Sümi language
Appearance
(Redirected fromSema language)
Sümi | |
---|---|
Sümi (Naga) | |
Pronunciation | [sɨ˧mi˩] |
Native to | India |
Region | Nagaland |
Ethnicity | Sümi Naga |
Native speakers | 350,000 (2011 census)[1] |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | nsm |
Glottolog | sumi1235 |
ELP | Sumi Naga |
Sümi,alsoSema,is aSino-Tibetanlanguage spoken inNagaland,India.It is spoken by theSümi Nagapeople. It differs from every other Naga languages due to the presence of guttural sounds.[2][3]
Geographical distribution
[edit]Sümi is spoken in central and southernNagaland,mainly inZünhebotoDistrict. There are also good number of speakers in parts ofNiuland,Dimapur,ChümoukedimaandKiphire District(s), as well as in 7 villages ofTinsukia District,Assam(Ethnologue).
Dialects
[edit]Ethnologuelists the following dialects of Sümi.
- Dayang (Western Sümi)
- Lazami
- Jimomi
- Zumomi
Phonology
[edit]The transcriptions in this section use theInternational Phonetic Alphabet.
Vowels
[edit]The vowels of Sümi are as follows:[4][5]
Front | Central | Back | |
---|---|---|---|
Close | i | ɨ | u |
Mid | e | o | |
Open | a |
Notes:
- The close front and the close central vowels have been variously described as near-close[i̞,ɨ̞]and close[i,ɨ].The close back vowel has only been described as close[u].[6][7]
- The mid vowels/e,o/can be realized as either close-mid[e,o]or open-mid[ɛ,ɔ].[4][9]
- Teo (2012)describes the close-mid allophone of/o/as slightly advanced[o̟].[6]
- /a/has been variously described as near-open[ɐ][6]and open[ä].[8]
Consonants
[edit]The consonants of Sümi are as follows:[5][10]
Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nasal | plain | m | n | ŋ | |||
aspirated | mʱ | nʱ | |||||
Plosive | voiceless | p | t | k | q | ||
aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | kʰ | qʰ | |||
voiced | b | d | ɡ | ||||
Affricate | voiceless | tʃ~ts | |||||
aspirated | tʃʰ~tsʰ | ||||||
Fricative | voiceless | f | ʃ~s | x | h | ||
voiced | v~w | ʒ~z | ɣ | ||||
Approximant | ɹ | j | |||||
Lateral | plain | l | |||||
aspirated | lʱ |
References
[edit]- ^"Statement 1: Abstract of speakers' strength of languages and mother tongues - 2011".www.censusindia.gov.in.Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India.Retrieved7 July2018.
- ^Sreedhar (1976).
- ^Sreedhar (1980).
- ^abcTeo (2012),p. 369.
- ^abTeo (2014),p. 20.
- ^abcTeo (2012),p. 368.
- ^Teo (2014),pp. 27–28.
- ^abcTeo (2014),p. 28.
- ^Teo (2014),p. 27.
- ^Teo (2012),p. 366.
Bibliography
[edit]- Sreedhar, Mangadan Veetil (1976),Sema phonetic reader,Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages
- Sreedhar, Mangadan Veetil (1980),A Sema Grammar,Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages
- Teo, Amos B. (2012), "Sumi (Sema)",Journal of the International Phonetic Association,42(3): 365–373,doi:10.1017/S0025100312000254
- Teo, Amos B. (2014),A phonological and phonetic description of Sumi, a Tibeto-Burman language of Nagaland,Canberra: Asia-Pacific Linguistics,ISBN978-1-922185-10-5
External links
[edit]- Sümi DoReCo corpuscompiled by Amos Teo. Audio recordings of narrative texts with transcriptions time-aligned at the phone level, translations, and time-aligned morphological annotations.