Jola (Joola) orDiola is adialect continuum spoken inSenegal,the Gambia, andGuinea-Bissau. It belongs to theBak branch of theNiger–Congo language family.

The nameJola is an exonym, and may be from theMandinka wordjoolaa 'one who pays back'.^[1] There is no widespread endonym used by all of the Jola speakers.

The primary branches of Jola proper and to some extent Central Jola are not mutually intelligible. The main varieties are:

• Bayot
• Jola proper
  • Kwatay (Kuwaataay), spoken along the coast south of theCasamance River.
  • Karon–Mlomp
    • Karon, spoken along the coast ofCasamance south ofDiouloulou.
    • Mlomp
  • Central Jola
    • Jola-Fonyi (Kujamatay), spoken aroundBignona. The official standard.
    • Bandial, spoken in a small area south of theCasamance River.
    • Gusilay, spoken in the village ofThionck Essyl.
    • Jola-Felupe (Ediamat), spoken in a handful of villages south of Oussouye inOussouye Department. Kerak may be a dialect.
    • (Jola) Kasa, spoken aroundOussouye.

Bayot, spoken aroundZiguinchor, is grammatically Jola, apart from a non-Jola pronominal system. However, perhaps half its vocabulary is non-Jola and even non-Atlantic. It may therefore be alanguage isolate with substantial Jola borrowing (relexification). In any case, Bayot is clearly distinct from (other) Jola languages.

Some Proto-Joola reconstructions of stable lexical roots by Segerer (2016) are:^[2]

• Kujamaat Jóola Folklore and Language materials

• Jola languages
• Bak languages
• Languages of Senegal

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• Short description is different from Wikidata