Ojude Oba Festival, Ogun State, Nigeria
Name used by its speakers (Endonym): Yorùbá, Èdè Yorùbá
Native speakers (estimated): 48 million
Total speakers, including second-language (estimated): 50 million
Where it’s spoken: Yoruba is spoken primarily in West Africa, where it is one of the three most widely spoken native languages of Nigeria—though English is used in government, schools and business and remains the official national language. Yoruba is dominant in the southwest and central regions of the country, including the states of Oyo, Ogun and Lagos, the latter of which contains the former Nigerian capital and largest city in sub-Saharan Africa. Dialects of Yoruba are also spoken in parts of Benin, Togo, Sierra Leone, and other West African countries. The Yoruba people include roughly one-fifth of Nigeria’s population, and over a million in the global diaspora outside Africa.
Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria
Between the 16th and 19th centuries, many enslaved Yoruba people were brought to the New World, taking with them elements of their language, culture and religion. The largest numbers came to Brazil, where their descendants are called Nagos, and Cuba, where they are known as Lucumí. Though these people mostly assimilated to the local language, many Yoruba words and phrases as well as West African spiritual concepts have been blended with Catholic symbolism into the religions known as Candomblé (in Brazil) and Santeria or Lucumí (in Cuba and the Spanish Caribbean).
Ife bronze heads from Nigeria, 14th-15th century (British Museum)
Since the latter 20th century, a second wave of Yoruba have left Africa primarily through migration to the United Kingdom, United States, and other countries. The American Community Survey estimates that over 700,000 US residents are of Nigerian descent; over a third of these are Nigerian-born; and the highest concentrations live in Texas, Maryland/DC, New York, California and Georgia. While Yoruba and Igbo are the largest two ethnic groups among Nigerian-Americans, census data show that Yoruba is spoken by over 200,000 people in the US, making it the third most spoken African language in the US (after Amharic and Somali). Yoruba is also the most spoken African language in six states including Texas, Florida, Illinois and Pennsylvania. The Yoruba (and Nigerian) emigrant community in Britain is second in size only to that of the US, with the largest concentration living in the London metropolitan area.
Language family: Niger-Congo family. Yoruba has more native speakers than any other member of this family (though Swahili has more speakers in total, due to its wide use as a lingua franca).
Related languages include: Among the many branches of the Niger-Congo family is the Volta-Niger branch, which includes both Yoruba and Igbo, as well as nearby languages Fon (spoken in Benin) and Ewe (spoken in Togo and Ghana). The next nearest branch, Benue-Congo, contains the large and geographically widespread class of Bantu languages—including Swahili, Zulu, Xhosa and many others.
Books by Yoruba writer and poet, Debo Awe (Débọ̀ Awẹ́)