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Me’en

A language of Ethiopia

ISO 639-3: mym

Population	80,000 (2005 SIL). 51,446 monolinguals including 4,553 Bodi. 3,500 Bodi. Ethnic population: 57,501 (1998 census) including 4,686 Bodi.
Region	Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Regional State, Bench-Maji zone. Highlanders (Banio) in Bachuma area; lowlanders (Koruwo) south; Bodi near Omo River.
Language map	Southwestern Ethiopia, reference number 54
Alternate names	Mekan, Men, Meqan, Mie’en, Mieken
Dialects	Banio and Koruwo, Bodi (Podi, Mela). Linguistically similar to Suri [suq] and Mursi [mur]. Lexical differences between highland and lowland dialects. Lexical similarity: 65% with the Chai and Tirma dialects of Suri, 30% with Murle [mur].
Classification	Nilo-Saharan, Eastern Sudanic, Eastern, Surmic, South, Southeast, Pastoral, Me’en
Language use	6,300 L2 speakers. All domains. All ages. Positive attitude.
Language development	Literacy rate in L1: 1%. Literacy rate in L2: 4%. The number of literates is increasing.
Writing system	Ethiopic script.
Comments	Suro is the name used by the Kafa [kbr] and Bench [bcq]. Tishena (Teshina, Teshenna, Tishana), meaning ‘hello’ in Me’en [mym], is a name given by Amhara settlers and should be avoided. The Bodi call themselves Mela. SVO; postpositions; genitives, adjective, articles, and relatives follow noun heads; question word final; prefixes and suffixes; verbs inflected; tonal. Banio and Koruwo: agriculturalists; Bodi (nomadic): pastoralists: cattle. Traditional religion, Christian.

Entries from the SIL Bibliography about this language:

Academic Publications

DIEHL, Achim, author. 2011. A Brief Grammar of the Me'en Language.

DIEHL, Achim; WILL, Hans-Georg, authors. 2007. "Meˀen language."

UNSETH, Peter, author. 1998. "Two old causative affixes in Surmic languages."

WILL, Hans-Georg, author. 1989. "Sketch of Meʼen grammar."

WILL, Hans-Georg, author. 1993. Adverbial clauses and topicalization in Meʼen.

WILL, Hans-Georg, author. 1998. "The Meʼen verb system: Does Meʼen have tenses?."

Vernacular Publications

Aɲi, edu oo ec ay biy. 2008.

Arʃide roʃine jɔynɛn denɛ. 2008.

De dɛʃi garsenɔ anen?. 2008.

Kaman de ɔrɛksɛduɲ. 2008.

Kucukucu kumɛ. 2008.

Kunasa ge bukudi ɔtkiye. 2008.

Mɛʼɛnɛn icɔ̀cɔn. 2010.

Mɛndiya aa iɗamanɛko aa ilaasi?. 2008.

Mokac oo tomok k'enɛsɛn. 2008.