Cham script
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Cham | ||
|---|---|---|
| Type | Abugida | |
| Spoken languages | Cham | |
| Time period | 3rd century–present | |
| Parent systems | Proto-Canaanite alphabet → Phoenician alphabet → Aramaic alphabet → Brāhmī → Cham |
|
| ISO 15924 | Cham | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
The Cham script is an abugida used to write Cham, an Austronesian language spoken by the Cham people in Vietnam and Cambodia. Cham has about 230,000 speakers.
The Cham script is one of the first scripts to develop from the latter southern Brahmi alphabet called Vatteluttu of South India, beginning by 200 AD. It is written horizontally, and left to right, as in English.
The Cham now live in two isolated groups: Western Cham in Cambodia, and Eastern Cham in Vietnam. Each uses a distinct variety of the script, although the former are mostly Muslim (Trankell & Ovesen 2004) and now prefer to use the Arabic alphabet. The latter are mostly Hindu, and still use their own script. During French colonial times, both groups had to use the Latin alphabet.
[edit] Published sources
- Blood, Doris (1980a). Cham literacy: the struggle between old and new (a case study). Notes on Literacy 12, 6-9.
- Blood, Doris (1980b). The script as a cohesive factor in Cham society. In Notes from Indochina, Marilyn Gregersen and Dorothy Thomas (eds.), 35-44. Dallas: International Museum of Cultures.
- Moussay, Gerard (1971). Dictionnaire Cam-Vietnamien-Français. Phan Rang: Centre Culturel Cam.
- Trankell, Ing-Britt and Jan Ovesen (2004). Muslim minorities in Cambodia. NIASnytt 4, 22-24. (Also on Web)
[edit] External links
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