Tarifit is a Northern Berber language of the Zenati subgroup, spoken mainly in the Moroccan Rif by about 2 million people.

Classification

Tarifit is a Berber language, belonging to the Zenati subgroup of Northern Berber, and possibly the Riff subgroup of Zenati.

Geographic distribution

Tarifit is spoken mainly in the Moroccan Rif by about 2 million people, with a few speakers across the border in Algeria. There is also a substantial Tarifit-speaking community in the Netherlands. Its own speakers simply call it thamazighth, or Tamazight, a term also often applied in a broader sense to Berber languages in general.

Sounds

Its most noticeable difference from other Berber languages is that in Tarifit l becomes r, and r after a vowel is dropped (somewhat as in British English.)

Writing system

Like other Berber languages, it has been written with several different systems over the years. Most recently (since 2003), Tifinagh has become official throughout Morocco, while the Arabic alphabet and Latin alphabet continue to be used unofficially online and in various publications. However, unlike the nearby Tachelhit (Tasusit), Tarifit has little written literature before the twentieth century.

References

McClelland, Clive. The Interrelations of Syntax, Narrative Structure, and Prosody in a Berber Language (Studies in Linguistics and Semiotics, V. 8). Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2000. (ISBN 0773477403)

External link

• Ethnologue report on Tarifit (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=RIF)