Foreword

Tchourama, also called Turka, is a language of the Gur (Central) family. It is spoken by the Tchouraba in Burkina Faso in the provinces of Comoé and Leraba. Linguistic surveys made it possible to determine two main dialects distributed between the western region (villages of Douna, Niofila, Tourni) and the eastern region (Bérégadougou, Moussodougou, Wolonkoto, Toumousseni, Mondon etc.) Among the villages from the western region, there are still dialect differences.

This lexicon is based on the Tchourama spoken in the villages of Bérégadougou and Fabédougou.

The purpose of this lexicon is to help tchouraphones to write their mother tongue well. We hope that it will be used by literacy educators as a reference lexicon.

This lexicon presupposes knowledge of the Tchourama Spelling Guide (SIL). This guide explains how to write Tchurama proposed and followed by SIL.

We are aware that this lexicon is neither complete nor perfect. This is a preliminary edition and we invite all readers who will use it to send us their suggestions for correcting and improving it.

This lexicon contains more than 2,500 words. It is the result of several years of research, but this lexicon would never have seen the light of day without the help of our Tchouraphone friends and collaborators. We thank all those who contributed in this research and in the development of this lexicon.