The Masai language

The Masai language is an eastern Nilotic language spoken in Southern Kenya and Northern Tanzania by the Masai people, totaling to about 800,000. It is closely related to the other Maa language varieties. For instance samburu language of the Samburu people in central Kenya, Chamus – spoken in the south and the southeast of Lake Baringo. This is at times said to be a direct dialect of samburu; and Parakuyu of Tanzania. The Maasai, il-Chamus, Samburu, and Parakuyu people are historically related and all refer to their language as il-Maa.
Grammar
Word order is usually Verb Subject Object, though order can vary because tone is the most important indicator of Subject versus Object. What really determines order in a clause is topicality; thus order in most simple clauses can be predicted according to the information structure pattern. Thus, if the Object is highly topical in the discourse (e.g. a first person pronoun), and the Subject is less topical, the Object will occur right after the verb and before the subject.
The Maasai language has only two fully grammaticalized prepositions, but can use “relational nouns” along with the most general preposition to designate specific locative ideas. Noun phrases begin with a Demonstrative or Gender-Number Prefix, followed by a quantifying noun or other head noun. Other modifiers follow the head noun, including Possessive phrases.
Phonology
Like the other Maa languages, Masai has Advanced Tongue Root vowel harmony. There are nine contrastive vowels, with the vowel /a/ being “neutral” for harmony. For some speakers the voiced stops may be realized as implosive consonants, but often the implosion is very light to non-existent. Tone is extremely important for conveying correct meaning.