Mwini
[aka Mwiini, Chimwiini, Af-Chimwiini]Classification: Niger-Congo
·endangered
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Endangered
40 percent certain, based on the evidence available
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"Chimwiini has been transformed from the language of a small but stable group of speakers to a scattered and highly endangered language in only a few decades as a result of government policy and political turmoil."
- TRANSMISSION
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- MORE ON VITALITY
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"Speakers under age twenty five often do not know the language well. ... Chimwiini thus must be considered highly endangered and unstable."
- OTHER LANGUAGES USED BY THE COMMUNITY
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Somali
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Tunni
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English (in UK and US)
- LANGUAGE CONTEXT COMMENTS
"Whatever the factors responsible for the stabilization of Chimwiini over the past six hundred years, the situation has changed drastically within the past forty years largely due to political maneuverings... By 1972 all government officials were required to speak and write Somali [the national language of Somalia] and it was instituted in all public schools, including the school in Brava. ... [The] most important factor in the endangerment of Chimwiini was the eruption of civil war in Somalia in the early 1990s. ... Those who could leave Brava did so by whatever means possible. ... In just three decades, Chimwiini has gone from having a stable community of speakers to having its speakers scattered across the globe."
- PLACES
- Somalia
- LOCATION DESCRIPTION
"For centuries, [Chimwiini] has been spoken in the town of Mwiini, better known to outsiders as Brava or Barawa, in southern Somalia, just 200 kilometers south of Mogadishu. ... Most [speakers] fled to Kenya in 1991-92... Today, the largest communities of Bravanese reside in London and Manchester in the UK, Atlanta and Columbus, OH in the US, and in Mombasa. A small community also continues to reside in Brava itself, but their residence there remains precarious."