Tasawaq language

Tasawaq
Tásàwàq
Native to	Niger
Region	Agadez
Ethnicity	Isawaghan/Ingalkoyyu
Native speakers	21,000 (2021)[1]
Language family	Nilo-Saharan? Songhay Northern Tasawaq
Dialects	Ingelshi Emghedeshie
Language codes
ISO 639-3	twq
Glottolog	tasa1240
ELP	Tasawaq
Location of Songhay languages[2] Northwest Songhay:   Korandje   Koyra Chiini   Tadaksahak   Tasawaq   Tagdal Eastern Songhay:   Tondi Songway Kiini   Humburi Senni   Koyraboro Senni   Zarma language   Songhoyboro Ciine   Dendi

Sawaq
Person	Asawagh / Ingalkoy
People	Isawaghan / Ingalkoyyu
Language	Tasawaq / Ingelshi

Tasawaq (Tuareg name: Tesăwăq),^[3] sometimes also called Ingelshi, is a Northern Songhay language spoken by the Issawaghan or Ingalkoyyu, a community surrounding the town of In-Gall in Niger.^[4][5] A closely related variety called Emghedeshie was spoken in Agadez but is now extinct.

It shares some similarities with Berber languages, e.g. Tamasheq. For example in both languages, the grammatical gender of a noun is female if it begins and ends with the letter t.

References

1. Tasawaq at Ethnologue (26th ed., 2023)
2. This map is based on classification from Glottolog and data from Ethnologue.
3. Ritter, Georg (2009). Wörterbuch zur Sprache und Kultur der Twareg II Deutsch-Twareg. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. p. 735.
4. Michael J. Rueck; Niels Christiansen. Northern Songhay languages in Mali and Niger, a sociolinguistic survey. Summer Institute of Linguistics (1999).
5. Catherine Taine-Cheikh. [Les langues parlées au sud Sahara et au nord Sahel http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00456346/]. De l'Atlantique à l'Ennedi (Catalogue de l'exposition « Sahara-Sahel »), Centre Culturel Français d'Abidjan (Ed.) (1989) 155–173