S'gaw Karen language
| Karen langauge | |
|---|---|
| စှီၤ/ကညီကျိာ် | |
| Pronunciation | [sɣɔʔ] |
| Native to | Myanmar, Thailand |
| Region | Eastern Burma, Western Thailand |
| Ethnicity | S'gaw, Karen |
Native speakers | (4 million cited 1983–2011)[1] |
|
Sino-Tibetan
| |
|
Myanmar script S'gaw Karen Script (Karen alphabet) Latin script Karen Braille | |
| Official status | |
Official language in |
 Karen State |
Recognised minority language in | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 |
kar |
| ISO 639-3 |
ksw – inclusive codeIndividual codes: ksw – S'gawjkp – Pakujkm – Mopwawea – Wewaw |
| Glottolog |
sout1554[2] |
S'gaw (S'gaw Karen: စှီၤ pronounced [sɣɔʔ], also known as Karen and S'gaw Kayin, is a Karen language spoken by over four million S'gaw Karen people in Burma, and 200,000 in Thailand. S'gaw Karen is spoken in Tanintharyi Region's Ayeyarwady Delta, Yangon Division, Bago Division, Western Thailand, Northern Thailand, and Kayin State. It is written using the Mon script. A Bible translation was published in 1853.
Various divergent dialects are sometimes seen as separate languages: Paku in the northeast, Mopwa (Mobwa) in the northwest, Wewew, and Monnepwa.[3]
Distribution and varieties
S'gaw is spoken in Ayeyarwady delta area, in the Ayeyarwady, Bago, Kayin, and Rangon regions. S'gaw speakers are frequently interspersed with Pwo Karen speakers.
S'gaw dialects are:
- Eastern dialect of S’gaw Karen (Pa’an)
- Southern dialect of Western Kayah (Dawei)
- Delta dialect of S’gaw Karen
Paku is spoken in:[1]
- northern Kayin State: hills southeast of Taungoo in eastern Bago Region, bordering Kayin State
- southern Kayah State
Paku dialects are Shwe Kyin, Mawchi, Kyauk Gyi, Bawgali, the names of which are based on villages.
- Kyauk Gyi and Shwe Kyin are spoken in Taungoo District, eastern Bago Region, near the Kayin State border.
- Mawchi is spoken in Kayah State.
- Bawgali is spoken in north Kayin State.
Mobwa is spoken in 9 villages at the western foot of the Thandaung Mountains in Thandaung township, Kayin State.[1] There are also some in Taungoo township, Bago Region.
Mobwa dialects are Palaychi (Southern Mobwa) and Dermuha (Southern Mobwa).
Alphabet
The Karen alphabet consist of 25 consonats, 9 vowels, 5 tones and 5 medials. The Karen alphabet was adopted from the Burmese script. it wad created by the help of the English missionaries around the early 1960s. The Karen alphabet was created for the reason of translating the Bible into the Karen language. Karen script is written from left to right and requires no spaces between words, although modern writing usually contains spaces after each clause to enhance readability.
| က k (kaˀ) | ခ kh (kʰaˀ) | ဂ gh (ɣ) | ဃ x (x) | င ng (ŋ) |
| စ s (s) | ဆ hs (sʰ) | ၡ sh (ʃ) | ည ny (ɲ) | တ t (t) |
| ထ hṭ (tʰ) | ဒ d (d) | န n (n) | ပ p (p) | ဖ hp (pʰ) |
| ဘ b (b) | မ m (m) | ယ y (ʝ) | ရ r (r) | လ l (l) |
| ဝ w (w) | သ th (θ) | ဟ h (h) | အ vowel holder (ʔ) | ဧ ahh |
| ါ ah (a) | ံ ee (i) | ၢ uh (ɣ) | ု u (ɯ) | ူ oo (u) | ့ ae or ay (e) | ဲ eh (æ) | ိ oh (o) | ီ aw (ɔ) |
| Tones | S'gaw Karen |
|---|---|
| rising | ၢ် |
| falling | ာ် |
| mid | း |
| high | ၣ် |
| low | ၤ |
| Medials | S'gaw Karen |
|---|---|
| ှ (hg) | ဟ |
| ၠ (y) | ယ |
| ြ (r) | ရ |
| ျ (l) | လ |
| ွ (w) | ဝ |
The examples of writing the Karen alphabet are:
- ခ + ံ → ခံ, pronounced /ki/
- လ + ံ + း → လံး, pronounced /li/
- က + ၠ +ိ → ကၠိ, pronounced /kʝo/
- က + ျ +ိ + ၣ် → ကျိၣ်, pronounced /klo/
References
- 1 2 3 Karen langauge at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
S'gaw at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
Paku at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
Mopwa at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
Wewaw at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) - ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Southern Karen". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ Christopher Beckwith, International Association for Tibetan Studies, 2002. Medieval Tibeto-Burman languages, p. 108.
External links
 |
S'gaw Karen language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator |
- S'gaw Karen Grammar
- S'gaw Karen Dictionary
- S'gaw Karen Bible
- S'gaw Karen Picture Bible
- SEAlang Library Sgaw Karen Dictionary
- Drum Publication Group
| Official language | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Semiofficial language | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Indigenous languages (by state or region) |
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sign languages | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||