Khams Tibetan

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Khams Tibetan
Khams skad, Khamké
ཁམས་སྐད
Region Khams (Tibet Autonomous Region, Qinghai, Sichuan, Yunnan in China)
Bhutan
Native speakers
2 million (2022) [1]
Tibetan script
Language codes
ISO 639-3 Variously:
khg  – Khams
kbg  –  Khamba
tsk  –  Tseku
Glottolog kham1299
ELP Khamba
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Khams Tibetan (Tibetan : ཁམས་སྐད, Wylie : Khams skad, THL : Khamké) is the Tibetic language used by the majority of the people in Kham. Khams is one of the three branches of the traditional classification of Tibetic languages (the other two being Amdo Tibetan and Ü-Tsang). [2] In terms of mutual intelligibility, Khams could communicate at a basic level with the Ü-Tsang branch (including Lhasa Tibetan). [2]

Contents

Both Khams Tibetan and Lhasa Tibetan evolve to not preserve the word-initial consonant clusters, [3] which makes them very far from Classical Tibetan, especially when compared to the more conservative Amdo Tibetan. [4] [5] Also, Kham and Lhasa Tibetan evolved to be tonal, which Classical Tibetan was not. [3] Khams Tibetan has 80% lexical similarity with Central Tibetan. [6]

Distribution

Kham Tibetan is spoken in Kham, which is now divided between the eastern part of Tibet Autonomous Region, the southern part of Qinghai, the western part of Sichuan, and the northwestern part of Yunnan, China.

Khampa Tibetan is also spoken by about 1,000 people in two enclaves in eastern Bhutan, the descendants of pastoral yak-herding communities. [7]

Dialects

There are five dialects of Khams Tibetan proper:

These have relatively low mutual intelligibility, but are close enough that they are usually considered a single language. Khamba [8] and Tseku are more divergent, but classified with Khams by Tournadre. [9] [ full citation needed ]

Several other languages are spoken by Tibetans in the Khams region: Dongwang Tibetan language and the Rgyalrong languages. [10]

The phonologies and vocabularies of the Bodgrong, Dartsendo, dGudzong, Khyungpo (Khromtshang), Lhagang Rangakha, Sangdam, Sogpho, sKobsteng, sPomtserag, Tsharethong, and Yangthang dialects of Kham Tibetan have been documented by Hiroyuki Suzuki. [11]

Other Khams Tibetan varieties include: [12]

Deng (2020) documents 1,707 words in the following three Khams Tibetan dialects: [16]

Phonology

Consonants

Labial Alveolar Retroflex (Alveolo-)
palatal 		Velar Glottal
Nasal voiceless m̥ n̥ ɲ̊ ŋ̊
voiced m n ɲ ŋ
Plosive voiceless p t k ʔ
aspirated pʰ tʰ kʰ
voiced b d ɡ
Affricate voiceless ts tʂ tɕ
aspirated tsʰ tʂʰ tɕʰ
voiced dz dʐ dʑ
Fricative voiceless s ʂ ɕ x h
aspirated sʰ ɕʰ xʰ
voiced z ʑ ɣ
Approximant w ɹ j
Lateral fricative ɬ
approximant l

Vowels

Front Back
Close i u
Close-mid e ø o
Open-mid ɛ
Open a ɑ

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tibetic languages</span> Subfamily of the Sino-Tibetan languages

The Tibetic languages form a well-defined group of languages descended from Old Tibetan. According to Tournadre (2014), there are 50 languages, which split into over 200 dialects or could be grouped into 8 dialect continua. These languages are spoken in the Tibetan Plateau and in the Himalayas in Gilgit-Baltistan, Aksai Chin, Ladakh, Nepal, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Bhutan. Classical Tibetan is the major literary language, particularly for its use in Buddhist literature.

