Yulu (also spelled Youlou, pronounced ) is a Central Sudanic language spoken by the Yulu people of South Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR). It has an estimated 7,000–13,000 speakers. Yulu is classified as a Central Sudanic language of the Bongo–Bagirmi branch. It has been written using Latin script (with adjustments for sounds with no corresponding letters) since the Rejaf Language Conference in 1928 attempted to standardize a writing system for the region's indigenous languages. Many Sudanese people prefer to speak Arabic; however, there is a new movement to promote the instruction of local languages in school. This is particularly because a large proportion of speakers are not literate in Yulu. Between 30 and 50 languages are spoken in South Sudan; Yulu was not recommended by the Rejaf Language Conference to be taught in schools, possibly contributing to its endangerment. Yulu has four tones in speech: high, mid, low and extra-low. One of its defining features is the use of compound verbs. Compound verbs are a cluster of between two and four related verbs that create meaning when combined. Some of the most comprehensive linguistic information on Yulu was written by Stefano Santandrea, a Catholic priest from Rome who lived in Bahr al-Ghazal for several decades. Classification Yulu has been geographically classified differently by different experts, some of whom refer to it as "Central Sudanic," some as "Eastern Sudanic," and still others as "West-Central Sudanic." Boyeldieu and Greenberg both place it in the "Bongo-Bagirmi" group of languages, while Tucker and Bryan refer to it as a "non-Bantu language of north-eastern Africa." Yulu is similar to Binga, the two being mutually intelligible, and there is debate as to whether they are separate languages or dialects of one. The Rejaf Language Conference classified the two as one language, and Gabjanda agrees that it makes more sense to see them as dialects of the same language. Santandrea, meanwhile, says that Yulu is the standard form, as opposed to a dialect. The vocabulary between the two languages does differ significantly. Yulu also shares certain linguistic features with Gula and Modo, and both cultural and linguistic features with Kara and Binga. History The Yulu population itself only numbers some thousands, and subsists mostly on agriculture, hunting, and honey production. They are not assumed to be indigenous to the region they currently inhabit, and the mythology surrounding the Yulu's origin tells that they migrated northwest