| Shan | |
|---|---|
| Tai Yai | |
| ၵႂၢမ်းတႆး (kwáam tái),လိၵ်ႈတႆး (līk tái) | |
| Pronunciation | [kwáːmtáj]ⓘ [liktáj]ⓘ |
| Native to | Myanmar |
| Region | Shan State |
| Ethnicity | Shan,Dai,Kula |
Native speakers | 4.7 million (2017)[1] |
Kra–Dai
| |
| Dialects | |
| Mon–Burmese (Shan alphabet) | |
| Official status | |
Recognised minority language in | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | shn |
| ISO 639-3 | shn |
| Glottolog | shan1277 |
 | |
| This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. | |
Shan is the native language of theShan people and is mostly spoken inShan State,Myanmar. It is also spoken in pockets in other parts of Myanmar, inNorthern Thailand, inYunnan, inLaos, inCambodia, inVietnam and decreasingly inAssam andMeghalaya. Shan is a member of theKra–Dai language family and is related toThai. It has five tones, which do not correspond exactly to Thai tones, plus a sixth tone used for emphasis. The term Shan is also used for related Northwestern Tai languages, and it is calledTai Yai orTai Long in other Tai languages. Standard Shan, which is also known as Tachileik Shan, is based on the dialect of the city ofTachileik.[citation needed]
In 2019, Ethnologue estimated there were 3.3 million Shan speakers, including 3.2 million in Myanmar.[2][1] TheMahidol University Institute for Language and Culture estimates there are gave the number of Shan speakers in Thailand as 95,000 in 2006.[citation needed] Many Shan speak local dialects as well as the language of their trading partners.
Historically, the dominance of Shan as a regional lingua franca made it the source of many loanwords in other regional languages, especiallyJingpo andPalaung.[3]
By the same token, Shan has been significantly influenced by Burmese, mediated by centuries of historical and ongoing contact and exchange between Burmese and Shan speakers, especially between the Burmese royal court and Shan principalities.[3] For instance, the lack of a/f/ sound in most Shan dialects is attributed to Burmese influence; this sound is present in the closely relatedKhün andNorthern Thai languages. Shan vocabulary has been significantly enriched by Burmese contact, with Burmese loan words appearing throughout the Shan lexicon,[3] including loanwords borrowed fromPali via Burmese. Burmese appears to have also influenced Shan grammar, with respect to the use of complex prepositions and certain word patterns that do not exist in closely related Tai languages.[3]
Due to Shan's status as a lingua franca in the region, it has served as an intermediary, passing loanwords fromBurmese into other regional languages.[3]
Due to labour migration in recent decades, one million ethnic Shan now live in Thailand.[3][4] As a result of ongoing language contact,Thai has increasingly become a competing source of loanwords into Shan, especially for scientific and political concepts.[3] These Thai loanwords are often more difficult to detect, because of phonetic and structural similarities between Shan and Thai.[3] Some recent phonological developments, like the reversal of the historical/f/ >/pʰ/ shift especially among younger Shan speakers, is attributed to contact with Thai.
The Shan language has a number of names in differentTai languages andBurmese.
The Shan dialects spoken inShan State can be divided into three groups, roughly coinciding with geographical and modern administrative boundaries, namely the northern, southern, and eastern dialects. Dialects differ to a certain extent in vocabulary and pronunciation, but are generally mutually intelligible.
While the southern dialect has borrowed moreBurmese words, eastern Shan is somewhat closer toNorthern Thai language andLao in vocabulary and pronunciation, and the northern so-called "Chinese Shan" is much influenced by the Yunnan-Chinese dialect.[clarification needed]
A number of words differ in initial consonants. In the north, initial/k/,/kʰ/ and/m/, when combined with certain vowels and final consonants, are pronounced/tʃ/ (writtenky),/tʃʰ/ (writtenkhy) and/mj/ (writtenmy). In Chinese Shan, initial/n/ becomes/l/. In southwestern regions/m/ is often pronounced as/w/. Initial/f/ only appears in the east, while in the other two dialects it merges with/pʰ/.
J. Marvin Brown divides the three dialects of Shan State as follows:[5]
Prominent divergent dialects are considered separate languages, such asKhün (called Kon Shan by the Burmese), which is spoken inKengtung valley. Chinese Shan is also called Tai Mao, referring to the old Shan State ofMong Mao. Tai Long is used to refer to the Southern Shan State dialect spoken in southern and central regions west of theSalween River,[6] the Northern Shan State dialect,[7] and the dialect spoken inLaos. There are also dialects still spoken by a small number of people inKachin State, such asTai Laing, andKhamti spoken in northernSagaing Region.
Shan has 19 consonants. UnlikeThai andLao (Isan) there are no voiced plosives /d/ and /b/.
| Labial | Dental/ Alveolar | (Alveolo-) Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | /m/ မ | /n/ ၼ | /ɲ/ ၺ | /ŋ/ င | ||
| Plosive | unaspirated | /p/ ပ | /t/ တ | /tɕ/ ၸ | /k/ ၵ | /ʔ/[a] ဢ |
| aspirated | /pʰ/ ၽ | /tʰ/ ထ | /kʰ/ ၶ | |||
| Fricative | (/f/)[b] ၾ | /s/ သ | /h/ ႁ | |||
| Trill | (/r/)[c] ရ | |||||
| Approximant | /j/ ယ | /w/ ဝ | ||||
| Lateral | /l/ လ | |||||
Shan has ten vowels and 13 diphthongs:
| Front | Central | Back |
|---|---|---|
| /i/ | /ɨ/~/ɯ/ | /u/ |
| /e/ | /ə/~/ɤ/ | /o/ |
| /ɛ/ | /a/ /aː/ | /ɔ/ |
[iw],[ew],[ɛw];[uj],[oj],[ɯj],[ɔj],[ɤj];[aj],[aɯ],[aw];[aːj],[aːw]
Shan has less vowel complexity than Thai, and Shan people learning Thai have difficulties with sounds such as "ia," "ua," and "uea"[ɯa]. Triphthongs are absent. Shan has no systematic distinction between long and short vowels characteristic of Thai.