Qiangic is a group of related languages within the Sino-Tibetan language family. They are spoken mainly in Southwest China, including Sichuan and northern Yunnan. Most Qiangic languages are distributed in the prefectures of Ngawa, Garzê, Ya'an and Liangshan in Sichuan with some in Northern Yunnan as well.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lhasa Tibetan</span> Official dialect of Tibetan, spoken in Lhasa

Lhasa Tibetan, or Standard Tibetan, is the Tibetan dialect spoken by educated people of Lhasa, the capital of the Tibetan Autonomous Region of China. It is an official language of the Tibet Autonomous Region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gyalrongic languages</span> Branch of the Qiangic languages of Sino-Tibetan

The Gyalrongic languages constitute a branch of the Qiangic languages of Sino-Tibetan, but some propose that it may be part of a larger Rung languages group and do not consider it to be particularly closely related to Qiangic but suggest that similarities between Gyalrongic and Qiangic may be from areal influence. However, other work suggests that Qiangic as a whole may in fact be paraphyletic, with the only commonalities of the supposed "branch" being shared archaisms and areal features that were encouraged by language contact. Jacques & Michaud (2011) propose that Qiangic including Gyalrongic may belong to a larger Burmo-Qiangic group based on some lexical innovations.

Baima is a language spoken by 10,000 Baima people, of Tibetan ethnicity, in north-central Sichuan Province and Gansu Province, China. Baima is passed on from parents to children in Baima villages. It is spoken within the home domain and is not used in any media of mass communication.

Amdo Tibetan is the Tibetic language spoken in Amdo. It has two varieties, the farmer dialects and the nomad dialects.

Central Tibetan, also known as Dbus, Ü or Ü-Tsang, is the most widely spoken Tibetic language and the basis of Standard Tibetan.

Munya or Muya is one of the Qiangic languages spoken in China. There are two dialects, Northern and Southern, which are not mutually intelligible. Most research on Munya has been conducted by Ikeda Takumi. There are about 2,000 monolinguals.

Horpa are a cluster of closely related Gyalrongic languages of China. Horpa is better understood as a cluster of closely related yet unintelligible dialect groups/languages closely related to Horpa Shangzhai or Stodsde skad. The term Stodsde skad is a Tibetan name meaning "language of the upper village".

Queyu is a Qiangic language of Yajiang County and Xinlong County, Sichuan. It is similar with and shares a name with Zhaba, but the two languages are distinct from each other.

Gserpa is an eastern Tibetic language of Sichuan. It is spoken by a few hundred or thousand people in Sêrba District, Sêrtar County, Sichuan, China and is different from the Amdo Tibetan language, the dominant Tibetan language in the surrounding region.

Zbu, or Showu, is a Rgyalrong language spoken in Sichuan, China.

Japhug is a Gyalrong language spoken in Barkam County, Rngaba, Sichuan, China, in the three townships of Gdong-brgyad, Gsar-rdzong and Da-tshang.

Basum is a divergent Bodish language spoken by about 2,500 people in Gongbo'gyamda County 工布江达县, Nyingtri Prefecture, Tibet, China. Basum is spoken by 13.5% of the population of Gongbo'gyamda County. Glottolog lists Basum as unclassified within Bodish.

Lamo is an unclassified Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Tshawarong, Zogang County, Chamdo Prefecture, Tibet. It was recently documented by Suzuki & Nyima (2016). sMad skad, a closely related language variety, is also spoken in Tshawarong.

Larong or Zlarong is a recently documented Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Zogang and Markam counties of southeastern Chamdo, Tibet. It was recently documented by Zhao (2018) and Suzuki & Nyima (2018). Zhao (2018) tentatively classifies Zlarong as a Qiangic language.

Drag-yab is a Sino-Tibetan language recently documented by Suzuki & Nyima. It is spoken in the southern half of Zhag'yab County, Chamdo, eastern Tibet.

The Chamdo languages are a group of recently discovered, closely related Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in Chamdo Prefecture, Tibet. Their position within the Sino-Tibetan language family is currently uncertain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Humla Tibetan language</span> Sino-Tibetan language of western Nepal.

