used for astrological and magical texts. The oldest known manuscript in that script is a short Malagasy-Dutch vocabulary from the early 17th century, which was first published in 1908 by Gabriel Ferrand^[40] though the script must have been introduced into the southeast area of Madagascar in the 15th century.^[23]

The first bilingual renderings of religious texts are those by Étienne de Flacourt,^[41] who also published the first dictionary of the language.^[42] Radama I, the first literate representative of the Merina monarchy, though extensively versed in the Arabico-Malagasy tradition,^[43] opted in 1823 for a Latin system derived by David Jones and invited the Protestant London Missionary Society to establish schools and churches. The first book to be printed in Malagasy using Latin characters was the Bible, which was translated into Malagasy in 1835 by British Protestant missionaries working in the highlands area of Madagascar.^[44]

The current Malagasy alphabet consists of 21 letters: a, b, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, r, s, t, v, y, z. The orthography maps rather straightforwardly to the phonemic inventory. The letters i and y both represent the /i/ sound (y is used word-finally, and i elsewhere), while o is pronounced /u/ (except in the northern dialects, where it corresponds to /o/). The affricates /ʈʂ/ and /ɖʐ/ are written tr and dr, respectively, while /ts/ and /dz/ are written ts and j. The letter h is often silent. All other letters have essentially their IPA values. The letters c, q, u, w and x are not part of the Malagasy alphabet, but are used in some foreign loanwords.^[45]

Mp and occasionally nt may begin a word, but they are pronounced /p, t/.

@ is used informally as a short form for amin'ny, which is a preposition followed by the definite form, meaning for instance 'with the'.

Malagasy shares much of its basic vocabulary with the Ma'anyan language, a language from the region of the Barito River in southern Borneo. The Malagasy language also includes some borrowings from Sanskrit, Arabic and Bantu languages (especially the Sabaki branch, from which most notably Swahili derives), and more recently from French and English.

^[53][54]

Malagasy contains many words that derive from Malay which have completely different original definitions unlike those of its close relative Ma'anyan:^[56]

The first dictionary of the language is Étienne de Flacourt's Dictionnaire de la langue de Madagascar published in 1658 though earlier glossaries written in Arabico-Malagasy script exist. A later Vocabulaire Anglais-Malagasy was published in 1729. An 892-page Malagasy–English dictionary was published by James Richardson of the London Missionary Society in 1885, available as a reprint; however, this dictionary includes archaic terminology and definitions. Whereas later works have been of lesser size, several have been updated to reflect the evolution and progress of the language, including a more modern, bilingual frequency dictionary based on a corpus of over 5 million Malagasy words.^[57]

• Winterton, M. et al.: Malagasy–English, English–Malagasy Dictionary / Diksionera Malagasy–Anglisy, Anglisy–Malagasy. Raleigh, North Carolina. USA: Lulu Press 2011, 548 p.
• Richardson: A New Malagasy–English Dictionary. Farnborough, England: Gregg Press 1967, 892 p. ISBN 0-576-11607-6 (Original edition, Antananarivo: The London Missionary Society, 1885).
• Diksionera Malagasy–Englisy. Antananarivo: Trano Printy Loterana 1973, 103 p.
• An Elementary English–Malagasy Dictionary. Antananarivo: Trano Printy Loterana 1969, 118 p.
• English–Malagasy Phrase Book. Antananarivo: Editions Madprint 1973, 199 p. (Les Guides de Poche de Madagasikara.)
• Paginton, K: English–Malagasy Vocabulary. Antananarivo: Trano Printy Loterana 1970, 192 p.
• Bergenholtz, H. et al.: Rakibolana Malagasy–Alemana. Antananarivo: Leximal/Moers: aragon. 1991.
• Bergenholtz, H. et al.: Rakibolana Alemana–Malagasy. Antananarivo: Tsipika/Moers: aragon. 1994.
• Rakibolana Malagasy. Fianarantsoa: Régis RAJEMISOA – RAOLISON 1995, 1061 p.

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Malagasy:

Teraka afaka sy mitovy zo sy fahamendrehana ny olombelona rehetra. Samy manan-tsaina sy fieritreretana ka tokony hifampitondra am- pirahalahiana.^[58]

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English:

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

• Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo
• Languages of Madagascar