text:
Horse tack

Tack is equipment or accessories equipped on horses and other equines in the course of their use as domesticated animals. This equipment includes such items as saddles, stirrups, bridles, halters, reins, bits, and harnesses. Equipping a horse is often referred to as tacking up, and involves putting the tack equipment on the horse. A room to store such equipment, usually near or in a stable, is a tack room.

Saddles
Saddles are seats for the rider, fastened to the horse's back by means of a girth in English-style riding, or a cinch in the use of Western tack. Girths are generally a wide strap that goes around the horse at a point about four inches behind the forelegs. Some western saddles will also have a second strap known as a flank or back cinch that fastens at the rear of the saddle and goes around the widest part of the horse's belly.

It is important that the saddle be comfortable for both the rider and the horse as an improperly fitting saddle may create pressure points on the horse's back muscle (Latissimus dorsi) and cause the horse pain and can lead to the horse, rider, or both getting injured.

There are many types of saddle, each specially designed for its given task. Saddles are usually divided into two major categories: "English saddles" and "Western saddles" according to the riding discipline they are used in. Other types of saddles, such as racing saddles, Australian saddles, sidesaddles and endurance saddles do not necessarily fit neatly in either category.

Saddle accessories

 * Breastplate or breastcollar: Prevents saddles of all styles from sliding sideways or backward on a horse's back
 * Surcingle
 * Crupper
 * Breeching, also called "britching"
 * Saddle blanket or numnah

Stirrups
Stirrups are supports for the rider's feet that hang down on either side of the saddle. They provide greater stability for the rider but can have safety concerns due to the potential for a rider's feet to get stuck in them. If a rider is thrown from a horse but has a foot caught in the stirrup, they could be dragged if the horse runs away. To minimize this risk, a number of safety precautions are taken. First, most riders wear riding boots with a heel and a smooth sole. Next, some saddles, particularly English saddles, have safety bars that allow a stirrup leather to fall off the saddle if pulled backwards by a falling rider. Other precautions are done with stirrup design itself. Western saddles have wide stirrup treads that make it more difficult for the foot to become trapped. A number of saddle styles incorporate a tapedero, which is covering over the front of the stirrup that keeps the foot from sliding all the way through the stirrup. The English stirrup (or "iron") has several design variations which are either shaped to allow the rider's foot to slip out easily or are closed with a very heavy rubber band. The invention of stirrups was of great historic significance in mounted combat, giving the rider secure foot support while on horseback.

Headgear

Bridles, hackamores, halters, or headcollars, and similar equipment consist of various arrangements of straps around the horse's head, and are used for control and communication with the animal.

Halters
A halter (United States) or headcollar (United Kingdom) (occasionally headstall) consists of a noseband and headstall that buckles around the horse's head and allows the horse to be led or tied. The lead rope is separate, and it may be short (from six to ten feet, two to three meters) for everyday leading and tying, or much longer (up to 25 ft, eight meters) for tasks such as for leading packhorses or for picketing a horse out to graze.

Some horses, particularly stallions, may have a chain attached to the lead rope and placed over the nose or under the jaw to increase the control provided by a halter while being led. Most of the time, horses are not ridden with a halter, as it offers insufficient precision and control. Halters have no bit.

In Australian and British English, a halter is a rope with a spliced running loop around the nose and another over the poll, used mainly for unbroken horses or for cattle. The lead rope cannot be removed from the halter. A show halter is made from rolled leather and the lead attaches to form the chinpiece of the noseband. These halters are not suitable for paddock usage or in loose stalls. An underhalter is a lightweight halter or headcollar which is made with only one small buckle, and can be worn under a bridle for tethering a horse without untacking.

Bridles
Bridles usually have a bit attached to reins and are used for riding and driving horses.

English Bridles have a cavesson style noseband and are seen in English riding. Their reins are buckled to one another, and they have little adornment or flashy hardware.

Western Bridles used in Western riding usually have no noseband, are made of thin bridle leather. They may have long, separated "Split" reins or shorter closed reins, which sometimes include an attached Romal. Western bridles are often adorned with silver or other decorative features.

