New Jersey resident Tomi Adeshokan has turned a break in her daily use of Yoruba into a deliberate effort to recover the language, using online conversation, formal lessons and a return visit to Nigeria to strengthen her connection with family and culture.
Adeshokan, a United States-born millennial, told The Associated Press that she lost regular exposure to Yoruba after moving out of her father’s home before the COVID-19 pandemic. The distance from everyday family conversation made the language less present in her life, even though it remained part of her identity.
When the pandemic restricted travel and social contact, she joined Clubhouse, the audio-based social platform, simply to hear Yoruba being spoken. She later began taking lessons with Olalekan Fabilola, the creator and host of the Lagos television game show Masoyinbo.
“It’s very important for us to immerse ourselves in our culture,” Adeshokan said, adding that Africans abroad should not define themselves entirely through Western culture.
Learning beyond the classroom
Her study moved from online spaces into a live cultural setting when she returned to Nigeria to visit family and attended a recording of Masoyinbo. The programme, whose name means “Do not speak English”, tests contestants on Yoruba language and culture and penalises the use of English.
Fabilola launched the show in 2024. He told the AP that its growth had coincided with renewed interest in cultural roots, particularly among younger people and members of the diaspora. Contestants on the programme have included Nigerians living abroad, turning language knowledge into entertainment watched by audiences at home and overseas.
For Adeshokan, sitting in the studio audience placed her inside an environment where Yoruba was not treated as an occasional family reference or a ceremonial language. It was the working language of the room, used for questions, responses and competition.
A wider return to African languages
Her experience reflects a broader increase in language-learning initiatives serving Africans outside the continent. Tutors, cultural organisations and digital platforms are using video calls, social audio, television and online communities to connect learners with languages that may no longer be spoken regularly in their homes.
The challenge extends beyond Yoruba. UNESCO estimates that Africa has between 1,500 and 3,000 languages across 54 countries, while fewer than two per cent of African languages have a meaningful presence online. That limited digital representation also reduces the amount of material available for education, translation and emerging technologies.
The United Nations designated 2022 to 2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous Languages, and UNESCO and the African Union have backed efforts to document and revitalise languages, including projects that use technology to produce learning materials.
Yet Adeshokan’s route back to Yoruba began with a much smaller decision: finding somewhere she could listen. Clubhouse provided the sound of the language during the pandemic, lessons supplied structure, and her family visit brought the learning back into a Nigerian setting.
At the Masoyinbo recording in Lagos, the language she had sought online was being spoken before a live audience, completing one stage of a journey that began after everyday exposure at home had fallen away.
