Language Information by Source

Dahalo: an endangered language

Mauro Tosco. 1992. "Dahalo: An Endangered Language." In Language death: factual and theoretical explorations with special reference to East Africa, edited by Matthias Brenzinger. 137-155. Mouton de Gruyter.

Endangered
100 percent certain, based on the evidence available
<400
Native Speakers Worldwide
Speaker Number Trends

Speaker Number Trend 2

A majority of community members speak the language. Speaker numbers are gradually decreasing.

2
Domains of Use

Domain Of Use 4

Used mainly only in the home and/or with family, and may not be the primary language even in these domains for many community members.

4
Transmission

Transmission 1

Most adults in the community, and some children, are speakers.

1

Speakers

Native or fluent speakers:
No results found.
Second-language speakers and learners
No results found.
Semi-speakers or rememberers
No results found.
Children:
No results found.
Young adults
No results found.
Older adults
No results found.
Elders
No results found.
Ethnic or community population
No results found.
Year information was gathered
No results found.
Comments on speakers
"Informants repeatedly told us that, while in the olden days there were Dahalo who did not master Swahili, today everybody can at least understand it. As a matter of fact, all the Dahalo we met were bilingual, while nobody had a good command of any other language. In particular, English - Kenya's official language - was totally unknown [...] None of [the Dahalo] had learnt to read, and even the hypothesis of written material in Dahalo seems to have been largely misunderstood: 'They seemed personally disinterested though not opposed to the development of mother tongue materials.' (Rilling 1986: 15)"

Location and Context

Countries
Coast Province, Kenya
Location Description

Lamu District of the Coast Province, Kenya.

Government Support
No results found.
Institutional Support
No results found.
Speakers' Attitude
Indifferent
Other Languages Used By The Community
Swahili
Number of Other Language Speakers:
Almost all
Domains of Other Languages:
Counting; Praying; Working

Writing Systems

Standard orthography:
No results found.
Writing system:
No results found.
Other writing systems used:
No results text.
Comments on writing systems:
No results found.

Community Members