Double bridles are a type of English bridle that use two bits in the mouth at once, a snaffle and a curb. The two bits allow the rider to have very precise control of the horse. As a rule, only very advanced horses and riders use double bridles. Double bridles are usually seen in the top levels of dressage, but also are seen in certain types of show hack and Saddle seat competition.

Hackamores and other bitless designs

A hackamore is a headgear that utilizes a heavy noseband of some sort, rather than a bit, most often used to train young horses or to go easy on an older horse's mouth. Hackamores are more often seen in western riding. Some related styles of headgear that control a horse with a noseband rather than a bit are known as bitless bridles.

The word "hackamore" is derived from the Spanish word jáquima. Hackamores are seen in western riding disciplines, as well as in endurance riding and English riding disciplines such as show jumping and the stadium phase of eventing. While the classic bosal-style hackamore is usually used to start young horses, other designs, such as various bitless bridles and the mechanical hackamore are often seen on mature horses with dental issues that make bit use painful, horses with certain training problems, and on horses with mouth or tongue injuries. Some riders also like to use them in the winter to avoid putting a frozen metal bit into a horse's mouth.

Like bitted bridles, noseband-based designs can be gentle or harsh, depending on the hands of the rider. It is a myth that a bit is cruel and a hackamore is gentler. The horse's face is very soft and sensitive with many nerve endings. Misuse of a hackamore can cause swelling on the nose, scraping on the nose and jawbone, and extreme misuse may cause damage to the bones and cartilage of the horse's head.

Other headgear
A longeing cavesson (UK: lungeing) is a special type of halter or noseband used for longeing a horse. Longeing is the activity of having a horse walk, trot and/or canter in a large circle around the handler at the end of a rope that is 25 to 30 ft long. It is used for training and exercise.

A neck rope or cordeo is a rope tied around a horse's neck used to guide the horse during bridleless riding or groundwork.

Reins
Reins consist of leather straps or rope attached to the outer ends of a bit and extend to the rider's or driver's hands. Reins are the means by which a horse rider or driver communicates directional commands to the horse's head. Pulling on the reins can be used to steer or stop the horse. The sides of a horse's mouth are sensitive, so pulling on the reins pulls the bit, which then pulls the horse's head from side to side, which is how the horse is controlled.

On some types of harnesses there might be supporting rings to carry the reins over the horse's back. When pairs of horses are used in drawing a wagon or coach it is usual for the outer side of each pair to be connected to reins and the inside of the bits connected by a short bridging strap or rope. The driver carries "four-in-hand" or "six-in-hand" being the number of reins connecting to the pairs of horses.

A rein may be attached to a halter to lead or guide the horse in a circle for training purposes or to lead a packhorse, but a simple lead rope is more often used for these purposes. A longe line is sometimes called a "longe rein", but it is actually a flat line about 30 ft long, usually made of nylon or cotton web, about one inch wide, thus longer and wider than even a driving rein.

Bits
A bit is a device placed in a horse's mouth, kept on a horse's head by means of a headstall. There are many types, each useful for specific types of riding and training.

The mouthpiece of the bit does not rest on the teeth of the horse, but rather rests on the gums or "bars" of the horse's mouth in an interdental space behind the front incisors and in front of the back molars. It is important that the style of bit is appropriate to the horse's needs and is fitted properly for it to function properly and be as comfortable as possible for the horse. The basic "classic" styles of bits are:
 * Curb bit
 * Snaffle bit
 * Pelham bit
 * Weymouth or Double Bridle

While there are literally hundreds of types of bit mouthpieces, bit rings and bit shanks, essentially there are really only two broad categories: direct pressure bits, broadly termed snaffle bits; and leverage bits, usually termed curbs.

Bits that act with direct pressure on the tongue and lips of the bit are in the general category of snaffle bits. Snaffle bits commonly have a single jointed mouthpiece and act with a nutcracker effect on the bars, tongue and occasionally roof of the mouth. However, regardless of mouthpiece, any bit that operates only on direct pressure is a "snaffle" bit.

