Jalaa
• Nigeria has a single
language isolate, the Jalaa or Cen Tuum language spoken among the Cham in the
Gombe area.
•Analysis so far suggests
that it is unrelated to any other language in the world and thus is probably a
survival from the hunting-gathering period when West Africa would have been occupied
by small foraging bands speaking a diverse range of now disappeared
languages
•Evidence from Mali
(Onjougou), Birimi (Ghana) and Shum Laka (Cameroun) puts the settlement of
West Africa by modern humans at ca. 40,000 BP
• Other language isolates are Laal (Chad) and
Bangi Me (Mali)