Oluʼbo language

Oluʼbo or Loluʼbo is a Central Sudanic language spoken by 33,000 Oluʼbo people in Southern Sudan.

Oluʼbo
Loluʼbo
Native to	South Sudan
Ethnicity	Oluʼbo
Native speakers	33,000 (2017)[1]
Language family	Nilo-Saharan? Central Sudanic Eastern Moru–Madi Southern Madi Oluʼbo
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	lul
Glottolog	olub1238

Phonology

Consonants

Consonants^[2]

		Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Labial- velar	Glottal
Implosive		ɓ		ɗ			ʄ
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p	t̪		tʃ	ʈ		k	kp	ʔ
	voiced	b	d̪		dʒ	ɖ		g	gb
	prenasalized	ᵐb	ⁿd̪		ⁿdʒ	ᶯɖ		ᵑg	ᵑᵐgb
Fricative	voiceless	f		s
	voiced	v		z
Approximant				l			j		w

Vowels

Vowels^[3]

	Front	Back
Close	i	u
Near-close	ɪ	ʊ
Close-mid	e	o
Open-mid	ɛ	ɔ
Open	a

Vowels form two vowel harmony sets, based on advanced and retracted tongue root. The [−ATR] group is commonly transcribed as /ɪ, ɛ, ɔ, ʊ/, and the [+ATR] group as /i, e, o, u/.^[3] /a/ is phonetically [−ATR] but is found in roots of both sets.^[4]

There is a tenth vowel quality [ɤ], which only occurs after /u/. When /u/ and [ɤ] are in separate morphemes, [ɤ] is in free variation with [o].^[5]

Tones

Oluʼbo has high /˦/, mid /˧/, and low /˨/ tones.There are also six compound tones, low-mid /˨˧/, low-high /˨˦/, mid-low /˧˨/, mid-high /˧˦/, high-low /˦˨/, and high-mid /˦˧/.^[6]