| Dumi | |
|---|---|
| Region | Khotang district, Nepal |
Native speakers | 7,600 (2011 census)[1] |
Sino-Tibetan
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | dus |
| Glottolog | dumi1241 |
| ELP | Dumi[2] |
Dumii which is a Kiranti language spoken in the area around the Tap and Rava rivers and their confluence in northern Khotang district, Nepal. It is spoken in the villages such as Makpa, Kharbari, Baksila, Sapteshwor, and Kharmi (Ethnologue).
Dialects are Kharbari, Lamdija, and Makpa, with Makpa being the most divergent dialect (Ethnologue).
It is one of the rarest and least spoken languages in the world, with only 8 counted speakers of it in a 2017 study[3]
Phonology
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i/iː | ɨ | u/u: |
| Mid | e/e: | o/o: | |
| Mid-low | œ | ə | |
| Low | a/a: |
The colon after a vowel means that it is a long vowel.
| Diphthongs | e:j | əj | oj | o:ə | ai |
|---|
| Labial | Dental | Lamino-alveolopalatal | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | |||||
| Plosive | unaspirated | p b | t̪ d̪ | t d | k ɡ | ʔ | ||
| aspirated | pʰ bʰ | t̪ʰ d̪ʰ | tʰ dʰ | kʰ ɡʰ | ||||
| Affricate | dz | |||||||
| Fricative | s | h | ||||||
| Trill | r | |||||||
| Approximant | l | j |
| Other Symbols | |
|---|---|
| Voiced Labial-Velar Approximant | w |
References
- ^ Dumi at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- ^ Endangered Languages Project data for Dumi.
- ^ http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-rarest-languages.php
- ^ Driem, George van (2011-07-22). A Grammar of Dumi. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 9783110880915.
External links
- Himalayan Languages Project
- Jalapa, Nepal