Leverage bits have shanks coming off the mouthpiece to create leverage that applies pressure to the poll, chin groove and mouth of the horse are in the category of curb bits. Any bit with shanks that works off of leverage is a "curb" bit, regardless of whether the mouthpiece is solid or jointed.

Some combination or hybrid bits combine direct pressure and leverage, such as the Kimblewick or Kimberwicke, which adds slight leverage to a two-rein design that resembles a snaffle; and the four rein designs such as the single mouthpiece Pelham bit and the double bridle, which places a curb and a snaffle bit simultaneously in the horse's mouth.

In the wrong hands even the mildest bit can hurt the horse. Conversely, a very severe bit, in the right hands, can transmit subtle commands that cause no pain to the horse. Bit commands should be given with only the quietest movements of the hands, and much steering and stopping should be done with the legs and seat.

Harness
A horse harness is a set of devices and straps that attaches a horse to a cart, carriage, sledge or any other load. There are two main styles of harnesses - breaststrap and collar and hames style. These differ in how the weight of the load is attached. Most Harnesses are made from leather, which is the traditional material for harnesses, though some designs are now made of nylon webbing or synthetic biothane.

A breaststrap harness has a wide leather strap going horizontally across the horses' breast, attached to the traces and then to the load. This is used only for lighter loads. A collar and hames harness has a collar around the horses' neck with wood or metal hames in the collar. The traces attach from the hames to the load. This type of harness is needed for heavy draft work.

Both types will also have a bridle and reins. A harness that is used to support shafts, such as on a cart pulled by a single horse, will also have a saddle attached to the harness to help the horse support the shafts and breeching to brake the forward motion of the vehicle, especially when stopping or moving downhill. Horses guiding vehicles by means of a pole, such as two-horse teams pulling a wagon, a hay-mower, or a dray, will have pole-straps attached to the lower part of the horse collar.

Breastplates and martingales

Breastplates, breastcollars or breastgirths attach to the front of the saddle, cross the horse's chest, and usually have a strap that runs between the horse's front legs and attaches to the girth. They keep the saddle from sliding back or sideways. They are usually seen in demanding, fast-paced sports. They are crucial pieces of safety equipment for English riding activities requiring jumping, such as eventing, show jumping, polo, and fox hunting. They are also seen in Western riding events, particularly in rodeo, reining and cutting, where it is particularly important to prevent a saddle from shifting. They may also be worn in other horse show classes for decorative purposes.

A martingale is a piece of equipment that keeps a horse from raising its head too high. Various styles can be used as a control measure, to prevent the horse from avoiding rider commands by raising its head out of position; or as a safety measure to keep the horse from tossing its head high or hard enough to smack its rider in the face.

They are allowed in many types of competition, especially those where speed or jumping may be required, but are not allowed in most "flat" classes at horse shows, though an exception is made in a few classes limited exclusively to young or "green" horses who may not yet be fully trained.

Martingales are usually attached to the horse one of two ways. They are either attached to the center chest ring of a breastplate or, if no breastplate is worn, they are attached by two straps, one that goes around the horse's neck, and the other that attaches to the girth, with the martingale itself beginning at the point in the center of the chest where the neck and girth straps intersect.

Martingale types include:

