Tuvan language
| Tuvan | |
|---|---|
| Tyvan | |
| Тыва дыл Tıva dıl | |
| Pronunciation | [tʰɯˈʋatɯɫ] |
| Native to | Russia,Mongolia,China |
| Region | Tuva |
| Ethnicity | Tuvans |
Native speakers | 257,750 (2020)[1] |
| Cyrillic script | |
| Official status | |
Official language in |  Russia |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | tyv |
| ISO 639-3 | tyv |
| Glottolog | tuvi1240Tuviniantodj1234Todja |
| ELP | Tuva |
| Tuha[3] | |
 Tuvan is classified as Vulnerable by theUNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
| People | Tuvan / Tyvans Тывалар (Tıvalar) Тувинцы (Tuvintsy) |
|---|---|
| Language | Tuvan / Tyvan Тыва дыл (Tyva dyl) |
| Country | Tuva / Tyva Тува́ (Tuvá) Тыва (Tıva) |
Tuvan(/ˈtuːvən/) orTyvan[a]is aTurkic languagespoken in theRepublic of TuvainSouth Central Siberia,Russia.The language has borrowed a great number of roots from theMongolian language,Tibetanand theRussian languages.There are small diaspora groups ofTuvan peoplethat speak distinct dialects of Tuvan inChinaandMongolia.
History
[edit]While this history focuses on mostly the people of Tuva, many linguists argue that language is inevitably intertwined with the socio-historical situation of a language itself.[4]The earliest record of Tuvan is from the early 19th century byWūlǐyǎsūtái zhìlüè(Chinese:Ô nhã tô đài chí lược),Julius Klaproth1823,Matthias Castrén1857,Nikolay Katanov,Vasily Radlov,etc.[5]
The name Tuva goes back as early as the publication ofThe Secret History of the Mongols.The Tuva (as they refer to themselves) have historically been referred to as Soyons, Soyots or Uriankhais.[6]
Classification
[edit]Tuvan (also spelled Tyvan) is linguistically classified as a Northeastern orSiberian Turkic language,closely related to several other Siberian Turkic languages includingKhakasandAltai.Its closest relative is the moribundTofa.
Although Tuvan has more speakers than endangered languages such asSeriinMexico(est. 1000 speakers) orNǁnginSouth Africa(fewer than 10 speakers), still Tuvan is endangered by global dialects around them likeRussianorMandarin.[7]
Tuvan, as spoken in Tuva, is principally divided into four dialect groups; Western, Central, Northeastern, Southeastern.
- Central: forms the basis of the literary language and includes Ovyur and Bii-Khem subdialects. The geographical centrality of this dialect meant it was similar to the language spoken by most Tuvans, whether or not exactly the same.[8]
- Western: can be found spoken near the upper course of theKhemchik.It is influenced by the Altai language.
- Northeastern, also known as the Todzhi dialect, is spoken near the upper course of theGreat Yenisey.The speakers of this dialect utilize nasalization. It contains a large vocabulary related to hunting and reindeer breeding not found in the other dialects.
- Southeastern: shows the most influence from theMongolic languages.
Other dialects include those spoken by theDzungar,theTsengeland theDukhaTuvans, but currently these uncommon dialects are not comprehensively documented. Different dialects of the language exist across the geographic region in which Tuvan is spoken.K. David Harrison,who completed his dissertation on the Tuvan language in 2001, argues that the divergence of these dialects relates to the nomadic nature of the Tuvan nation.[8]
One subset is the Jungar Tuvan language, originating in theAltai Mountainsin the western region of Mongolia. There is no accurate number of Jungar-Tuvan speakers because most currently reside in China, and the Chinese include Tuvan speakers as Mongolians in their census.[6]
Phonology
[edit]Consonants
[edit]Tuvan has 19 nativeconsonantphonemes:
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | ||
| Plosive | lenis[b] | p | t | ɡ | |
| fortis[b] | pʰ | tʰ | k | ||
| Affricate | t͡s[c] | t͡ʃ | |||
| Fricative | voiceless | f[c] | s | ʃ | x |
| voiced | z | ʒ | |||
| Approximant | ʋ | l | j | ||
| Flap | ɾ | ||||
Vowels
[edit]Vowelsin Tuvan exist in three varieties: short, long and short with lowpitch.Tuvan long vowels have a duration that is at least (and often more than) twice as long as that of short vowels. Contrastive low pitch may occur on short vowels, and when it does, it causes them to increase in duration by at least a half. When using low pitch, Tuvan-speakers employ a pitch that is at the very low end of their modal voice pitch. For some speakers, it is even lower and using what is phonetically known ascreaky voice.When a vowel in a monosyllabic word has low pitch, speakers apply low pitch only to the first half of that vowel (e.g.[àt]'horse').[9]That is followed by a noticeable pitch rise, as the speaker returns to modal pitch in the second half of the vowel.
