When words sail through the desert

Abstract Wolof is generally classified as a North-Atlantic language within the Niger-Congo phylum. However, despite a considerable number of cognates ( Merrill 2021b ), this classification is more of a working hypothesis than a demonstrated fact. Linguists such as Wilson (1989) and Lüpke (2020) consider that the Atlantic group resembles more an areal/typological class rather than a genealogical unit, thus pointing to intense dynamics of language contact in the area. In this paper, as a follow-up of Bourdeau and Rojas-Berscia (2023) , we focus on a potential Wolof-Songhay non-genetic connection, based on triangulation (q.v. Kuorikoski & Marchionni 2016 ) between linguistic, historical and archaeological evidence. We further argue that Wolof is a language in layers, resulting from constant polylectal interaction between various peoples of the West Sudan world-system ( Kea 2004 ).