Kinnauri language
| Kinnauri | |
|---|---|
| Kanawaringskad | |
| Region | Himachal Pradesh |
Native speakers | 65,000 (2001 census)[1] |
|
Sino-Tibetan
| |
| Dialects | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
Variously: kfk – Kinnauri proper cik – Chitkuli ssk – Sunam jna – Jangshung (Thebor) scu – Shumcho |
| Glottolog |
kinn1250[2] |
Kinnauri, also known as Kanauri, Kanor, Koonawur, or Kunawar, is a Sino-Tibetan dialect cluster centered on the Kinnaur district of the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh.
Kaike, once thought to be Kinnauri, is closer to Tamangic. Bhoti Kinnauri and Tukpa are Bodish (Lahauli–Spiti).
Sounds
This description is of the Pangi dialect of Kinnauri.
Consonants
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | |||
| Plosive | voiced | b | d | ɖ | ɡ | ||
| voiceless | p | t | ʈ | k | |||
| aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | ʈʰ | kʰ | |||
| Affricate | voiced | dz | dʒ | ||||
| voiceless | ts | tʃ | |||||
| aspirated | tsʰ | tʃʰ | |||||
| Fricative | s | ʃ | h | ||||
| Trill | r | ||||||
| Approximant | l | j | w | ||||
Note on palatals: /dʒ/, /tʃ/, /tʃʰ/, and /ʃ/ are post-alveolar. /ɲ/ is alveolo-palatal.
Vowels
Kinnauri has five pairs of long/short vowels:
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | ɨ | |
| Mid | e | o | |
| Open | a |
Syllables
/h/, aspirated obstruents (i.e. /pʰ/, /tʰ/, /ʈʰ/, /kʰ/, /t͡sʰ/, /t͡ʃʰ/), and glides (i.e. /w/, /j/) do not occur in syllable codas.
All consonants may occur in onsets and word-medially.
Kinnauri has the following types of syllables:
- (C)V(C)(C)(C)
- CCV(C)
- CCCVC
Grammar
Kinnauri is SOV, V-Auxiliary, Postpositional, and has head-final noun phrases. It shows case marking with an ergative alignment in the past tense, nominative-accusative elsewhere. The ergative case is identical to the instrumental. There is no distinction between accusative and dative, and a genitive is partially syncretic with the accusative/dative. An ablative case is also recognized, normally attached outside the genitive but with different allomorphs for animate and inanimate referents. There is also a locative case, normally used only with inanimate nouns.
References
- ↑ Kinnauri language at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- ↑ Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Kinnauric". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Bibliography
- Nagano, Yasuhiko; & LaPolla, Randy J. (Eds.). (2001). New research on Zhangzhung and related Himalayan languages. Bon studies 3, Senri ethnological reports 19. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology.
- Takahashi, Yoshiharu. (2001). A descriptive study of Kinnauri (Pangi dialect): A preliminary report. In Y. Nagano & R. J. LaPolla (Eds.), New research on Zhangzhung and related Himalayan languages. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology.
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