The acoustic impression is similar to that of a rising tone like the risingpitch contourof theMandarinsecond tone, but the Tuvan pitch begins much lower. However, Tuvan is considered apitch accentlanguage with contrastive low pitch instead of atonal language.When the low pitch vowel occurs in a multisyllabic word, there is no risingpitch contouror lengthening effect:[àdɯ]'his/her/its horse'. Such low pitch vowels were previously referred to in the literature as eitherkargyraaorpharyngealizedvowels. Phonetic studies have demonstrated that the defining characteristic of such vowels is low pitch. See Harrison 2001 for a phonetic and acoustic study of Tuvan low pitch vowels.
In her PhD thesis, "Long Vowels in Mongolic Loanwords in Tuvan", Baiarma Khabtagaeva states that the history of long vowels is ambiguous. While the long vowels may originate from Mongolic languages, they could also be of Tuvan origin. In most Mongolic languages, the quality of the long vowel changes depending on the quality of the second vowel in the conjunction. The only exception to this rule is if the conjunction is labial. The ancient Tuvan languages, in contrast, depended upon the first vowel rather than the second to determine the long vowels.[10]
Khabtagaeva divided the transformation of these loanwords into two periods: the early layer and the late layer. The words in the early layer are words in which the Mongolic preserved the conjunction, the VCV conjunction was preserved but the long vowel still developed when it entered the Tuvan language, or the stress is on the last syllable and a long vowel in the loanword replaced a short vowel in the original word. The Late Layer includes loanwords in which the long vowel does not change when the word entered Tuvan.[10]
| Short | Long | Low pitch | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| High | Low | High | Low | High | Low | ||
| Front | Unrounded | i | e | iː | eː | ì | è |
| Rounded | y | ø | yː | øː | ỳ | ø̀ | |
| Back | Unrounded | ɯ | a | ɯː | aː | ɯ̀ | à |
| Rounded | u | o | uː | oː | ù | ò | |
Vowels may also benasalizedin the environment of nasal consonants, but nasalization is non-contrastive. Most Tuvan vowels in word-initial syllables have a low pitch and do not contrast significantly with short and long vowels.[8]
Vowel harmony
[edit]Tuvan has two systems ofvowel harmonythat strictly govern the distribution of vowels within words and suffixes. Backness harmony, or what is sometimes called 'palatal' harmony, requires all vowels within a word to be either back or front. Rounding harmony, or what is sometimes called 'labial' harmony, requires a vowel to be rounded if it is a high vowel and appears in a syllable immediately following a rounded vowel. Low rounded vowels[ø][o]are restricted to the first syllable of a word, and a vowel in a non-initial syllable may be rounded only if it meets the conditions of rounding harmony (it must both be a high vowel[y][u]and be preceded by a rounded vowel). See Harrison (2001) for a detailed description of Tuvan vowel harmony systems.[8]
Grammar
[edit]Tuvan builds morphologically complex words by adding suffixes. For example,тевеteveis 'camel',тевелерteveleris 'camels',тевелеримtevelerimis 'my camels',тевелеримденtevelerimdenis 'from my camels'.
Nouns
[edit]Tuvan marksnounswith sixcases:genitive, accusative, dative, ablative, locative, and allative. The suffixes below are in front vowels, however, except-Jethe suffixes follow vowel harmony rules. Each case suffix has a rich variety of uses and meanings, only the most basic uses and meanings are shown here.
