Khmer language

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Khmer
Image:PhiesaKhmae.gif [pʰiːəsaː kʰmaːe]
Spoken in: Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, the People's Republic of China, USA, France, Australia
Total speakers: 15.7 to 21.6 million (2004)
  • Native speakers: 14.7 to 20.6 million
    • Cambodia: 12.1 million
    • Vietnam: 1.1[1] to 7[2] million
    • Thailand: 1.2 million
    • USA: 190,000
    • France: ca. 50,000
    • Australia: 22,000
    • Canada: 16,500
  • 2nd language speakers: 1 million in Cambodia
Language family: Austro-Asiatic
 Mon-Khmer
  Eastern Mon-Khmer
   Khmer 
Official status
Official language of: Cambodia
Regulated by: no official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1: km
ISO 639-2: khm
ISO/FDIS 639-3: either:
khm — Central Khmer
kxm — Northern Khmer

 
Indic script
 This page contains Indic text. Without rendering support you may see irregular vowel positioning and a lack of conjuncts. More...

Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for a pronunciation key.

Khmer (ភាសាខ្មែរ), the language of the Khmer people of Cambodia, is one of the main Austroasiatic languages. Sanskrit and Pali have had considerable influence on the language, through the vehicles of Buddhism and Hinduism. As result of their geographic proximity, the Khmer language has influenced Thai and Laotian and vice versa.

Khmer is somewhat unusual among its neighboring languages (Thai, Laotian and Vietnamese) in that it is not a tonal language.

Contents

[edit] Phonology

Modern Standard Khmer has the following consonant and vowel phonemes. The phonological system described here is the inventory of sounds of the spoken language, not how they are written in the Khmer alphabet.

[edit] Consonants

Labial Apical Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive pʰ p ɓ tʰ t ɗ cʰ c kʰ k ʔ
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Liquid r l
Fricative s h
Approximant ʋ j

The consonants /f/, /ʃ/, /z/ and /g/ occur only in loanwords from French and other recent introductions.

[edit] Vowel nuclei

Long vowels iː eː ɛː ɨː əː aː uː oː ɔː
Short vowels i e ɨ ə ɐ a u o
Long diphthongs iə ei ɐe ɨə əɨ ɐə ao uə ou ɔə
Short diphthongs eə̆ uə̆ oə̆

It must be noted that the precise number and the phonetic value of vowel nuclei vary from dialect to dialect.

[edit] Syllables and words

Khmer words are predominantly of one or two syllables. There are 85 possible clusters of two consonants at the beginning of syllables and two three-consonant clusters with phonetic alterations as shown below:

p ɓ t ɗ c k ʔ m n ɲ ŋ j l r s h ʋ
p pʰt- pɗ- pʰc pʰk- pʔ- pʰn- pʰɲ- pʰŋ- pʰj- pʰl- pr- ps-
t tʰp- tɓ tʰk- tʔ- tʰm- tʰn- tʰŋ- tʰj- tʰl- tr- tʰʋ
c cʰp- cɓ cʰk- cʔ- cʰm- cʰn- cʰŋ- cʰl- cr- cʰʋ-
k kʰp- kɓ kʰt- kɗ- kʰc kʔ- kʰm- kʰn- kʰɲ- kŋ- kʰj- kʰl- kr- ks- kʰʋ-
s sp- sɓ st- sɗ- sk- sʔ- sm- sn- sɲ- sŋ- sl- sr- sʋ
ʔ ʔʋ-
m mt- mɗ- mc mʔ- mʰn- mʰɲ- ml- mr- ms- mh-
l lp- lɓ lk- lʔ- lm- lŋ- lh- lʋ-

Syllables begin with one of these consonants or consonant clusters, followed by one of the vowel nuclei. When the vowel nucleus is short, there has to be a final consonant. /p/ /t/ /c/ /k/ /ʔ/ /m/ /n/ /ɲ/ /ŋ/ /l/ /h/ /j/ and /ʋ/, can exist in a syllable coda. /h/ and /ʋ/ become [ç] and [w] respectively. The most common word structure in Khmer is a full syllable as described above, preceded by an unstressed, “minor” syllable that has a consonant-vowel (CV) structure CV-, CrV-, CVN- or CrVN- (N is any nasal in the Khmer inventory). The vowel in these “minor” syllables is usually reduced to [ə] in the spoken language.

