The Balanta-Kentohe (Kəntɔhɛ) language is spoken by about 423,000 people on the north central and central coast of Guinea-Bissau (where as of 2006 it is spoken by about 397,000 people, many of whom can be found in the Oio Region[4]) as well as in the Gambia. Films and portions of the Bible have been produced in Balanta-Kentohe.
The Kəntɔhɛ dialect is spoken in the north, while the Fora dialect is spoken in the south.[5]
Ethnologue lists the alternative names of Balanta-Kentohe as Alante, Balanda, Balant, Balanta, Balante, Ballante, Belante, Brassa, Bulanda, Frase, Fora, Kantohe (Kentohe, Queuthoe), Naga and Mane. The Naga, Mane and Kantohe dialects may be separate languages.
Balanta-Ganja is spoken by 86,000 people (as of 2006) in the southwest corner of and the south of Senegal. Literacy is less than 1% for Balanta-Ganja.[2][3] In September 2000, Balanta-Ganja was granted the status of a national language in Senegal, and as of then can now be taught in elementary school.
Ethnologue lists the alternative names of Balanta-Ganja as Alante, Balanda, Balant, Balante, Ballante, Belante, Brassa, Bulanda, Fjaa, Fraase (Fraasɛ). Its dialects are Fganja (Ganja) and Fjaalib (Blip).
The distinction between tense and non-tense vowels is indicated by the addition of an acute diacritic above tense vowels. Pre-nasalised consonants are indicated by preceding their consonant with a homorganic nasal (i.e. mp, nt, ñj). Unvoiced consonants are represented by doubling voiced consonants (i.e. bb = /p/)
^Wilson, William A. A. (2007). Guinea Languages of the Atlantic Group: Description and Internal Classification. Schriften zur Afrikanistik, 12. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.
^Creissels, Denis; Biaye, Séckou (2016). Le balant ganja: phonologie, morphosyntaxe, liste lexicale, textes (in French). Dakar: IFAN Cheikh Anta Diop.
^Mbodj, Chérif (2011). Description synchronique du Balante So:fa (Guinée-Bissau) [Synchronic description of Balante So:fa (Guinea-Bissau)] (Doctoral thesis) (in French). Université Cheikh Anta Diop.
^Gomes, Cleonice Candida (2008). O sistema verbal do balanta: um estudo dos morfemas de tempo [The verbal system of Balanta: a study of time morphemes] (Doctoral thesis) (in Portuguese). Universidade de São Paulo. doi:10.11606/t.8.2008.tde-19012009-154521.
Creissels, Denis. 2016. A sketch of Ganja (Balant). In Friederike Lüpke (ed.), The Oxford guide to the Atlantic languages of West Africa. Oxford University Press.
Mansaly, Jules. 2018. Dictionnaire des proverbes balant: Une langue du groupe atlantique-ouest de la famille niger-congo au Sénégal. (Series: Verbal Art and Documentary Literature in African Languages Volume 37.) Rüdiger Köppe Verlag.
Migeod, F.W.H., The Languages of West Africa Volume II London 1913.
Westermann, D. & Bryan, M.A. The Languages of West Africa. Published for the International African Institute by Dawsons of Pall Mall, Folkestone & London 1970.
