Pular language

There are some particularities to this version of Fula, including:

• Use of plural form for politeness (such as in German or French, unlike other varieties of Fula)
• A number of separate verbal roots for politeness (these may exist only in Pular)
• There is no initial consonant mutation from singular to plural verb forms as is the case in other varieties of Fula (there is in nominal forms, however)
• In addition to the more standard long-form pronouns of Fula there are alternate forms in Pular (= hi(l) + pronoun). The table below summarizes these (question marks where the info is not complete):

Like other varieties of the Fula language, Pular was written before colonization in an Arabic-based orthography called Ajami. Today, Ajami remains prevalent in rural areas of Fouta Djallon, but Pular is mainly written in a Latin-based orthography, the so-called UNESCO orthography and the Adlam script, an indigenous alphabet created at the end of the 1980s by two brothers for the Fula language. Adlam have widely spread over the years in over 20 countries.

Up until 1989, Pular in Guinea was written with the Guinean languages alphabet that differed from that used in other countries.^[2]

Latin Alphabet

Pre-1989 Latin Alphabet

Pular Ajami Alphabet

Despite decades of official endorsement and preference granted to the Latin Alphabet, Pular Ajami writing still remains widespread in every segment of Fuuta Jalon society. The study and literacy in Pular Ajami still forms an important part of Fula-speaking children's formative years.^[3]

But despite its widespread and historic usage, the Pular Ajami script remains basic and without standardization, although consistently in the Maghrebi script. The alphabet does not contain any additional letters to represent consonant phonemes that don't exist in Arabic. A single Arabic letter can correspond to multiple Latin letters and digraphs. Some authors do use small dots and markings to denote a different pronunciation. For example, in a Pular text, one may see the letter ba with three small dots 'بۛ‎' to indicate a [ɓ] or [p] pronunciation instead of a [b] pronunciation.^[4]

Unlike consonants, there are no variations in writing of vowels, and there does exist a universally accepted convention for them in Pular Ajami. While Arabic has 3 basic vowels, Pular has 5. Vowels [a], [i], and [u] are written with the three Arabic diacritics, whereas vowel [e] is written with the Quranic notation commonly found in books of Warsh tradition, which is a 'dot below' diacritic, and vowel [o] is written with 'damma' ([u]) with a dot on top. Vowels at the beginning of syllables are written not with alif or hamza as is common in Arabic, but with ‘ayin. Vowel lengthening is done with a succeeding alif for [aː], a succeeding yaa for [eː] and [iː], and succeeding waawu for [oː] and [uː].^[4][5]

Below is a short segment of a larger poetry, called "the Mine of Happiness" (Oogirde Malal, عࣾوࢼِرْدٜ مَلَلْ‎, 𞤌𞥅𞤺𞤭𞤪𞤣𞤫 𞤃𞤢𞤤𞤢𞤤).^[6]

• Miɗo Waawi Pular! Learner's guide to Pular (Fuuta Jallon) by Herb Caudill and Ousmane Diallo