Words can also be made up of two full syllables.

Words with three or more syllables are mostly loanwords from other languages, usually Pali, Sanskrit, or French.

[edit] Grammar

Khmer is an SVO language with prepositions. Adjectives, demonstratives and numerals follow their noun:

/srəːj lʔɐː nuç/ (girl pretty that) = that pretty girl

The noun has no grammatical gender or singular/plural distinction. Plurality can be marked by postnominal particles, numerals, or by doubling the adjective, which can also serve to intensify the adjective:

/cʰkae tʰom/ (dog large) = large dog

/cʰkae tʰom tʰom/ (dog large large) = large dogs or a very large dog

/cʰkae ɓəːj/ (dog three) = three dogs

There are no obligatory classifier between numerals and nouns. As is typical of most East Asian languages,[citation needed] the verb does not inflect at all; tense and aspect can be shown by particles and adverbs or understood by context. Verbs are negated by putting "/min/", "/pum/" or "/ʔɐt/" before them and "/teː/" at the end of the sentence.

/kʰɲom cɨə/ - I believe

/kʰɲom min cɨə teː/ - I don't believe

The pronominal system is complex, full of honorific variations.

[edit] Dialects

Dialects are sometimes quite marked. Notable variations are found in speakers from Phnom Penh (the capital city), the rural Battambang area, the Cardamom Mountains and the adjacent areas of Thailand (such as Surin province).

Northern Khmer, the dialect spoken in Thailand, is referred to in Khmer as Khmer Surin and, although it only began divergence from standard Khmer within the last 200 years, is considered by some linguists to be a separate language. This is due to its distinct accent influenced by the surrounding tonal language, Thai, lexical differences and its phonemic differences in both vowels and distribution of consonants. Final "r" which has become silent in other dialects of Khmer, is pronounced in Northern Khmer.

Western Khmer, also called Cardamom Khmer, spoken by a small, isolated population in the Cardamom mountain range extending from Cambodia into Thailand, although little studied, is unique in that it maintains a definite system of vocal register that has all but disappeared in other dialects of modern Khmer.

A notable characteristic of Phnom Penh casual speech is merging or complete elision of syllables, considered by speakers from other regions as a "relaxed" pronunciation. For instance, "Phnom Penh" will sometimes be shortened to "m'Penh". Another characteristic of Phnom Penh speech is observed in words with an "r" either as an initial consonant or as the second member of a consonant cluster (as in the English word "bread"). The "r", trilled or flapped in other dialects, is either pronounced as an uvular trill (similar to French) or not pronounced at all. This alters the quality of any preceding consonant causing a harder, more emphasized pronunciation. Another unique result is that the syllable is spoken with a low-rising or "dipping" tone much like the "hỏi" tone in Northern Vietnamese. For example, some people pronounce /trəj/ (meaning "fish") as /təj/, the "r" is dropped and the vowel begins by dipping much lower in tone than standard speech and then rises, effectively doubling its length. Another example is the word /riən/ ("study, learn"). It is pronounced /ʀiən/, with the "uvular r" and the same intonation described above.

[edit] Grammar

Word order in Khmer is generally Subject Verb Object. Khmer is primarily an isolating language, but lexical derivation by means of prefixes and infixes is common.

[edit] Writing system

Khmer is written with the Khmer script. Khmer numerals, which were inherited from Indian numerals, are used more widely than Hindu-Arabic numerals.

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Vietnamese government figure.
  2. ^ Non-government estimate of the Khmer Krom living in Vietnam.

[edit] References

  • Ferlus, Michel. 1992. Essai de phonétique historique du khmer (Du milieu du premier millénaire de notre ère à l'époque actuelle)", Mon-Khmer Studies XXI: 57-89)
  • Headley, Robert et. al. 1977. Cambodian-English Dictionary. Washington, Catholic University Press.
  • Huffman, Franklin. 1967. An outline of Cambodian Grammar. PhD thesis, Cornell University.
  • Huffman, Franklin. 1970. Cambodian System of Writing and Beginning Reader. Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-01314-0
  • Jacob, Judith. 1974. A Concise Cambodian-English Dictionary. London, Oxford University Press.

[edit] External links

Wikipedia
Khmer language edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../k/h/m/Khmer_language.html"