Karko language (Sudan)

Not to be confused with Karko language (India).

Karko (also Garko, Kaak, Karme, Kithonirishe; autonym: Kakenbi) is a Hill Nubian language spoken in the northwestern Nuba Mountains in the south of Sudan. It is spoken by around 7,000 people in the Karko hills, 35 km west of Dilling, including Dulman, although Jakobi Angelika & Hamdan Ahma estimate the Karko population at up to 15,000 individuals, mostly in urban centers. Ethnologue reports that speakers of Karko are shifting to Sudanese Arabic.^[2]

Karko
Kakenbi
Native to	Sudan
Region	Nuba Mountains
Native speakers	15,000 (2013)[1]
Language family	Nilo-Saharan? Eastern Sudanic Northern Eastern Nubian Central Hill (Unclassified) Karko
Dialects	Karko Kasha Shifir
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	kko
Glottolog	kark1256
ELP	Karko (Sudan)
Karko is classified as Definitely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

The language is referred to in Karko as "Kàâŋg" or "káákmbἑἑ", which means "Karko ́s language". They also write that "Karko is part of Kordofan Nubian, a group of closely related languages which are also known as Hill Nubian" and descend from the Nubian language family.^[3]

Dialects

Karko has three dialects: Karko, Kasha and Shifir. Additionally, varieties spoken by the Ilaki on Abu Junuk to the west (by 1,000 people) and by the Tamang at El Tabaq southwest of Katla (by 800 people) may be dialects or separate languages.^[2]

Vowels

According to Angelika and Ahmad, the vowel system of Karko is “characterized by the distinction of eight vowel qualities. Except for the mid-central vowel /ǝ/ , which is attested as short vowel only, all other vowels appear both short and long."^[4]