Le Petit Wolof

The Wolof pronunciation system is relatively simple. Every symbol stands for only one sound. Every symbol is pronounced the same way in every word.

Wolof vowels are either long or short. Long vowels are always doubled, while short vowels are not. Long vowels must be pronounced a little bit longer than a short vowel. Long and short vowels can occur anywhere in the word. The distinction between long and short vowels is very important, because it is sometimes the only way to distinguish pairs of words which have different meanings.

There is a lot of prenalization in Wolof, occurring usually with nasals such as m, n, etc.

Peace Corps The Gambia