Shan hasphonemic contrasts among thetones of syllables. There are five to six tonemes in Shan, depending on the dialect. The sixth tone is only spoken in the north; in other parts it is only used for emphasis.
The table below presents six phonemic tones in unchecked syllables, i.e. closed syllables ending insonorant sounds such as [m], [n], [ŋ], [w], and [j] and open syllables.
| No. | Description | IPA | Description | Transcription* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | rising (24) | ˨˦ | Starting rather low and rising pitch | ǎ | a (not marked) |
| 2 | low (11) | ˩ | Low, even pitch | à | a, |
| 3 | mid-falling (32) | ˧˨ | Medium level pitch, slightly falling in the end | a (not marked) | a; |
| 4 | high (55) | ˥ | High, even pitch | á | a: |
| 5 | high-falling and creaky (42) | ˦˨ˀ | Short, creaky, strongly falling with lax final glottal stop | âʔ,â̰ | a. |
| 6 | emphatic (343) or middle (33) | ˧˦˧ /˧ | Starting mid level, then slightly rising, with a drop at the end (similar to tones 3 and 5) | a᷈ | a- |
The following table shows an example of thephonemic tones:
| Tone | Shan | IPA | Transliteration | English |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| rising | ၼႃ | /nǎː/ | na | thick |
| low | ၼႃႇ | /nàː/ | na, | very |
| mid-falling | ၼႃႈ | /nà̱ː/ | na; | face |
| high | ၼႃး | /náː/ | na: | paddy field |
| high-falling and creaky | ၼႃႉ | /nâ̰(ː)/ | na. | aunt, uncle |
| emphatic or middle | ၼႃႊ | /nāː/ | na- | (for interjection / transcription) |
The Shan tones correspond to Thai tones as follows:
The table below presents four phonemic tones in checked syllables, i.e. closed syllables ending in aglottal stop [ʔ] andobstruent sounds such as [p], [t], and [k].
| Tone | Shan | Phonemic | Phonetic | Transliteration | English |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| high | လၵ်း | /lák/ | [lak˥] | lak: | post |
| creaky | လၵ်ႉ | /la̰k/ | [la̰k˦˨ˀ] | lak. | steal |
| low | လၢၵ်ႇ | /làːk/ | [laːk˩] | laak, | differ from others |
| mid | လၢၵ်ႈ | /lāːk/ | [laːk˧˨] | laak; | drag |
Thesyllable structure of Shan is C(G)V((V)/(C)), which is to say theonset consists of a consonant optionally followed by aglide, and therhyme consists of a monophthong alone, a monophthong with a consonant, or a diphthong alone. (Only in some dialects, a diphthong may also be followed by a consonant.) The glides are: -w-, -y- and -r-.There are seven possible final consonants:/ŋ/,/n/,/m/,/k/,/t/,/p/, and/ʔ/.
Some representative words are:
Typical Shan words are monosyllabic. Multisyllabic words are mostly Pali loanwords, or Burmese words with the initial weak syllable/ə/.
| Person | Pronoun | IPA | Meaning[8] |
|---|---|---|---|
| first | ၵဝ် | [kǎw] | I/me (informal) |
| တူ | [tǔ] | I/me (informal) | |
| ၶႃႈ | [kʰaː] | I/me (formal) "servant, slave" | |
| ႁႃး | [háː] | we/us two (familiar/dual) | |
| ႁဝ်း | [háw] | we/us (general) | |
| ႁဝ်းၶႃႈ | [háw.kʰaː] | we/us (formal) "we servants, we slaves" | |
| second | မႂ်း | [máɰ] | you (informal/familiar) |
| ၸဝ်ႈ | [tɕaw] | you (formal) "master, lord" | |
| ၶိူဝ် | [kʰɤ̂] | you two (familiar/dual) | |
| သူ | [sǔ] | you (formal/singular, general/plural) | |
| သူၸဝ်ႈ | [sǔ.tɕaw] | you (formal/singular, general/plural) "you masters, you lords" | |
| third | မၼ်း | [mán] | he/she/it (informal/familiar) |
| ၶႃ | [kʰǎː] | they/them two (familiar/dual) | |
| ၶဝ် | [kʰǎw] | he/she/it (formal), or they/them (general) | |
| ၶဝ်ၸဝ်ႈ | [kʰǎw.tɕaw] | he/she/it (formal), or they/them (formal) "they masters, they lords" | |
| ပိူၼ်ႈ | [pɤn] | they/them, others |
Given the present instabilities in Burma, one choice for scholars is to study the Shan people and their language in Thailand, where estimates of Shan refugees run as high as two million, andMae Hong Son Province is home to a Shan majority. The major source for information about the Shan language in English is Dunwoody Press'sShan for English Speakers. They also publish a Shan-English dictionary. Aside from this, the language is almost completely undescribed in English.[citation needed]
| International | |
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| National | |
