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Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

Yoruba en · NOUN

Pronunciation

  • /ˈjɔːɹəbə/ (US)
  • /ˈjɒɹʊbə/ (UK)
  • (US) audio

Etymology

Borrowed from Yoruba Yorùbá.

Meanings

  1. (in-plural) A member of an ethnic group or tribe living mainly in southwest Nigeria, southern Benin, and eastern Togo and, as well as in communities elsewhere in West Africa, United States, Brazil and Cuba.
    • Approximately 40 percent of Yorubas in Nigeria are Muslim and 60 percent are Christian. […] Its members express a strong preference for being among Yorubas during their worship service: “Since I am a Yoruba and we Yorubas have our own Church. . . ." 2014 April 7, Claire L. Adida, Immigrant Exclusion and Insecurity in Africa, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 60:

Forms

SpellingFeaturesLabelsSource
Yorùbá alternative lexicographic
Yoruba Number=Plur lexicographic
Yorubas Number=Plur lexicographic

Deriveds

Yorubaland · Yorubic · Yorubian · Yoruban

Yoruba en · PROPN

Pronunciation

  • /ˈjɔːɹəbə/ (US)
  • /ˈjɒɹʊbə/ (UK)
  • (US) audio

Etymology

Borrowed from Yoruba Yorùbá.

Meanings

  1. A sub-Saharan language. It belongs to the Benue-Congo branch of the Niger-Congo language family, and has nearly 40 million speakers in Nigeria, Benin, Togo, and Sierra Leone, as well as communities in The United States, Brazil and Cuba.
    • In the parlour, she could hear Aunty Biola attempting to teach her father Yoruba, collapsing into helpless giggles whenever he mispronounced his vowels, giving them the flat English sound instead of lifting them upwards with the slight outward puff of breath that was required. 2005, Helen Oyeyemi, The Icarus Girl, Bloomsbury, page 48:
    • Comparative wordlists of two dialects of Yoruba with Igala. 2007 February 5, Roger Blench, “The Ayere and Ahan languages of Central Nigeria and their affinities”, in rogerblench.info, archived from the original on 17 Apr 2022, page 25:
  2. An African traditional religion which spawned various offshoots in the Americas in the 15th to 19th centuries, including santería and Lucumí. (See Yoruba religion.)
    • This is because when the Yoruba practitioner heals a stomach ache, he uses medicine, when he protects someone from accident, he uses magic, and when he invokes for the purpose of harming or killing a person, he uses sorcery. 2011, Philemon Omerenma Amanze, African Traditional Medicine, Author House, →ISBN, page 20:
    • She was not a Yoruba practitioner but nevertheless had asked for a “birth reading” for her newborn daughter. 2012, Velma E. Love, Divining the Self: A Study in Yoruba Myth and Human Consciousness, Penn State Press, →ISBN, page 25:
    • The Yoruba practitioner has no difficulty in knowing the difference between what we have classified as magic, medicine or sorcery. 2003, P. Adelumo Dopamu, Samuel O. Oyewole, African Culture, Modern Science, and Religious Thought, African Centre for Religions and the Sciences, →ISBN, page 445:
    • The Yoruba practitioner describes it as a condition where a man's semen will flow out of the vagina before fertilization can take place. 1979, Zacchaeus Akin Ademuwagun, John A. A. Ayoade, Ira E. Harrison, Dennis M. Warren, African Therapeutic Systems, Crossroads Press, page 130:

Forms

SpellingFeaturesLabelsSource
Yorùbá alternative lexicographic

Deriveds

Yoruboid · Yoruban

Relateds

Wiktionary’s coverage of Yoruba terms

Translations (33)

tum Ciyoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · de Yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · sw Kiyoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · gl ioruba (a sub-Saharan language) · pl joruba (family of religions) · hy յորուբա (a sub-Saharan language) · fi joruba-uskonto (family of religions) · es yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · ga Iarúbach (family of religions) · yo Yorùbá (a sub-Saharan language) · mr योरुबा (a sub-Saharan language) · pl joruba (a sub-Saharan language) · tr Yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · cmn 約魯巴語 /约鲁巴语 (a sub-Saharan language) · ka იორუბა (a sub-Saharan language) · bg йору́ба (a sub-Saharan language) · pt ioruba (a sub-Saharan language) · pt yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · es nago (a sub-Saharan language) · fi joruba (a sub-Saharan language) · fr yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · pt nagô (a sub-Saharan language) · sv yoruba (a sub-Saharan language) · mr योरुबा (family of religions) · ko 요루바어 (a sub-Saharan language) · ca ioruba (a sub-Saharan language) · pt iorubano (a sub-Saharan language) · ga Iarúibis (a sub-Saharan language) · fr yorouba (a sub-Saharan language) · ja ヨルバ語 (a sub-Saharan language) · pt iorubá (a sub-Saharan language) · ru йо́ру́ба (a sub-Saharan language) · nup Èyàgi (a sub-Saharan language)