Dumi language

Dumi
Region	Khotang district, Nepal
Ethnicity	Dumi kirat. Ethnic population: 7,640 (2011 census) [1]
Speakers	Native: 2,500 (2017) [1] L2: 1,000 (2011 census) [1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman Mahakiranti (?) Kiranti Western Upper Dudhkosi Dumi
Language codes
ISO 639-3	dus
Glottolog	dumi1241
ELP	Dumi

Dumi is a Kiranti language spoken in the area around the Tap and Rava rivers and their confluence in northern Khotang district, Nepal. ^[1] It is spoken in the villages such as Makpa, Kharbari, Baksila, Sapteshwor, and Kharmi.^{[ citation needed ]}

Dialects are Kharbari, Lamdija, and Makpa, with Makpa being the most divergent dialect. ^[1]

Phonology

Consonants ^[2]

		Labial	Dental	Lamino- alveolopalatal	Alveolar	Dorsal	Glottal
Nasal		m			n	ŋ
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p	t̪		t	k	ʔ
	voiceless aspirated	pʰ	t̪ʰ		tʰ	kʰ
	voiced	b	d̪	dz	d	ɡ
	voiced aspirated	bʱ	d̪ʰ		dʱ	ɡʱ
Fricative					s		h
Trill					r
Approximant		w			l	j

Vowels

	Front		Central		Back
	Short	Long	Short	Long	Short	Long
High	i	iː	ɨ		u	uː
Mid	e	eː			o	oː
Mid-low	œ		ə
Low			a	aː
Diphthongs	əj	e:j	ai		oj	o:ə

Grammar

Dumi is an ergative-absolutive language. Embedded sentences may take on the ergative case. Subjects of intransitive verbs and patients of transitive verbs take the absolutive case. A transitive verb shows agreement with both agent and patient.

Dumi case suffixes

Case	Suffix
Ergative	-(ʔ)a
Absolutive	-ø
Genitive	-(ʔ)a
Locative	-bi, -hoy
Comitative	-kəy
Ablative	-ləkə, -lam, -kə
Comparative	-yikə

Nominal plurality is denoted by the suffix <-mɨl> and duality by the suffix <-nɨ>. The plural suffix precedes the ergative and most case endings.

Personal pronouns distinguish between three persons, three numbers, and between inclusive and exclusive. Third person -ɨm denotes only human referents. tom 'this' and mom 'that' can refer to non-human third person subjects. Additionally, aŋ, an, ɨm, and hammɨl have possessive prefixes o:-, a-, ɨ-, and ham-, respectively. The pronouns abo 'who', mwo: 'what', hempa 'where' and hempo 'which one' occupy the same position as their corresponding non-interrogative pronoun would occupy.

Person	Singular	Dual		Plural
		Incl.	Excl.	Incl.	Excl.
1	aŋ	intsi	antsɨ	iŋki	aŋkɨ
2	an	antsi		ani
3	ɨm, tom, mom	ɨmnɨ, ɨntsi		hammɨl, ɨmmɨl

The default word order is Subject-Object-Verb.

Attributive forms of numerals 1-9 use the numeral classifier -bo, while the attributive forms of other numerals are unmarked. The interrogative pronoun hittakbo 'how many' also carries this classifier.

Dumi numerals

Numeral	Dumi	Numeral	Dumi
1	tɨk	6	mu
2	sak	7	sɨm
3	ryek	8	ɨm
4	tɨm	9	nu/dek
5	ŋo	10	tɨksi

See also

• Jalapa, Nepal

References

1. Dumi at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
2. Driem, George van (2011-07-22). A Grammar of Dumi. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN   9783110880915.

External links

• Himalayan Languages Project ^{[ usurped ]}