 * German martingale or Market Harborough: This design consists of a split fork that comes up from the chest, runs through the rings of the bit and attaches to the reins of the bridle between the bit and the rider's hand. It acts in a manner similar to a running martingale, but with greater leverage.  It is not usually considered show legal and is used primarily as a training aid.
 * Irish martingale: Unlike the previous designs, this very simple "martingale" does not control the height of the horse's head, but merely keeps the reins from going over the horse's head in the result of a fall. It consists of a piece of leather with a ring on each end through which each rein runs.
 * Running martingale: This design adds leverage to a bit and features a split fork beginning at the chest with a ring on each side of the fork through which the reins pass, enabling the rider to more easily keep the horse under control, but also allowing the horse freedom of movement when needed. Fitted correctly, the running martingale only controls how high the horse carries its head when the rider tightens the reins.  The standard adjustment of a running martingale is to set the rings at a height where they do not engage and add leverage to the reins when the horse carries its head at the proper height.  Sometimes a running martingale may be adjusted at a greater or lesser length depending on the needs of the horse and rider.
 * Standing martingale: A design with one strap that runs from the girth or the chest and attaches to the noseband of the bridle. The standing martingale acts on the horse's nose and creates an absolute limit to how high a horse can raise its head. The term used in western riding for this piece of equipment is the tie down.  Standard adjustment of a standing martingale allows enough slack to bring the strap to the horse's throatlatch when the animal has its head in a relaxed, natural position.  However, it is sometimes adjusted shorter.  Unlike the running martingale, it limits the freedom of the horse's head, no matter how long or short the reins may be.  While standing martingales are common in show hunter and equitation classes, the limits placed on the horse's movement are dangerous for cross-country riding or show jumping. Therefore, in these disciplines, a running martingale is necessary for safety reasons, if a martingale is used at all.

There are other training devices that fall loosely in the martingale category, in that they use straps attached to the reins or bit which limit the movement of the horse's head or add leverage to the rider's hands in order to control the horse's head. Common devices of this nature include the overcheck, the chambon, de Gogue, grazing reins, draw reins and the "bitting harness" or "bitting rig". However, most of this equipment is used for training purposes and is not legal in any competition. In some disciplines, use of leverage devices, even in training, is controversial.

Associated Equipment

 * Bell boots
 * Crop
 * Hoof boot
 * Horseshoe
 * Polo wraps
 * Splint boots
 * Spurs
 * Whip
 * Blinkers and Blinders

title: Horse tack


text:
Hausa language

Hausa (Harshen/Halshen Hausa ; Ajami: هَرْشٜىٰن هَوْسَا) is a Chadic language that is spoken by the Hausa people in the northern parts of Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon, Benin and Togo, and the southern parts of Niger, and Chad, with significant minorities in Ivory Coast. A small number of speakers also exist in Sudan.

Hausa is a member of the Afroasiatic language family and is the most widely spoken language within the Chadic branch of that family. Ethnologue estimated that it was spoken as a first language by some 54 million people and as a second language by another 34 million, bringing the total number of Hausa speakers to an estimated 88 million.

In Nigeria, the Hausa film industry is known as Kannywood.

Classification
Hausa belongs to the West Chadic languages subgroup of the Chadic languages group, which in turn is part of the Afroasiatic language family.

Geographic distribution
Native speakers of Hausa, the Hausa people, are mostly found in southern Niger and northern Nigeria. The language is used as a lingua franca by non-native speakers in most of northern Nigeria, southern Niger, northern Cameroon, northern Ghana, northern Benin, northern Togo, southern Chad and parts of Sudan.

Nigeria
In Nigeria, Hausa is dominant throughout the north, but not dominant in the states of Kwara, Kogi and Benue. States (or cities) in which Hausa is spoken predominantly include Kano, Kaduna, Katsina, Daura, Gobir, Zaria, Sokoto, Birnin Kebbi, Gusau, Dutse, Hadejia, Bauchi, Misau, Zamfara, Gombe, Nafada, Maiduguri, Yobe, Yola, Jalingo, Jos, Lafia, Nasarawa, Minna, Kontagora, Keffi and Abuja.

Niger Republic
In Niger, Hausa is spoken by up to 53% of the population. It is very popular in the cities of Maradi, Diffa, Tahoua, Zinder, Tillaberi, Dosso, and Agadez.

Cameroon
In Cameroon, Hausa is spoken in the north, including the cities of Ngaoundere, Garoua, and Maroua.

Ghana
In Ghana, Hausa is the lingua franca of the Zongo communities across the country.

Benin
In Benin, Hausa is spoken in the north. Cities where it is spoken include Parakou, Kandi, Natitingou, and Djougou.

Togo
In Togo, Hausa is spoken in the north. Cities where it is spoken include Sokode, Kara, and Dapaong.

Chad
In Chad, Hausa is spoken in the south. Cities where it is spoken include N'Djamena.

Sudan
In Sudan, Hausa is spoken in the states of Jazirah, Blue Nile, and Kordofan.

