oki ISO 639

Okiek

  • Geography

    KE Nakuru county: east Mau escarpment. Mau forest between Amala and Ewas Ng’iro rivers near Nosogami stream (Sogoo dialect).
  • Language Cloud

A language of Kenya

oki
Akie, Akiek, Kinare, Ogiek, “Ndorobo” (pej.)
50 L1 speakers in Kenya and Tanzania (Austin 2008). Spoken by a small number of people (Dimmendaal and Voeltz 2007). Ethnic population: 52,600 (2019 census). Total users in all countries: 250.
Nakuru county: east Mau escarpment. Mau forest between Amala and Ewas Ng’iro rivers near Nosogami stream (Sogoo dialect).
Kenya, Tanzania
8b (Nearly extinct).
Nilo-Saharan, Satellite-Core, Core, Eastern Sudanic, Southern (n languages), Nilotic, Southern, Kalenjin, Okiek
Okiek, Suiei, Sogoo (Sokoo). A member of macrolanguage Kalenjin [kln].
VSO; case-marking on nouns and adjectives (2 cases: nominative and accusative); verb affixes mark person and number of subject and object; aspect and tense affixes on verbs; 17 consonants and 10 vowels; tonal (3 - high, mid, low).
Some languages associated with Okiek have few remaining speakers. Akiek in northern Tanzania now speak Maasai [mas]. Those of Kinare in Kenya now speak Gikuyu [kik]. Those in Tanzania and Kenya are not in contact with each other. Sogoo dialect may be extinct. Home, social gatherings. Many shifted to Maasai [mas] (Sommer 1992). Many shifted to Swahili [swh] (Sommer 1992). Also use English [eng].
Unwritten [Qaax].
“Ndorobo” is a pejorative term for several hunter or forest groups that are not linguistically related (El Molo, Yaaku, Okiek, Omotik, Aasáx). Christian.
OLAC resources in and about Okiek
Akie
250 in Tanzania (2016 K. Legere). Another 250 semi-speakers.
Manyara, Simiyu, and Tanga regions.
7 (Shifting)
Larger parts of the Akie ethnic community do no longer speak Akie, but speak Maasai [mas] or a Bantu language, such as Ngulu [ngp]. Adults only. Many shifting to Maasai [mas] (Sommer 1992). Many shifting to Swahili [swh] (Sommer 1992).
Non-indigenous. Speakers in Tanzania and Kenya are not in touch with each other.
View other languages of Tanzania