The death of an elderly woman last week may have gone unnoticed to many, but to those fighting to preserve the culture of the Yaaku community, it was a big blow... their total population is just 6,000.

The Yaaku have been struggling to keep their culture, language and tradition alive, and the death of their matriach, Ms Naruato Matunge, aged 105, could not have come at a worse time. Until two weeks ago, Ms Matunge was among the only remaining eight people who could speak pure Yaaku language — Yakunte — fluently without using words borrowed from the Maasai community, which is dominant in their region.

In fact, her grandson, Manasseh Rux Ole Matunge, himself a Yaaku and a Yakunte speaker, is now struggling to revive the language. All the seven people left alive who speak the language are aged over 70. Yakunte speakers occupy two administrative areas; Mukogondo and Sieku locations, and are represented in Parliament by Mwangi Kiunjuri of Laikipia East.

“There are only about 30 whom I can call semi-speakers because they can communicate in Yakunte only to a certain extent. The rest can only respond to a word or two,” says Mr Matunge. According to an official of Yaaku People Association, Gabriel Sipuko, the Yaaku have four clans spread in Laikipia North district. The four clans are Orondi, Sihalo, Losos and Luno, which is the smallest.

According to Mr Sipuko, said there are about 4,000 people with Yaaku genes but pure Yaaku people are slightly over 1,000 in number. “We are about 1,500 pure Yaaku but we still cannot communicate in our Yakunte language,” said Mr Sipuko, adding: “We still consider our language inferior to the Maasai and I am sure even if the language was to be taught in schools, many would still prefer to speak Kimaasai and Kiswahili.”

Evidently, Yakunte is among the languages which have since been declared endangered by the United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organisation. The Yaaku people resemble the Cushites of northern Kenya but in the last one century, they have been assimilated into the Maasai culture and lifestyle that they have discarded the language of their forefathers.

By SAMWEL KUMBA and MWANGI NDIRANGU

Nation.

Photo: Ms Eunice Sirankasio displays the Yakunte dictionary. Ms Sirankasio has been distributing the dictionary, a glossary of Yakunte words translated into the Maasai language, in an effort to preserve the language of her Yaaku people. Photo/MWANGI NDIRANGU

It's sad to read about this. It is painful to experience the death of one's native language, especially where the owners do not care about revitalizing it.

2 languages which have been near extinction but revitalized are Maori (spoken in New Zealand) and Hebrew languages. Hebrew language is said to be one of the most successful world cases of language death to revitalization.