Languages of Uganda

An ethnolinguistic map of Uganda

Uganda is a multilingual country. Forty of its living indigenous languages[1] fall into three main families—Bantu, Nilotic and Central Sudanic—with another two languages in the Kuliak family.

English, inherited from the colonial period, and Swahili, which is regionally important, are official languages. Including second-language speakers, there are more speakers of Swahili than English in Uganda.[2] There is also a Ugandan Sign Language.

Languages

In all of the Bantu speaking areas of Uganda, dialect continua are very common. For example, people around Mbarara speak Nkole and people from Fort Portal in Toro District speak Tooro, but in the area between those towns, there are villages where most of the people speak a dialect that is best characterised as intermediate between Nkole and Tooro. In recognition of the closeness of four of these languages (Nkole, Tooro, Kiga and Nyoro), and to facilitate work in them such as teaching, a standardised version called "Runyakitara" was developed around 1990.

In south central Uganda, the Bantu languages of Luganda and Soga are largely interintelligible. This dialectic similarity also extends to the Lussese language spoken in the Ssese Islands of Lake Victoria.[3]

Of Nilo-Saharan, the Eastern Sudanic branch is well represented by several Nilotic languages, eastern as well as western. Eastern Nilotic languages include Karamojong of eastern Uganda (population 370,000), the Bari languages in the extreme north-western corner (about 150,000 population) and Teso south of Lake Kyoga (999,537 population). Alur (population 459,000), Acholi, Lango, Adhola and Kuman of eastern Uganda are Western Nilotic Luo languages. (Acholi and Lango are interintelligible, and sometimes the term "Luo" is used to cover them.)

Some southern Nilotic Kalenjin languages are spoken along the border with Kenya, including Pokot and the Elgon languages near Kupsabiny. The eastern Ugandan Kuliak languages Ik and Soo are also members of the Eastern Sudanic branch. Lugbara, Aringa, Ma'di and Ndo of north-western Uganda are languages of the Central Sudanic branch of Nilo-Saharan.

Language policy

In Uganda, as in many African countries, English, the language of the colonising power, was introduced in government and public life by way of missionary work and the educational system. During the first decades of the twentieth century, Swahili gained influence as it was not only used in the army and the police, but was also taught in schools. The Ganda viewed the introduction of Swahili as a threat to their political power and partly through their influence, English remained the only official language at that time.

Upon Uganda's independence in 1962, English was maintained as the official language, as it was already rooted deeply in administration, media and education. Also, Uganda's ethnolinguistic diversity made it difficult to choose another language as the official language of Uganda.

After independence, there were efforts to choose an indigenous official language, with Swahili and Luganda as the most considered candidates. Although Luganda was the most geographically spread language, people outside Buganda were opposed to having it as a national language,[4] as were those of the Buganda kingdom because they felt other tribes' mispronunciation and grammar errors would ruin their language. English remained the official language.[5]

The native languages of the Ugandan people have influenced Ugandan English.

During the regime of Idi Amin, Swahili, the East African lingua franca, became the second official national language, but it lost its official and national status in the 1995 Constitution. In September 2005, the Ugandan Parliament voted to once again make Swahili the second official national language.[6] It is most widely spoken outside of Buganda.

References

  1. ↑ Ethnologue, "Languages of Uganda" (lists also 2 languages with no speakers, English, Swahili, and Ugandan Sign Language for a total of 45)
  2. ↑
  3. ↑ Alexandra Aikhenvald; Anne Storch (eds.). Perception and Cognition in Language and Culture. Koninklijke Brill NV. p. 252. ISBN 978-90-04-23367-6. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  4. ↑ Ladefoged et al., 1972:28-30
  5. ↑ Mpuga 2003
  6. ↑ "Museveni Signs 3rd Term Bill". New Vision (Kampala). 29 September 2005. From now on, Swahili is the second official language...

Further reading

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