Small grant awarded

A grant of $2,275 has been awarded to Colleen Ahland for her research on “The Classification of the B’aga languages.” The B’aga languages are a group of four underdocumented languages in Ethiopia. Their classification has been debated, as has the classification of the five Koman languages of Ethiopia and Sudan. Dr. Ahland’s research is showing that the B’aga and Koman languages are related and form a subgroup within the broader Nilo-Saharan family. This grant will allow her to present her findings at the Nilo-Saharan Colloquium in Vienna (29 May to 1 June 2019) and to get them published in the proceedings.  Determining the classification of these languages not only contributes to a better understanding of the social history of these peoples, it can also contribute to the language development efforts in these languages since solutions found for one language are often applicable to other closely related languages. Colleen Ahland is a Linguistics Consultant for SIL in Ethiopia and also serves as Classifications Editor for the Ethnologue; she holds a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Oregon.