Shabo, also called Chabu or Mikeyir, is an endangered language spoken by about 400 former hunter-gatherers in three communities, Anderaccha, Gecha and Kaabo, in the Keficho Shekicho Zone of southwestern Ethiopia's South West Ethiopia Peoples' Region, out of an ethnic population of about 600 recorded around 2000. Early scholars classified it within Nilo-Saharan, but later investigation found none of the grammatical features typical of that family, and current scholarship, notably Blench in 2019, treats Shabo as a likely language isolate, with only speculative vocabulary similarities to the Koman, Surmic and Gumuz languages. Speakers are gradually shifting to the neighboring Majang and Shekkacho languages as the community moves from hunting and gathering into agriculture and wage labor.
Facts
RegionKeficho Shekicho Zone, South West Ethiopia Peoples' Region (Anderaccha, Gecha and Kaabo) 1 Speaker CountNo year given in the cited extract; the existing entity description gives an ethnic population figure of about 600 around 2000. Proto-Language StatusLikely a language isolate; early classifications placed it within Nilo-Saharan, but Blench (2019) finds little evidence for that affiliation. 1 Sources
1. Wikipedia: Shabo Language
Wikimedia FoundationDemographics section, sentence 1: three communities
Shabo speakers live in three places in the Keficho Shekicho Zone: Anderaccha, Gecha, and Kaabo.
Lead section, sentence 1: population and region
Shabo (or preferably Chabu; also called Mikeyir) is an endangered language and likely language isolate spoken by about 400 former hunter-gatherers in southwestern Ethiopia
Classification section: Blench 2019 isolate conclusion
More recently, Blench (2019) classifies Shabo (Chabu) as a language isolate, noting little evidence for it being part of Nilo-Saharan.
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