| Root | Allomorphs | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| When after: | voiceless | nasals | voiced/vowel | After-л |
| Nominative | -∅ | |||
| Genitive(-NIŋ) | -тиң(-tiŋ) | -ниң(-niŋ)) | -диң(-diŋ) | |
| Accusative(-NI) | -ти(-ti) | -ни(-ni) | -ди(-di) | |
| Dative(-KA) | -ке(-ke) | -ге(-ge) | ||
| Locative(-DA) | -те(-te) | -де(-de) | ||
| Ablative(-DAn) | -тен(-ten) | -ден(-den) | ||
| AllativeI (-Je) | -че(-če) | -же(-že) | ||
| Allative II (-DIvA)[11] | -тиве(-tive) | -диве(-dive) | ||
| Plural | ||||
| Nominative (-LAr) | -тер(-ter) | -нер(-ner) | -лер(-ler) | -дер(-der) |
| Oblique cases: by adding voiced variant into the plural suffix (-лерниң,-лерге,...) | ||||
| Case | Form | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | теве(teve) | "camel" |
| Genitive | тевениң(teveniŋ) | "of the camel" |
| Accusative | тевени(teveni) | "the camel" (definite direct object of verb) |
| Dative | тевеге(tevege) | "for the camel" or "at the camel" (in the past tense) |
| Locative | теведе(tevede) | "at the camel" or "in the camel" |
| Ablative | теведен(teveden) | "from the camel" or "than a/the camel" |
| Allative I | тевеже(teveže) | "to(wards) the camel" |
| Allative II | теведиве(tevedive) |
Verbs
[edit]Verbsin Tuvan take a number of endings to marktense,mood,andaspect.Auxiliary verbsare also used to modify the verb. For a detailed scholarly study of auxiliary verbs in Tuvan and related languages, see Anderson 2004.
Syntax
[edit]Tuvan employsSOVword order. For example,теве сиген чипкен(camel hay eat-PAST) "The camel ate the hay."
Vocabulary
[edit]
Tuvan vocabulary is mostly Turkic in origin but marked by a large number of Mongolianloanwords.The language has also borrowed several Mongolian suffixes. In addition, there existKeticandSamoyedicsubstrata.[citation needed]A Tuvan talking dictionary is produced by theLiving Tongues Institute.[12]
In contrast with most Turkic languages, which have many Arabic and Persian loanwords that even cover some basic concepts, these loanwords are very few in Tuvan, if any, as Tuvans never adopted Islam like most Turkic peoples.
Writing system
[edit]Cyrillic script
[edit]The current Tuvan Alpha bet is a modified version of theRussian Alpha bet,with three additional letters: ң (Latin "ng" orInternational Phonetic Alphabet[ŋ]), Өө (Latin "ö",[ø]), Үү (Latin "ü", IPA[y]). The sequence of the Alpha bet follows Russian exactly, with ң located after Russian Н, Ө after О, and Ү after У.
| А а | Б б | В в | Г г | Д д | Е е | Ё ё | Ж ж |
| З з | И и | Й й | К к | Л л | М м | Н н | Ң ң |
| О о | Ө ө | П п | Р р | С с | Т т | У у | Ү ү |
| Ф ф | Х х | Ц ц | Ч ч | Ш ш | Щ щ | Ъ ъ | Ы ы |
| Ь ь | Э э | Ю ю | Я я |
The letters Е and Э are used in a special way. Э is used for the short/e/sound at the beginning of words while Е is used for the same sound in the middle and at the end of words. Е is used at the beginning of words, mostly of Russian origin, to reflect the standard Russian pronunciation of that letter,/je/.Additionally, ЭЭ is used in the middle and at the end of words for the long/e/sound.
The letter ъ is used to indicate pitch accent, as in эътèt'meat'.
Historic scripts
[edit]Mongol script
[edit]In the past, Tuvans used Mongolian as their written language.
Mongolian scriptwas later developed byNikolaus Poppeto suit the Tuvan language. This is the first known written form of the Tuvan language.[13]
Tuvan Latin
[edit]
TheLatin-based Alpha betfor Tuvan was devised in 1930 by a Tuvan Buddhist monk, MongushLopsang-Chinmit(a.k.a. Lubsan Zhigmed). A few books and newspapers, including primers intended to teach adults to read, were printed using this writing system. Lopsang-Chinmit was later executed in Stalinist purges on 31 December 1941.[14]
| A a | B ʙ | C c | D d | E e | F f | G g | Ƣ ƣ |
| H h | I i | J j | Ɉ ɉ | K k | L l | M m | N n |
| Ꞑ ꞑ | O o | Ө ө | P p | R r | S s | Ş ş | T t |
| U u | V v | X x | Y y | Z z | Ƶ ƶ | Ь ь |
The letter Ɉ ɉ was excluded from the Alpha bet in 1931.
