April 28, 2005
Why the Fulani think their dogs are saying 'wuff'
The Net is bursting with improbable and outlandish theories (about the Roswell incident, bin Laden, Proctor and Gamble, the Yeti, Donald Rumsfeld etc etc) and don't we just love them? I think it is high time that Voice in the Desert stuck its neck out and entered improbable-and-outlandish-theory territory:
I believe there are ancient and sinister links between Fulfulde and English, even though the ethno-linguists tell us that the two languages evolved separately. I am not talking about the 'bye-bye' which small children have picked up from tourists (kids here say 'bye-bye' ad infinitum when they actually mean 'hello'). Nor even about the 'STOP' signs at the end of roads (which are in fact imports from France).
I am talking about words like 'soppude', which means to chop. In the plural this changes to 'choppude' - hence 'ebe choppa' (they are chopping) and the noun 'choppoowo' (chopper - of wood etc).
Also, 'wuffude' - which means to woof, amazingly. Onomatopoeia, you might cry, but is it really? How much does what a dog say actually resemble the syllable 'woof' (or 'wuff')? After all, a French dog says 'Haw-haw' and a German dog says 'Ra-Ra'. Is it mere coincidence that Fulani dogs and English dogs both go 'woof'?
To cap it all, speakers of other African languages (such as Moore) often say that English sounds to them like Fulfulde. There is something about the sounds and the rhythm which is similar, they say.
For what it's worth, I subscribe to DJ Stenning's theory (see 'Savannah Nomads', Oxford University Press, 1959, pp 18-20) that the Fulani are descended from the people of Atlantis. I reckon that these Atlantans spoke olde englishe (bear with me) but that the shock of the Flood made them forget all their englishe except for a few random language particles such as 'chop' and 'woof'. And when the survivors made it back onto dry ground they included these particles in their new language.
This Atlantis theory would account for the Fulani saying that cows used to be sea-creatures - this is nothing but the folk-memory of seeing cows floundering around in the sea. It would also explain the fact that Fulani men are scared of large bodies of water, and that Fulani women do not like fish. Most telling of all, it explains why the Fulani think that their dogs are saying 'woof'. Need I go on?
What do you reckon, Keith?
Posted by sahelsteve at April 28, 2005 10:24 PM