Dialects
Hausa presents a wide uniformity wherever it is spoken. However, linguists have identified dialect areas with a cluster of features characteristic of each one.

Traditional dialects
Eastern Hausa dialects include Dauranci in Daura, Kananci in Kano, Bausanci in Bauchi, Gudduranci in Katagum Misau and part of Borno, and Hadejanci in Hadejiya.

Western Hausa dialects include Sakkwatanci in Sokoto, Katsinanci in Katsina, Arewanci in Gobir, Adar, Kebbi, and Zanhwaranci in Zamfara, and Kurhwayanci in Kurfey in Niger. Katsina is transitional between Eastern and Western dialects. Sokoto is used in a variety of classical Hausa literature, and is often known as Classical Hausa.

Northern Hausa dialects include Arewa (meaning 'North') and Arewaci.

Zazzaganci in Zazzau is the major Southern dialect.

The Daura (Dauranchi) and Kano (Kananci) dialect are the standard. The BBC, Deutsche Welle, Radio France Internationale and Voice of America offer Hausa services on their international news web sites using Dauranci and Kananci. In recent language development Zazzaganci took over the innovation of writing and speaking the current Hausa language use.

Northernmost dialects and loss of tonality
The western to eastern Hausa dialects of Kurhwayanci, Damagaram and Adarawa, represent the traditional northernmost limit of native Hausa communities. These are spoken in the northernmost sahel and mid-Saharan regions in west and central Niger in the Tillaberi, Tahoua, Dosso, Maradi, Agadez and Zinder regions. While mutually comprehensible with other dialects (especially Sakkwatanci, and to a lesser extent Gaananci), the northernmost dialects have slight grammatical and lexical differences owing to frequent contact with the Zarma, Fula, and Tuareg groups and cultural changes owing to the geographical differences between the grassland and desert zones. These dialects also have the quality of bordering on non-tonal pitch accent dialects.

This link between non-tonality and geographic location is not limited to Hausa alone, but is exhibited in other northern dialects of neighbouring languages; example includes differences within the Songhay language (between the non-tonal northernmost dialects of Koyra Chiini in Timbuktu and Koyraboro Senni in Gao; and the tonal southern Zarma dialect, spoken from western Niger to northern Ghana), and within the Soninke language (between the non-tonal northernmost dialects of Imraguen and Nemadi spoken in east-central Mauritania; and the tonal southern dialects of Senegal, Mali and the Sahel).

Ghanaian Hausa dialect
The Ghanaian Hausa dialect (Gaananci), spoken in Ghana and Togo, is a distinct western native Hausa dialect-bloc with adequate linguistic and media resources available. Separate smaller Hausa dialects are spoken by an unknown number of Hausa further west in parts of Burkina Faso, and in the Haoussa Foulane, Badji Haoussa, Guezou Haoussa, and Ansongo districts of northeastern Mali (where it is designated as a minority language by the Malian government), but there are very little linguistic resources and research done on these particular dialects at this time.

Gaananci forms a separate group from other Western Hausa dialects, as it now falls outside the contiguous Hausa-dominant area, and is usually identified by the use of c for ky, and j for gy. This is attributed to the fact that Ghana's Hausa population descend from Hausa-Fulani traders settled in the zongo districts of major trade-towns up and down the previous Asante, Gonja and Dagomba kingdoms stretching from the sahel to coastal regions, in particular the cities of Accra (Sabon Zango, Nima), Takoradi and Cape Coast

Gaananci exhibits noted inflected influences from Zarma, Gur, Jula-Bambara, Akan, and Soninke, as Ghana is the westernmost area in which the Hausa language is a major lingua-franca among sahelian/Muslim West Africans, including both Ghanaian and non-Ghanaian zango migrants primarily from the northern regions, or Mali and Burkina Faso. Ghana also marks the westernmost boundary in which the Hausa people inhabit in any considerable number. Immediately west and north of Ghana (in Côte d'Ivoire, and Burkina Faso), Hausa is abruptly replaced with Dioula–Bambara as the main sahelian/Muslim lingua-franca of what become predominantly Manding areas, and native Hausa-speakers plummet to a very small urban minority.

