Hill Miri dialect

Hill Miri
Sarak
Region Assam
Ethnicity Hill Miri people
Native speakers
 (undated figure of 10,100)[1]
Sino-Tibetan
Language codes
ISO 639-3 None (mis)
Individual code:
mrg – (included under Plains Miri)
Glottolog None

Hill Miri or Sarak is a Tani language of India. It is spoken in Arunachal Pradesh by an estimated 9,000 people of the Hill Miri tribe.[2] It appears to be a dialect of the Nishi language.[3]

Portrait of a girl of the Hill Miri people

Description

Hill Miri is a member of the Tani branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages and is considered a dialect of the Nishi language. It is spoken by 9,000 people in the northern regions of India by the Hill Miri people[4] It is threatened because the younger generation is slowly breaking away from their people's tradition and language.[5] The term "Hill Miri" is an exonym, as the Hill Miri people identify themselves simply as Nyishi.[6] Many audiobooks of gospel narratives in the Hill Miri language have been collected.

History of scholarship

George Abraham Grierson, in his survey of India regarding its linguistics, researched the Nyishi language and published a record over a century ago.

Phonology

Consonants

The following table includes an inventory of Hill Miri consonants.[7]

Labial Alveolar Post-
alveolar		 Velar Glottal
Nasal mnɲ[8]ŋ
Stop voiceless ptc[9]k
voiced bdɟ[10]ɡ
Fricative sʃh
Approximant wlj
Trill? r

Vowels are front /i, e/, central /ɨ, ʉ, ə, a/,[11] and back /u, o/. Vowels occur long and short.

Grammar

The basic Hill Miri grammar and basic word order are like those of related Sino-Tibetan languages, similar to that of Nishi.

Numerals

Hill Miri
1aken
2eñi
3oum
4epi
5ango/angngo
6ake
7kenne
8pine
9kora
10íri

Pronouns

Personal

SingularPlural
1st personngongu-lu
2nd personnonu-lu
3rd personbu, búbu-lu, bú-lu

References

  1. ↑ Mising at Ethnologue (15th ed., 2005)
  2. ↑ Moseley, Christopher (2007). Encyclopedia of the world's endangered languages. Routledge. p. 298. ISBN 978-0-7007-1197-0. Retrieved 1 April 2012.
  3. ↑ Post, Mark W. (2013). Defoliating the Tani Stammbaum: An exercise in areal linguistics. Paper presented at the 13th Himalayan Languages Symposium. Canberra, Australian National University, Aug 9.
  4. ↑ http://www.endangeredlanguages.com/lang/10414
  5. ↑ Hill Miri Audio
  6. ↑ Nabam Tadar Rikam, "Emerging religious Identities of Arunachal Pradesh", Mittal Publications, 2005
  7. ↑ Ju Namkung, "Phonological inventories of Tibeto-burman languages", Center for Southeast Asia Studies, University of California, 1996
  8. ↑ Value unclear, perhaps [nʲ]?
  9. ↑ Value unclear, perhaps [t͡ʃ]?
  10. ↑ Value unclear, perhaps [d͡ʒ]?
  11. ↑ Transcribed ⟨ɯ, y, ɤ, a⟩ in Namkung

Further reading

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