Wali language (Gur)

Not to be confused with Wali language (Sudan).

Wali (Waale,^[2] Waalii^[3]) is a Mabia or Gur language of Ghana that is spoken mainly in and nearby the town of Wa, the capital town of the Upper West Region, Ghana. In the Upper West Region, there are two predominant ethnic groups, the Mole Dagbon (75.7%) and the Grusi (18.4%). The Wala (16.3%) of the Mole Dagbon and the Sissala (16%) of the Grusi are the major subgroupings in the region.

Wali
Waale, Waalii
Native to	Ghana
Region	Upper West Region, Northern Region
Ethnicity	Wala
Native speakers	85,000 (2013)[1]
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Gur Northern Oti–Volta Moré–Dagbani Moré Wali
Dialects	Fufula Yeri Waali Cherii Bulengee Dolimi
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	wlx
Glottolog	wali1263

The people of Wa are believed to have migrated from The Ancient Mali to settle in today's Wa, the western part of the Upper Region of Ghana.^[4]

Orthography

Wali is written in the Latin alphabet using three orthographies: by the Ghana Institute of Languages, by the Ghana Institute of Linguistics, Literacy and Bible Translation (GILLBT), and by the Baptist Mid-Missions.^[5] The Baptist Mid-Missions system uses the basic alphabet with the addition of the apostrophe to mark different vowel quality, and the other two systems use the special letters ε, ɩ, ɔ, ʋ, and ŋ.