Tangkhulic languages
| Tangkhulic | |
|---|---|
| Ethnicity | Tangkhul Naga |
| Geographic distribution | Ukhrul District, Manipur, India; Naga Self-Administered Zone, Myanmar |
| Linguistic classification |
Sino-Tibetan
|
| Subdivisions | |
| Glottolog | tang1335[1] |
The Tangkhulic and Tangkhul languages are a group of Sino-Tibetan languages spoken mostly in northeastern Manipur, India. Conventionally classified as "Naga", they are not clearly related to other Naga languages, and are conservatively classified as an independent branch of Tibeto-Burman, pending further research.
Languages
Tangkhulic languages include:
- Tangkhul (Indian Tangkhul)
- Somra (Burmese Tangkhul)
- Akyaung Ari
- Maring (including Khoibu)
- Kachai
- Huishu
- Tusom
The Tangkhulic languages are not particularly close to each other. No linguistic data is available for Maring. Ethnologue lists Khoibu as a second Maring language.
The recently discovered Sorbung language could be either a Kuki-Chin or Tangkhulic language. Mortenson and Keogh (2011) consider a Kuki-Chin affiliation to be more likely, although they recognize that are strong links with Southern Tangkhul.[2]
Koki, Long Phuri, Makuri, and Para are "Naga" languages spoken in and around Leshi Township, Myanmar. These four languages are listed as unclassified Kuki-Chin-Naga languages in Ethnologue, but could possibly classify as Tangkhulic languages or Ao languages.[3]
Classification
Mortensen (2003:5) classifies the Tangkhulic languages as follows.
- Tangkhulic
Reconstruction
Proto-Tangkhulic, the reconstructed ancestral proto-language of the Tangkhulic languages, has been reconstructed by Mortensen (2012).[4]
Mortensen (2003:5-7)[5] lists the following phonological innovations (sound changes) from Proto-Tibeto-Burman (PTB) to Proto-Tangkhulic.
- PTB *s- > *th-; PTB *ts-, *sy- > *s-
- PTB *dz-, *dzy-, *tsy- > *ts-
- PTB *ky-, *gy- > *ʃ-
- PTB *kr-, *tsy- > *c-
- Neutralization of vowel length distinctions in non-low vowels
- Dissimilation of aspiration in prefixes
Proto-Tangkhulic also has the nominalizing prefix *kV-.[5]
Proto-Tangkhulic lexical innovations are:[5]
- *war ‘mushroom’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic)
- *kɔ.phuŋ ‘mountain’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic)
- *kɔ.mi ‘to give’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic)
- *khaj ‘fish’ (also found in some Zeme and Angami languages)
- *pan ‘hand’ (also found in some Zeme languages)
- *pej ‘foot’ (also found in some Zeme and Angami languages)
References
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Tangkhul–Maring". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ David Mortenson and Jennifer Keogh. 2011. Sorbung, an Undocumented Language of Manipur: its Phonology and Place in Tibeto-Burman. In JEALS 4, vol 1. http://jseals.org/JSEALS-4-1.pdf
- ↑ Barkman, Tiffany. 2014. A descriptive grammar of Jejara (Para Naga). MA thesis, Chiang Mai: Payap University.
- ↑ Mortensen, David R. 2012. Database of Tangkhulic Languages. (unpublished ms. contributed to STEDT).
- 1 2 3 Mortensen, David R. (2003). “Comparative Tangkhul.” Unpublished Qualifying Paper, UC Berkeley.
- George van Driem (2001) Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region. Brill.
- Mortensen, David R. and James A. Miller (2013). “A reconstruction of Proto-Tangkhulic rhymes.” Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area 36(1): 1-32.
- Mortensen, David R. (2012). Database of Tangkhulic Languages. (unpublished ms. contributed to STEDT).
- Mortensen, David R. and James A. Miller (2009). “Proto-Tangkhul Onsets in Comparative Perspective.” International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics 42, Chiangmai, November 4.
- Mortensen, David R. (2003). “Comparative Tangkhul.” Unpublished Qualifying Paper, UC Berkeley.
- Mortensen, David. 2014. The Tangkhulic Tongues - How I Started Working on Endangered Languages.