Because of this, and the presence of surrounding Akan, Gbe, Gur and Mande languages, Gaananci was historically isolated from the other Hausa dialects. Despite this difference, grammatical similarities between Sakkwatanci and Ghanaian Hausa determine that the dialect, and the origin of the Ghanaian Hausa people themselves, are derived from the northwestern Hausa area surrounding Sokoto.

Hausa is also widely spoken by non-native Gur, and Mandé Ghanaian Muslims, but differs from Gaananci, and rather has features consistent with non-native Hausa dialects.

Other native dialects
Hausa is also spoken in various parts of Cameroon and Chad, which combined the mixed dialects of Northern Nigeria and Niger. In addition, Arabic has had a great influence in the way Hausa is spoken by the native Hausa speakers in these areas.

Non-native Hausa
In West Africa, Hausa's use as a lingua franca has given rise to a non-native pronunciation that differs vastly from native pronunciation by way of key omissions of implosive and ejective consonants present in native Hausa dialects, such as ɗ, ɓ and kʼ/ƙ, which are pronounced by non-native speakers as d, b and k respectively. This creates confusion among non-native and native Hausa speakers, as non-native pronunciation does not distinguish words like ' ("correct") and ' ("one-by-one"). Another difference between native and non-native Hausa is the omission of vowel length in words and change in the standard tone of native Hausa dialects (ranging from native Fulani and Tuareg Hausa-speakers omitting tone altogether, to Hausa speakers with Gur or Yoruba mother tongues using additional tonal structures similar to those used in their native languages). Use of masculine and feminine gender nouns and sentence structure are usually omitted or interchanged, and many native Hausa nouns and verbs are substituted with non-native terms from local languages.

Non-native speakers of Hausa numbered more than 25 million and, in some areas, live close to native Hausa. It has replaced many other languages especially in the north-central and north-eastern part of Nigeria and continues to gain popularity in other parts of Africa as a result of Hausa movies and music which spread out throughout the region.

Hausa-based pidgins
There are several pidgin forms of Hausa. Barikanchi was formerly used in the colonial army of Nigeria. Gibanawa is currently in widespread use in Jega in northwestern Nigeria, south of the native Hausa area.

Loan words
The Hausa language has a long history of borrowing words from other languages, usually from the languages being spoken around and near Hausaland.

Consonants
Hausa has between 23 and 25 consonant phonemes depending on the speaker.

The three-way contrast between palatals, plain velars , and labialized velars is found only before long and short , e.g.  ('grass'),  ('to increase'),  ('shea-nuts'). Before front vowels, only palatals and labialized velars occur, e.g. ('jealousy') vs. ('side of body'). Before rounded vowels, only labialized velars occur, e.g. ('ringworm').

Glottalic consonants
Hausa has glottalic consonants (implosives and ejectives) at four or five places of articulation (depending on the dialect). They require movement of the glottis during pronunciation and have a staccato sound.

They are written with modified versions of Latin letters. They can also be denoted with an apostrophe, either before or after depending on the letter, as shown below:

 * ɓ / b', an implosive consonant,, sometimes ;
 * ɗ / d', an implosive, sometimes ;
 * ts', an ejective consonant, or, according to the dialect;
 * ch', an ejective (does not occur in Kano dialect)
 * ƙ / k', an ejective ; and  are separate consonants;
 * ƴ / 'y is a palatal approximant with creaky voice,, found in only a small number of high-frequency words (e.g. "children",  "daughter"). Historically it developed from palatalized.

Vowels
Hausa vowels occur in five different vowel qualities, all of which can be short or long, totaling 10 monophthongs. In addition, there are four diphthongs, giving a total number of 14 vocalic phonemes.

In comparison with the long vowels, the short can be similar in quality to the long vowels, mid-centralized to  or centralized to.

Medial can be neutralized to, with the rounding depending on the environment.

Medial are neutralized with.

The short can be either similar in quality to the long, or it can be as high as , with possible intermediate pronunciations.

