General overview of Cushitic

Abstract This chapter gives a general overview of Cushitic. According to current classifications and sources, there are at least 30 living Cushitic languages. The Cushitic languages are spoken primarily in the modern nation states of Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya, and Tanzania. The chapter discusses the relationship with Omotic, and elaborates on the four branches of Cushitic: North, Central, East, and South. However, almost every detail of this classification is open to serious doubt and has been the source of controversy. The Cushitic languages are verb-final, while the phrasal order is either the typologically expected modifier–head, or the less frequent head–modifier. The Cushitic robust systems of nominal derivation, nominative case system, directional adverbials, and verbs and verb phrases are analyzed.