The Atwot (Reel) are a
Nilotic ethnic group of
South Sudan who live near
Yirol in
Eastern Lakes State. They comprise a majority of the population in the
payam of
Yirol West.
Language
The Atwot people speak the
Atwot language (Atwot: ''Thok Reel''), which was first recognized as a separate language from
Dinka by anthropologist John Burton in 1987. It is a
Western Nilotic language
The Western Nilotic languages are one of the three primary branches of the Nilotic languages, along with the Eastern Nilotic languages and Southern Nilotic languages; Themselves belonging to the Eastern Sudanic subfamily of Nilo-Saharan. The abou ...
of the Dinka-Nuer group, closely related to the
Nuer language and more distantly to the
Luo languages.
SIL International
SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) is an evangelical Christian non-profit organization whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to ex ...
estimate that the number of Atuot speakers is 50,000.
Atwot speakers distinguish two dialects to their language, ''Thok Reel Cieng Luai'' and ''Thok Reel Cieng Nhyam'' with ''Thok Reel Cieng Nhyam'' being the more lexically conservative of the two.
[Reid, pp. 20-21] Most Atwot are bilingual in Dinka and Atwot.
A distinctive feature of the language is its having of three contrastive vowel lengths.
Culture
The Atwot share much of their culture with their neighbours. Like the Dinka and Nuer, they are also
semi-sedentary cattle-herding pastoralists, meaning that while the travel with their herds to grazing grounds, they don't go far from where they had started.
There are seven subsections of the Atuot: Jilek, Luac, Jikeyi (Rorkec), Kuek, Apak, Akot and Ajong. The Ajong subsection claims to speak their own dialect known as
Thok-ajong, a hard version of Thok Reel. Jikeyi and Kuek speak ''Thok Reel Cieng Nhyam''. The Luac, Jilek, and Akot speak ''Thok Reel Cieng Luai''.
The Apak speak Thong Apak which is dialect of
South Central Dinka.
Atwot country
There were approximately 24,700 Atwot at the time of the local dialect survey in 1987. SIL estimates that there were over 50,000 Atwot in 1998.
The population of Yirol West in the 2008
Sudan
Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
ese
census was 103,190 although not all inhabitants of the municipality are Atwot.
See also
*
Reel language
*
Nilotic peoples
The Nilotic peoples are people Indigenous peoples of Africa, indigenous to the Nile Valley who speak Nilotic languages. They inhabit South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania. ...
*
Demographics of South Sudan
*
Geography of South Sudan
The geography of South Sudan describes the physical features of South Sudan, a country in East Africa. South Sudan is a landlocked country and borders – clockwise – Sudan from the north, Ethiopia from the east, Kenya, Uganda and the Democrat ...
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
{{authority control
Ethnic groups in South Sudan