| Nuosu | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ꆈꌠ꒿ Nuosuhxop | ||||
| Spoken in | China | |||
| Region | southern Sichuan, northern Yunnan | |||
| Ethnicity | Yi people | |||
| Native speakers | 2 million (2000 census) | |||
| Language family | ||||
| Language codes | ||||
| ISO 639-1 | ii | |||
| ISO 639-3 | iii | |||
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Nuosu (Nosu), also known as Northern Yi, Liangshan Yi, and Sichuan Yi, is the prestige language of the Yi people; it has been chosen by the Chinese government as the standard Yi language (in Mandarin: Yí yǔ, 彝語/彝语) and, as such, is the only one taught in school, both in its oral and written form. It is spoken by two million people and is increasing; 60% are monolingual. Nuosu is the native Nuosu/Yi name for their own language and is not used in Mandarin Chinese; although it may sometimes be spelled out for pronunciation (nuòsū yǔ 诺苏语/諾蘇語), the Chinese characters for nuòsū have no meaning.[1]
The occasional terms 'Black Yi' (Mandarin: hēi Yí 黑彝) and 'White Yi' (bái Yí 白彝) are castes of the Nuosu people not dialects.
Nuosu is one of several often mutually unintelligible varieties known as Yi, Lolo, Moso, or Noso; the six Yi languages recognized by the Chinese government hold only 25% to 50% of their vocabulary in common. They share a common traditional writing system, though this is used for shamanism rather than daily accounting. The Yi people regard the traditional Western term Lolo (Luóluó 羅羅/罗罗) as pejorative.
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Classic Yi is a syllabic logographic system of 8,000–10,000 glyphs. Although similar to Chinese in function, the glyphs are independent in form, with little to suggest a direct relation.
The Modern Yi script (ꆈꌠꁱꂷ nuosu bburma [nɔ̄sū bʙ̝̄mā] 'Nosu script') is a standardized syllabary derived from the classic script in 1974 by the local Chinese government. It was made the official script of the Yi languages in 1980. There are 756 basic glyphs based on the Liangshan dialect, plus 63 for syllables only found in Chinese borrowings.
In 1958 the Chinese government had introduced a Roman-based alphabet for use in Yi, based on the romanized script of Gladstone Porteous of Sayingpan.[2] (This was later replaced by the Yi script.)
The written equivalents of the phonemes listed here are "Yi Pinyin". For information about the actual script used, see the section above entitled Writing System.
| Labial | Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | voiced | m /m/ | n /n/ | ny /ɲ/ | ng /ŋ/ | ||
| unvoiced | hm /m̥/ | hn /n̥/ | |||||
| Plosive | prenasalized | nb /mb/ | nd /nd/ | mg /ŋɡ/ | |||
| voiced | bb /b/ | dd /d/ | gg /ɡ/ | ||||
| unvoiced | b /p/ | d /t/ | g /k/ | ||||
| aspirated | p /pʰ/ | t /tʰ/ | k /kʰ/ | ||||
| Affricate | prenasalized | nz /ndz/ | nr /ndʐ/ | nj /ndʑ/ | |||
| voiced | zz /dz/ | rr /dʐ/ | jj /dʑ/ | ||||
| unvoiced | z /ts/ | zh /tʂ/ | j /tɕ/ | ||||
| aspirated | c /tsʰ/ | ch /tʂʰ/ | q /tɕʰ/ | ||||
| Fricative | unvoiced | f /f/ | s /s/ | sh /ʂ/ | x /ɕ/ | h /x/ | hx /h/ |
| voiced | v /v/ | ss /z/ | r /ʐ/ | y /ʑ/ | w /ɣ/ | ||
| Lateral | voiced | l /l/ | |||||
| unvoiced | hl /l̥/ | ||||||
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i /i/ | y /z̞*/ | u /u/ |
| Close-mid | ie /e/ | o /o/ | |
| Open-mid | e /ə/ | uo /ɔ/ | |
| Open | a /a/ |
* Identified with the vowel of the Mandarin 四 sì "four"