Kolokwa

Kolokwa turns English into Liberian Kolokwa on your phone, for free. Liberian Kolokwa is the language most of Liberia actually speaks — around five million people — and until recently it had no agreed way of being written down. This app writes it using Kolokwa Orthography v1.6, developed by Philip Kaleewoun and Dr. John Victor Singler. COMPLETELY OFFLINE The whole orthography is built into the app. Translation is computed on your device, so it works offline on a plane, in a village with no signal, and on a phone with no data plan. Nothing you type is sent anywhere just because you typed it. SEE WHY, NOT JUST WHAT Tap any word in a translation and the app shows you how that spelling was reached, citing the numbered section of the orthography that decided it — the vowel chart, the consonant rules, the rules that end a syllable in a vowel, the fact that Kolokwa does not write the present tense of "to be" at all. It is a translator that shows its work, which makes it a way to learn the writing system rather than only to use it. HONEST ABOUT WHAT IT DOES NOT KNOW The orthography settles a fixed list of words. For anything outside that list the app derives a spelling from the same published rules and marks it clearly as a best guess, with a dotted underline and a plain-language note. An approximation is never presented as a settled spelling, and you can flag any word that reads wrong so a Kolokwa speaker can correct it. ALSO IN THE APP - Your recent translations, kept on the device and never sent anywhere - Copy to the clipboard, or share a translation as an image card - Dark mode, larger text sizes, and full screen-reader support - No account, no sign-up, no advertising, no analytics A PROJECT OF THE PALAVA HUT FOUNDATION The Palava Hut Foundation is a nonprofit building the first comprehensive digital archive of Liberia's languages. Kolokwa is phase one; the work ahead covers all sixteen of Liberia's indigenous languages through paid community participation. Corrections raised in this app feed back into the orthography itself. Go to