Cover not available
Part of
Endangered Languages and Languages in Danger: Issues of documentation, policy, and language rights
Edited by Luna Filipović and Martin Pütz
[IMPACT: Studies in Language, Culture and Society 42] 2016
► pp. 313–333

Reacting to language endangerment

The Akie of north-central Tanzania

| University of Cologne
| University of Frankfurt
| University of Gothenburg

Language endangerment in Africa is of a different kind than it is in many other parts of the world. Globalization and the impact of languages such as English, French, or Portuguese are not a major problem for the maintenance of African languages. Language loss is no less a factor in Africa than it is elsewhere in the world, but the replacing languages are, with very few exceptions, not international languages such as those of the former colonial powers but rather fellow African languages (Sommer 1992; Brenzinger 2007a: 197; 2007b). On the basis of the research findings on language endangerment that exist it is possible to understand the main factors that can be held responsible for language replacement. But there is less information on why replacement does not take place – that is, why people in certain situations do not give up their heritage language in favour of some other language even if their sociolinguistic environment discourages such a behavior. This is the question looked into in the present paper, using the Akie, a traditional hunter-gatherer people in Tanzania as an example.

Keywords: African, Akie, defensive culture, language purism, language transmission, Maasai, quadrilingualism, Swahili
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 3 October 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.42.13hei
References
Bakken, M.H
2004 Becoming Visible: Economic and Social Transformation and Marginalization of Akie Hunters and Gatherers in Northern Tanzania. PhD dissertation, University of Oslo.Google Scholar
Batibo, H
1992 The fate of ethnic languages in Tanzania. In Brenzinger (ed.), 85–98. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blench, R
2007 Endangered languages in West Africa. In Brenzinger (ed.), 140–162.Google Scholar
Brenzinger, M
(ed.) 1992 Language Death. Factual and Theoretical Explorations with Special Reference to East Africa [Contributions to the Sociology of Language 64]. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2003 Language and conceptual diversity under threat: Language endangerment on the African continent. In Linguistic Cultural Identity and International Communication, J. Vielberth & G. Drexler (eds), 59–77. Saarbrücken: AQ-Verlag,Google Scholar
2007a Language endangerment in Southern and Eastern Africa. In Brenzinger (ed.), 179–204. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(ed.) 2007b Language Diversity Endangered [Trends in Linguistics, Studies and Monographs 181]. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Greenberg, J.H
1963 The Languages of Africa. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Guthrie, M
1948 The Classification of the Bantu Languages. London: International African Institute.Google Scholar
Heine, B
1980 The Non-Bantu Languages of Kenya [Language and Dialect Atlas of Kenya 2]. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer.Google Scholar
Heine, B., König, C. & Legère, K
2014 What does it mean to be an endangered language? The state of Akie, a Tanzanian language. In Current Research in African Studies: Papers in Honour of Mwalimu Dr. Eugeniusz Rzewuski, I. Kraska-Szlenk & B. Wójtowicz (eds), 107–122. Warsaw: Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa.Google Scholar
Kaare, B.T.M
1996 The Symbolic Construction of Community Identity of the Akie Huntergatherers of Northern Tanzania. PhD dissertation, London School of Economics and Political Science.Google Scholar
Kenny, M.G
1981 Mirror in the forest: The Dorobo hunter-gatherers as an image of the other. Africa 15(1): 477–495. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Klumpp, D. & Kratz, C
1993 Aesthetics, expertise, and ethnicity: Okiek and Maasai perspectives on personal ornament. In Being Maasai: Ethnicity & Identity in East Africa, T. Spear & R. Waller (eds), 195–221. Oxford: Currey; Dar es Salaam: Mkuki na Nyota; Nairobi: EAEP; Athens: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
König, C., Heine, B. & Legère, K
2014 The Akie language of Tanzania: Observations on their language and culture. Typescript, Universität zu Köln/Universität Wien.Google Scholar
2015 The Akie Language of Tanzania: A Sketch of Discourse Grammar. Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa (Tokyo University of Foreign Studies).Google Scholar
Krauss, M
2007 Classification and terminology for degrees of language endangerment. In Brenzinger (ed.), 1–8.Google Scholar
Legère, K
1992 Language shift in Tanzania. In Brenzinger (ed.), 99–115. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2006 Language endangerment in Tanzania: Identifying and maintaining endangered languages. South African Journal of African Languages 26(3): 99–112.Google Scholar
2008 Vidunda (G38) as an endangered language? In Vanishing Voices: The Endangered Languages across the Globe, S. Priya (ed.), 83–100. Bangalore: Icfai Research Center. Google Scholar
2012 Endangered languages in Africa: Focus on Tanzania’s Ngasa and Akie. In Issues of Language Endangerment, X. Shixuan, T. de Graaf & C. Brassett (eds), 89–102. Beijing: Chinese Academy of Sciences.Google Scholar
Maghimbi, S
2005 The dynamics of household livelihood strategies in the drylands of Central and North Eastern Tanzania: The case of Kiteto District. In Biodiversity Research for Livelihood Support and Food Security, B. Kamondo et al. (eds), 145–149. Nairobi: National Museum of Kenya.Google Scholar
Maguire, R.A.J
1948 Il-Torobo, Being some notes on the various types of Dorobo found in the Masai reserve of Tanganyika territory and contiguous districts. Tanganyika Notes and Records 26: 1–28.Google Scholar
MLT (Mradi wa lugha za Tanzania [Languages of Tanzania Project, LoT])
2009 Atlasi ya Lugha za Tanzania (Language Atlas of Tanzania). Dar es Salaam: University of Dar es Salaam.Google Scholar
Nurse, D. & Philippson, G
(eds) 2003 The Bantu Languages. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Petrollino, S. & Mous, M
2010 Recollecting words and phrases in Aasá, a dead language in Tanzania. Anthropological Linguistics 52(2): 206–216. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rottland, F
1982 Die südnilotischen Sprachen: Beschreibung, Vergleichung und Rekonstruktion [Kölner Beiträge zur Afrikanistik 7]. Berlin: Reimer.Google Scholar
Rottland, F. & Voßen, R
1977 Grundlagen für eine Klärung des Dorobo-Problems. In Zur Sprachgeschichte und Ethnohistorie in Afrika, W.J.G. Möhlig, F. Rottland & B. Heine (eds), 213–238. Berlin: Reimer.Google Scholar
Schöperle, F
2011 The Economics of Akie Identity: Adaptation and Change among a Hunter-gatherer People in Tanzania. MA thesis, University of Leiden.Google Scholar
Sommer, G
1992 A survey on language death in Africa. In Brenzinger (ed.), 301–417. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
UNESCO Ad Hoc Expert Group on Endangered Languages
2003 Language Vitality and Endangerment. Document submitted to the International Expert Meeting on UNESCO Programme Safeguarding of Endangered Languages. Paris, 10–12 March.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 1 other publications

Shah, Sheena & Matthias Brenzinger
2018. The Role of Teaching in Language Revival and Revitalization Movements. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 38 ► pp. 201 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 march 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.