Humla Tibetan, also known as Humla Bhotiya, and Humli Tamang, is the Sino-Tibetan language of the Tibetan people of Humla district in Nepal.

mDungnag Tibetan is a divergent Tibetic language of western Gansu, China.

References

  1. ↑ Khams at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Khamba at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Tseku at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. 1 2 Gelek, Konchok (2017). "Variation, contact, and change in language: Varieties in Yul shul (northern Khams)". International Journal of the Sociology of Language (245): 91-92.
  3. 1 2 Haller, Felix (1999). "A bref comparison of register tone in central tibetan and kham tibetan" (PDF). Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area. 22 (2). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2015-06-16.
  4. ↑ Makley, Charlene; Dede, Keith; Hua, Kan; Wang, Qingshan (1999). "The Amdo Dialect of Labrang" (PDF). Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area. 22 (1): 101. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-05.
  5. ↑ Reynolds, Jermay J. (2012). Language variation and change in an Amdo Tibetan village: Gender, education and resistance (PDF) (PhD thesis). Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University. p. 19-21. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2017-08-12.
  6. ↑ "China". Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Nineteenth Edition. 2016. Archived from the original on 2016-09-09. Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  7. ↑ van Driem, George L. (1993). "Language Policy in Bhutan". London: SOAS. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-11-01. Retrieved 2011-01-18.
  8. ↑ George van Driem, Languages of the Himalayas, p 892
  9. ↑ (2013)
  10. ↑ N. Tournadre (2005) "L'aire linguistique tibétaine et ses divers dialectes." Lalies, 2005, n°25, p. 7–56
  11. ↑ Asian and African Languages and Linguistics
  12. ↑ Suzuki, Hiroyuki; Wangmo, Sonam; Samdrup, Tsering (2021-03-30). "A Contrastive Approach to the Evidential System in Tibetic Languages: Examining Five Varieties from Khams and Amdo". Gengo Kenkyu (Journal of the Linguistic Society of Japan). 159: 69–101. doi:10.11435/gengo.159.0_69. ISSN   0024-3914 . Retrieved 2023-03-21.
  13. ↑ Suzuki, Hiroyuki & Sonam Wangmo (2017). Language evolution and vitality of Lhagang Tibetan: a Tibetic language as a minority in Minyag Rabgang. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 245: 63–90. doi : 10.1515/ijsl-2017-0003
  14. ↑ Suzuki, Hiroyuki (2018b). Litangxian ji qi zhoubian Zangzu yuyan xianzhuang diaocha yu fenxi [Current situation of Tibetans’ languages in Lithang County and its surroundings: Research and analysis]. Minzu Xuekan 2: 35-44+106-109. doi : 10.3969/j.issn.1674-9391.2018.02.05
  15. ↑ Suzuki, Hiroyuki (2018a). Xianggelila-si hokubu no Kamutibettogo syohoogen no hoogen tokutyoo to sono keisei [Dialectal characteristics of Khams Tibetan dialects spoken in the north of Shangri-La Municipality and their formation]. Journal of Asian and African Studies 95: 5–63. doi : 10.15026/92458
  16. ↑ Deng, Ge 邓戈 (2020). Zangyu Kang fangyan cihuiji 藏语康方言词汇集. Lhasa: Tibet Ethnic Publishing House 西藏民族出版社. ISBN   978-7-223-06515-3.
  17. ↑ Suzuki, Hiroyuki (2011). Phonetic Analysis of dGudzong Tibetan: The Vernacular of Khams Tibetan spoken in the rGyalrong Area. Bulletin of the National Museum of Ethnology.
  18. ↑ Olson, Robert F. (1974). Central Khams Tibetan: A phonemic survey. Kailash.
  19. ↑ Sun, Hongkai (1991). Zang Mian yu yu yin he ci hui [藏缅语语音和词汇]. Chinese Social Sciences Press. pp. 156–159.

Further reading

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