The 4 diphthongs in Hausa are.

Tones
Hausa is a tonal language. Each of its five vowels may have low tone, high tone or falling tone. In standard written Hausa, tone is not marked. In recent linguistic and pedagogical materials, tone is marked by means of diacritics.

 * à è ì ò ù – low tone: grave accent (`)

 * â ê î ô û – falling tone: circumflex (ˆ)

An acute accent (´) may be used for high tone, but the usual practice is to leave high tone unmarked.

Morphology
Except for the Zaria and Bauchi dialects spoken south of Kano, Hausa distinguishes between masculine and feminine genders.

Hausa, like the rest of the Chadic languages, is known for its complex, irregular pluralization of nouns. Noun plurals in Hausa are derived using a variety of morphological processes, such as suffixation, infixation, reduplication, or a combination of any of these processes. There are 20 plural classes proposed by Newman (2000).

Pronouns
Hausa marks tense differences by different sets of subject pronouns, sometimes with the pronoun combined with some additional particle. For this reason, a subject pronoun must accompany every verb in Hausa, regardless of whether the subject is known from previous context or is expressed by a noun subject.

Boko (Latin)
Hausa's modern official orthography is a Latin-based alphabet called boko, which was introduced in the 1930s by the British colonial administration.

The letter ƴ (y with a right hook) is used only in Niger; in Nigeria it is written ʼy.

Tone and vowel length are not marked in writing. So, for example, "from" and  "battle" are both written daga. The distinction between and  (which does not exist for all speakers) is not marked in orthography, but may be indicated with R̃ r̃ for the trill in linguistic transcription.

Ajami (Arabic)
Hausa has also been written in ajami, an Arabic alphabet, since the early 17th century. The first known work to be written in Hausa is Riwayar Nabi Musa by Abdullahi Suka in the 17th century. There is no standard system of using ajami, and different writers may use letters with different values. Short vowels are written regularly with the help of vowel marks, which are seldom used in Arabic texts other than the Quran. Many medieval Hausa manuscripts in ajami, similar to the Timbuktu Manuscripts, have been discovered recently; some of them even describe constellations and calendars.

As Hausa Ajami script was never recognized and regulated officially, there has never been a top down imposition of a unified convention. Standardization of letters in Ajami has happened over time and in various stages, in synch with neighbouring Ajami traditions, as well as external factors.

In Niger and Nigeria, there exists two general orthographic traditions, each derived from two Quranic orthographic practices. One of these is based on the Quran recitation and inscription of the 8th century religious scholar Hafs ibn Sulayman, the other based on the Quran recitation and inscription of another 8th Century scholar, Warsh. Hafs tradition is the most popular across the Muslim world, and especially in Egypt, the Levant, and the Arabian Peninsula. Warsh tradition is the second most popular tradition across the Muslim world, and has been especially popular in North Africa, West Africa, and Andalusia.

For example, vowels in Hausa Ajami script, including representation of vowel [e], and differentiation of short versus long vowels, were one of the first aspects to be unified and standardized. Consonants on the other hand, especially consonant letters for representing sounds that don't exist in Arabic, took longer to become standardized. Some new letters were even coined in the late 19th and early 20th century, and because of the direct influence of the Boko alphabet (Latin alphabet). For example, whereas previously in writing, sounds [b] and [ɓ] may have usually been written with a singe letter ba '', it was the innovation of introducing the separate letter in Latin alphabet that created an impetus for scholars writing in Ajami script, to innovate and introduce a separate Ajami letter for the distinct sound as well.

Below is the list of letters of Hausa Ajami, in both Warsh and Hafs traditions. Beige highlight marks letters that are only used for writing of loan words of Arabic or European origin. Green highlight marks letters that are innovations of Hausa orthography and are not used in Arabic language.

Other systems
Hausa is one of three indigenous languages of Nigeria that have been rendered in braille.

At least three other writing systems for Hausa have been proposed or "discovered". None of these are in active use beyond perhaps some individuals.

