Acholi (/əˈtʃoʊ.li/ ə-CHOH-li, also Leb Acoli, or Leb Lwo) is a Southern Luo dialect spoken by the Acholi people in the districts of Gulu, Kitgum, Amuru, Lamwo, Agago, Nwoya, Omoro and Pader (a region known as Acholiland) in northern Uganda. It is also spoken in South Sudan in Magwi County, Eastern Equatoria.

Song of Lawino, well known in African literature, was written in Acholi by Okot p'Bitek, although its sequel, Song of Ocol, was written in English.^[1]

Acholi, Alur, and Jo Padola have between 84 and 90 per cent of their vocabulary in common^[2] and are mutually intelligible.^{[dubious – discuss]} However, they are often counted as separate languages because their speakers are ethnically distinct. Labwor (Thur), once considered a dialect of Acholi, may not be intelligible with it.^[2]

Phonology

Acholi has vowel harmony: all vowels in a word have to belong to a single class (e.g. [kojo] the cold vs. [kɔjɔ] to separate). There are two sets of five vowels, distinguished by the feature [+/-ATR].

/pʷ/ and /bʷ/ sounds may also sound as labial affricates [pf] and [bv].^[3]

Acholi is a tonal language. Thus, some words may be distinguished by tone alone, e.g. bèl (low) 'wrinkled' vs. bél (high) 'corn' and kàl (low) 'place enclosed by a palisade' vs. kál (high) 'millet'. Tone furthermore plays a role in verb conjugation.

Recent work

The above were the old work of the missionaries Alfred Malandra and Crazzolara published in 1955. However, a more up-to-date Acholi orthography by Janet Lakareber shows that a vowel in Acholi language has more than two pronunciations.^[4] A monosyllabic word in Acholi has 14 different pronunciations. This is explained in the nine books of Acoli Accented Orthography.^[5]