Bajuni Translation Services

Prism Language Solutions works in Bajuni, or Kibajuni, the language of the islands and coast running south from Kismayu in Somalia to the Lamu archipelago in Kenya. Bajuni cases reach us late, usually after a Somali interpreter and then a Swahili one have already failed. Most of the certified translation is of UNHCR registration papers, Kenyan camp records and statements, because families who left in the early 1990s rarely hold a civil record of any kind.

Last reviewed September 12, 2026 by Sarah J, Prism Language Solutions

Perhaps a hundred thousand people speak Bajuni. Linguists file it as a northern dialect of Swahili, which is accurate on a classification chart and misleading in a hearing room, because mainland Swahili speakers find it hard going and most island Bajuni never learned Somali at all. The community scattered after the Somali state collapsed in 1991, through Kenyan coastal camps that closed in 1997 and on to Kakuma, and from there to resettlement cities including the Twin Cities, Columbus, Seattle, San Diego and Nashville.

• Certified translations prepared to meet USCIS requirements
• Human linguists only, matched to the subject
• Fixed written quote within 60 minutes in business hours
• One office in New York, linguists in every state

Bajuni Booked as Somali or Swahili on an Interpreter Request

Both substitutions happen constantly and neither is harmless. Somali is a different language family altogether, so that booking fails visibly and at least gets corrected. The Swahili substitution is the dangerous one, because it half works: the applicant follows some of it, answers some of it, and the room concludes the language is fine while the detail quietly drains out of the account.

There is a generational wrinkle worth knowing. Younger Bajuni speech has drifted closer to standard Swahili than older island speech, so a twenty-year-old may cope with a Swahili interpreter where a sixty-year-old from Chula or Chovaye will not. We ask the island and the age before assigning, and where a Swahili linguist genuinely would serve we say so rather than charging for the scarcer booking. For the separate languages, see Somali and Swahili.

Language Analysis and the Bajuni Interpreter in an Asylum Claim

Bajuni asylum cases are unusual in that the language is often the claim. Where no documents exist, an applicant's account of island life, lineage, fishing and the events of 1991 is what establishes origin, and how fluently they speak Kibajuni forms part of that assessment. Commercial language analysis has been used on these claims for years, and it has a contested record.

British country guidance in ASA (Bajuni: correct approach, Sprakab reports) CG [2022] UKUT 00222 (IAC) sets out what a competent analysis should contain: morphology, syntax, phonology and vocabulary pointing to Bajuni origin, compared against known Bajuni speakers of the same age range, with the drift in younger speech accounted for. Earlier cases drew criticism for analysts who spoke Swahili but not Bajuni. That is not US law, and we do not pretend otherwise, but it explains why a Bajuni applicant asked to speak through a Swahili interpreter sounds exactly like someone whose claimed origin is being doubted. Anything that goes on the record should be interpreted in Bajuni.

Certified Bajuni Translation When No Civil Record Exists

The first useful thing we do on a Bajuni file is explain what is missing and why. Families who left the Somali coast in the early 1990s almost never hold a birth certificate, and Somalia has had no functioning civil authority to issue one since. 8 CFR 103.2(b)(2) is the provision that matters here: secondary evidence where a primary record cannot be obtained, and affidavits where secondary evidence is unavailable too. What we translate is the trail of displacement.

• UNHCR registration documents and ration cards, usually in English
• Kenyan camp paperwork from the coastal camps and later from Kakuma, in English or Swahili
• Notes and records from UNHCR verification and resettlement interviews
• Kenyan civil documents issued to a relative rather than to the applicant
• Affidavits and elders' declarations confirming a birth, a marriage or a lineage

Swahili pages are translated complete, every stamp and handwritten marginal entry included, and English pages are identified as English so nobody pays to have them retranslated. Where one name is spelled differently at UNHCR registration and on a later record, and it usually is, each spelling stays as printed with the variants set out in a translator's note. The certificate and delivery detail is on certified translation.

Written Bajuni: Letters, Statements and Recorded Evidence

Bajuni is written in Latin letters when it is written at all, and there is no official body anywhere producing documents in it. So genuine Bajuni-language work is a narrow but important band: a letter from a relative supporting a family reunification petition, a declaration from an elder, a recorded statement made for an asylum claim.

These go to a Bajuni speaker rather than a Swahili one, for the same reason the interpreting does. Audio is transcribed and translated in parallel columns, with inaudible stretches marked instead of guessed at, and switches into Swahili or Somali shown where they occur. See transcription.

Bajuni Interpreters for Immigration Court and Refugee Clinics

Almost all of this runs by video or phone. Bajuni speakers who interpret professionally are very few in the United States, and we will tell you plainly whether anyone can attend in person rather than accept a booking we cannot staff. Give us the court, the hearing type and the applicant's island of origin and you will get a straight answer, usually within a day or two.

No state certifies court interpreters in Bajuni, so an immigration judge qualifies one on the record, and sending the interpreter's background ahead of the hearing turns that into a two-minute exchange rather than an adjournment. We take that work as a private agency; no court has appointed or listed us. On the medical side, a newly resettled family meets the system through a refugee health screening, and the clinic, like any provider taking federal funds, owes them an interpreter at no cost. A switchboard will offer Somali, and a polite family will accept it. Ask for Bajuni. See court interpreting and medical interpreting.

Bajuni Translation and Interpreting Costs

Swahili and English camp paperwork is quoted at ordinary certified rates, from roughly $24.95 a page as a US market guide, and short items usually come back within a business day. Handwritten camp entries and faded photocopies are slower. Bajuni letters and recordings are quoted once seen, since a recording with overlapping speakers takes far longer than its running time. Remote interpreting is billed hourly with a shorter minimum than an in-person booking. The pricing page holds the ranges, and attorneys filing for several relatives should read immigration attorneys.

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