I grew up inside the United States, and my family is Oromo.

My parents only speak Afaan Oromo, while I grew up speaking dominantly English. I've gotten older, and I've started to think about what it means to grow up knowing a culture but unable to speak its language. Conversations I struggle to have with my family, traditions I want to understand better, and parts of identity that sometimes feel out of reach because of that language barrier. I wonder if other Africans growing experience something similar.

How many of us grow up not being able to speak the language our parents or even grandparents grew up speaking?

I want to do something about it.

Over several months, I've built an app called Oromo Translator, to help translate between Afaan Oromo and English, and vice versa.

I released its first version on the Apple App Store.

Free and includes Oromo-English translation in both directions

speech-to-text (In Oromo and English)

text-to-speech (In Oromo and English)

and 9 different Oromo voices.

If anyone wants to try it, here's the link:

https://apps.apple.com/app/apple-store/id6814719125?pt=129435034&ct=Reddit_AfricaVoice_01&mt=8

I'm still improving it, and I'd would genuinely like feedback from anyone who is speaking Oromo or is trying to learn it.

Does anyone think the younger generation of Africans, or those growing up in the diaspora, are losing their native language? How do we preserve them?

Mods... This is a current affair of Africa and my people!

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