 * A Hausa alphabet, named in some sources as Salifou or Gobiri, supposedly of ancient origin and in use north of Maradi, Niger.
 * A script that apparently originated with the writing/publishing group Raina Kama in the 1980s.
 * A script called "Tafi" proposed in the 1970s(?)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Hausa language


text:
Talk:Homosexual

This is the first I ever heard of the "assumption" that homosexuals choose their orientation. My careful study of the Bible -- okay :-) my haphazard skimming, geez, gimme a break! -- shows absolutely nothing about choosing to have sexual desires of any sort. The Bible speaks only of what to do with those desires we realize we have.

There is no small controversy over how homosexual desire arises. Is is it innate (perhaps genetic), learned somehow, or what? I've never heard anyone admit, "It was then I decided to have homosexual desires." --Ed Poor

 * I agree that it's a ridiculous theory, but there are vocal conservative christians in the US who hold this position, blaming gays for their "wrong choices" and trying to reform them. These views are probably irrelevant or non-existant elsewhere, (I certainly haven't heard them in 25 years of living in Germany) and that should be mentioned in the article. --AxelBoldt

 * I believe that the argument is something along the lines of: "Although we may covet a neighbors's goods, it would be wrong to act upon these impulses." Similarly some would argue that we have a duty not to act on homosexual or other "unGodly" desires.

 * Right, it's such a ridiculous theory that it's probably a staw man argument. After you knock down that straw man, you can say that having conceded that I didn't choose to be homosexual, surely you must see that I was born that way. I think this is the fallacy of the excluded middle. --Ed Poor

I have never seen anything to suggest that the following sentence is true.

 * Judaism, Christianity and Islam have always assumed that homosexuals choose their sexual orientation.

The only thing I've ever heard from any of the monotheistic religions about homosexuality and "choosing" is that people have a moral obligation to choose not to perform homosexual acts. The quoted sentence is more likely a straw man, but I'll let it alone while I follow Taw's advice. - As a philosopher, the following is very interesting to me:
 * the notion that sexual identities such as 'homosexuality', 'heterosexuality' or 'bisexuality' have any objective existence, as opposed to being a social construction.

This is supposed to be, I imagine, a radical thing to say. But I'm not sure what it even means. It seems to me that social constructions always, unless they are totally arbitrary (which they almost never are), grounded in some facts. For example, the notion of homosexuality might very well be a social construction, in the simple, humble, uncontroversial (!) sense that we wouldn't have the concept of homosexuality if we hadn't invented it. It's not an innate concept. But it hardly follows from that that there is no objective basis on which to apply the concept. For instance, it seems we can have a perfectly objective basis on which to notice that people are sexually attracted to members of the same sex. (E.g., we might use hidden webcams in their bedrooms...er, scratch that thought.) On the other hand, if Foucault's point is that homosexuality is a "social construct" in the sense that the behavior is chosen (one thinks of the radical freedom of the existentialists) and not something to which some people have a genetic, perhaps in some cases irresistible disposition, he'll be disagreeing with many scientists, or so the authors of our homosexuality say. If neither of those are what Foucault means by saying that homosexuality (etc.) is "merely" a social concept and not "objective," then I can't figure out what he means.

Now, I don't intend to get into an argument about all this. I just think I'm saying some pretty obvious stuff, so that I can say the following: has anyone replied to Foucault and the others who make such points as I have above? If yes, for pity's sake, please add a reply into the article  If not, too bad. Perhaps we could add: "Most trained philosophers in English-speaking countries pretty much ignore Foucault, however." That would be both accurate and relevant, I imagine... --LMS

Without having read Foucault (even though I think I should) I would interpret the "social construction" as follows: society wants to neatly divide people into (bad) homosexuals and (good) heterosexuals, forcing everybody to pick their side, while in reality it's a spectrum with everybody being a little bit of both (mostly based on the people they meet and like), some more on one side than on the other. Akin to the criticism of the "race" concept I would imagine, which society wants to define but biologists can't find an objective basis for. --AxelBoldt

--

Can someone tell me a good reason for homosexual and homosexuality to be separate articles? - user:Montrealais

 * I think they should be combined. AxelBoldt

title: Talk:Homosexual