Sisters save a language in Kenya

Sisters nurse language from brink - 3rd February 2025

An average of nine languages become obsolete annually. Yaakunte, the language of the Yaaku tribe in Kenya, is one of those languages in severe danger of dying out.

Despite the fact that in 2010 Yaakunte was officially declared extinct by UNESCO, in one village in Laikipia county, two sisters have been attempting to salvage both their language and culture, now teetering on the brink of extinction.

Raised by their grandfather, the Yaakunte language was passed down to Ann and Juliana Loshiro by him, and they’re now two of a meagre handful of proficient speakers. A teacher by profession, Juliana conducts classes for the young and even the village elders who themselves were not brought up speaking Yaakunte.

The second half of the last century witnessed a dramatic fall in usage. The Yaaku tribe are traditionally hunter-gatherers whose land ran alongside that of the Maasai people. As pastoralists, the latter were perceived to have higher social standing and therefore wealth, so when the tribes began intermarrying, the Yaakunte language and culture gradually became assimilated. The siblings aspire to resurrect their language, and simultaneously, their tribe's culture.

Seeing that the Yaaku's time-honoured home was the Mukogodo Forest, which served as both the hunting ground and foraging area for plants and honey, it's fitting that this is where the sisters plan to help their language flourish. The Kenyan government's ban on hunting caused numerous Yaakunte people to drift away, but with the forest at the centre of their teaching, the sisters reclaim their connection with the land of their forefathers.

On forest visits, the learners plant indigenous trees, distribute seedballs and dangle metal tags on the branches, inscribed with words in Yaakunte and English. Juliana calls it a word forest, stating "as the trees grow, the language grows."

Juliana isn’t averse to employing up-to-date means to preserve this ancient language and is planning to build a website, an app to digitise the language and an audio-archive for reference. She states, "My goal is that by the end of the day, the language is spoken [and] that my kids also – apart from the language – know their culture."