Gorowa is a
Cushitic
The Cushitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They are spoken primarily in the Horn of Africa, with minorities speaking Cushitic languages to the north in Egypt and Sudan, and to the south in Kenya and Tanzania. As of 2 ...
language spoken in
Tanzania
Tanzania, officially the United Republic of Tanzania, is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It is bordered by Uganda to the northwest; Kenya to the northeast; the Indian Ocean to the east; Mozambique and Malawi to t ...
in the
Dodoma
Dodoma ( in Gogo), officially Dodoma City (''Jiji Kuu la Dodoma'', in Swahili), is the capital city of Tanzania. With a population of 765,179,
it is also the administrative capital of both Dodoma Municipal Council and the entire Dodoma R ...
and
Manyara Region
Manyara Region (''Mkoa wa Manyara'' in Swahili language, Swahili) is one of Tanzania's 31 administrative Regions of Tanzania, regions. The regional capital is the town of Babati. According to the 2012 national census, the region had a population ...
s.
It is also known as Fiome, Goroa, Gorwaa, Kimbulu, Ufiomi.
As of 2014, an estimated 79,000 people (approx. 60% of the ethnic population) use this language on a daily basis. Older Gorwaa speakers in rural areas tend to be enthusiastic about their language and have contributed to a large body of data including songs, traditional stories, uncommon vocabulary, etc. Younger Gorwaa in urban areas view the language as less useful and may be reticent to speak it. Some use the exonym Mbulu (from a large Iraqw settlement) and say they speak Kimbulu; however, this is still the Gorwaa language. Codeswitching with Swahili is ubiquitous. Young speakers involved in documentation of Gorwaa have become researchers and assumed ownership of the project.
Instances of Gorwaa writing are rare, and show a great variety of non-standard spellings. It is common to use the orthography of Iraqw for Gorwaa written communication.
See also
*
Gorowa people
The Gorowa, also known as Fyomi are a Cushitic ethnic group and Iraqw community inhabiting the Manyara and Dodoma regions in Tanzania. They speak the Gorowa language as a mother tongue, which belongs to the South Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiat ...
Notes
External links
Link to ELAR documentation of GorwaaBrief introduction to Gorwaa by Andrew T. HarveyAn archive of language and cultural material from the Gorwaa people of BabatiGorwaa DoReCo corpuscompiled by Andrew Harvey. Audio recordings of narrative texts with transcriptions time-aligned at the phone level, translations, and time-aligned morphological annotations.
South Cushitic languages
Languages of Tanzania
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