The future of Ekegusii is gloomy and uncertain. Modern trends in education science and technology have proved to be the force that will deal a last decisive blow to the language sending it into extinction sooner than later. The language is in a rapidly shifting mode. Words are always borrowed first, then structure and grammar. Even those who are not fluent in the language that loans a new word to Ekegusii still prefer to use the borrowed term over its equivalent in Ekegusii, particularly if the borrowed word is simpler than its equivalent.

4.1. Multilingualism and how it affects Ekegusii maintenance

Speakers of Ekegusii are all multilingual. It happens that as one is born, he picks up the language from the home environment which is Ekegusii traditionally. When this child starts formal education Kiswahili and English are introduced gradually (Otieno & Mecha, 2019). That gives the child an opportunity to interact with other languages. The speaker then can operate with many languages at his disposal by switching between them.

The majority of parents in Gusii today do not invest time in transmitting their mother tongue to their children. They are ignorant of this or are deliberately ensuring that the children miss out on their linguistic, cultural, and religious heritage that is operating during cross-generational communication and family ties. Parents have a negative attitude towards their language thus influencing the language choice of their children. The language of the home is now Kiswahili and Sheng, a Kiswahili argot, used in Kenyan urban centers. The majority today see language shift from mother tongue to exclusive use of Kiswahili and English as a step to advance academically and hence socially and economically.

We point out here that language shift is a determinant of language endangerment. In a setting where more than one language is spoken, the way languages interact lead to a situation where some languages are progressively becoming less spoken, and even lost (Rehg & Campbell, 2018).  In a country like Kenya, several languages are dying out because they are dominated by other languages, they make contact with; languages perceived to be an economic and social panacea to ‘success’ in life. This is seen in choices made by its speakers in various domains of language use.

Recent studies indicate that the co-existence of languages in Kenya and the rest of Africa is being threatened especially in most urban settings. As the numbers of indigenous languages face the threat of extinction around the world, the issue of language shift and endangerment becomes an important linguistic inquiry area. Language shift and endangerment of indigenous languages would not only reduce the culture and history of the indigenous language but also endanger their rich source of the whole culture.