Aari (also rendered Ari, Ara, Aro, Aarai) is an Omotic language spoken by the Aari people in the South Omo Zone of Ethiopia. Dialects are Bako, Biyo (Biya), Laydo, Seyki, Shangama, Sido, Wubahamer, Zeddo. History The Aari people suffered considerable pressures to assimilate after the conquest of the Omo River region by the Ethiopian Empire in the late 1800s, which resulted in the widespread adoption the Amharic language there. Nevertheless, the Aari language survived; today, many Aari are also fluent in Amharic. Current status Aari had a population of 285,000 first language speakers in 2007, of whom 129,350 were monolingual. 13,300 second language users were also recorded in 2007. The ethnic population was 289,835 as of 2007. Aari is used at home and at local markets. The size of the Aari tribe is growing, and thus the Aari language has seen an increase in language use and development in recent years. The language is learned by all of the Aari people and some members of neighboring tribes as well. Many Aari speakers also use Amharic, the official language of Ethiopia. Although it is widely spoken by Aari people, literacy in the language low. An orthography has been developed and rolled out in local schools; today, all schools in the two districts where it is spoken teach Aari writing and literature as a subject. An Aari-English-Amharic dictionary has also been published. A translation of the New Testament into Aari was published in 1997. Dialects There are nine dialects of the Aari language, each dialect being associated with a former chiefdom. While these dialects are mutually intelligible with one another, some also have distinct features. The following are dialects of Aari. Alternate names are given in parenthesis. Bako (Baco) Biyo (Bio) Gayil (Galila) Laydo Seyki Shangama Sido Wubahamer (Ubamer) Zeddo Phonology Stop sounds /p b/ can have allophones as fricatives [ɸ β]. /ʋ/ can also be heard as labio-velar [w]. Aari has two tones, high and low. Grammar Aari is a subject-object-verb language (SOV), meaning that the English sentence "the cow (subject) ate (verb) the grass (object)" would translate back from Aari as "cow (subject) grass (object) ate (verb)." Verbs In Aari, the suffix -sis can be applied to the stem of most verbs with a causative meaning. Doing so will increase the verb's valency. When applied to an intransitive verb, it will make the verb transitive. For example, the intransitive verb