Examples
| Pirgi tьʙa dьldьꞑ yƶykteri | PYGY TELEGEJNIꞐ PROLETARLARЬ POLGAŞ TARLATKAN ARATTARЬ KATTЬƵЬꞐAR! |
|---|---|
| Бирги тыва дылдың үжүктери | Бүгү телегейниң пролетарлары болгаш дарлаткан араттары каттыжыңар! |
| First Tuvan language Alpha bet | All the world's workers and oppressed peoples, unite! |
By September 1943, this Latin-based Alpha bet was replaced by a Cyrillic-based one, which is still in use to the present day. In the post-Soviet era, Tuvan and other scholars have taken a renewed interest in the history of Tuvan letters.
Transliteration
[edit]For bibliographic purposes, transliteration of Tuvan generally follows the guidelines described in the ALA-LC Romanization tables for non-Slavic languages in Cyrillic script.[15]Linguistic descriptions often employ theIPAorTurcologicalstandards for transliteration.[16]
Status
[edit]Tuvans inChina,who live mostly inXin gian g Autonomous Region,are included under theMongol nationality.[17]Some Tuvans reportedly live atKanas Lakein the northwestern part of Xin gian g, where they are not officially recognized, and are counted as a part of the localOirat Mongolcommunity that is counted under the general PRC official ethnic label of "Mongol". Oirat and Tuvan children attend schools in which they useChakhar Mongolian[18]andMandarinStandard Chinese,native languages of neither group.
Notes
[edit]References
[edit]- ^"Tuvan".Ethnologue.
- ^abElisabetta Ragagnin (2011),Dukhan, a Turkic Variety of Northern Mongolia, Description and Analysis,Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden
- ^Endangered Languages Project data for Tuha.
- ^Nettle, Romaine; Daniel, Suzanne (2000).Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages.New York, New York: Oxford University Press.
- ^Todoriki (2011),pp. 234–230
- ^abMawkanuli, Talant (2001). "The Jungar Tuvas: Language and National Identity in the PRC".Central Asian Survey.20(4): 497–517.doi:10.1080/02634930120104654.S2CID143405271.
- ^"What Is Lost When A Language Goes Extinct?".Dictionary.12 August 2012.Retrieved2 April2024.
- ^abcdHarrison (2001)
- ^Anderson, Greg; Harrison, K. David (2002).A Grammar of Tuvan.Gaithersburg, MD: Scientific Consulting Services International. pp. 3–5.ISBN9781584900450.
- ^abKhabtagaeva, Baiarma (2004). "Long Vowels in Mongolic Loanwords in Tuvan".Turkic Languages.8:191–197.
- ^Obsolete or dialectal version of current allative I
- ^seeTuvan Talking Dictionary
- ^Cf. Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar:Einführung in die mongolischen Schriften.Buske Verlag, Hamburg 2008,ISBN978-3-87548-500-4,S. 70. "Daher wurde der Sprachforscher Nikolaus Poppe von der tuwinischen Regierung mit der Entwicklung eines für die eigene Sprache geeigneten Alphabets beauftragt."
- ^Mänchen-Helfen (1992),p. 133n
- ^"Non-Slavic languages (in Cyrillic Script)"(PDF).Library of Congress.Archived fromthe original(PDF)on 3 November 2021.Retrieved31 March2022.
- ^Harrison, K. David; Anderson, Gregory D.S.; Ondar, Alexander."Tuvan Talking Dictionary".Retrieved31 March2022.
- ^Mongush (1996)
- ^"Öbür mongγul ayalγu bol dumdadu ulus-un mongγul kelen-ü saγuri ayalγu bolqu büged dumdadu ulus-un mongγul kelen-ü barimǰiy-a abiy-a ni čaqar aman ayalγun-du saγurilaγsan bayidaγ." (Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 85).
Sources
[edit]- Harrison, K. David (2001).Topics in the Phonology and Morphology of Tuvan(PDF)(Doctoral thesis). Yale University.OCLC51541112.
- Mänchen-Helfen, Otto (1992) [1931].Journey to Tuva.Translated by Alan Leighton. Los Angeles: Ethnographic Press University of Southern California.ISBN978-1-878986-04-7.
- Mongush, M. V. (1996). "Tuvans of Mongolia and China".International Journal of Central Asian Studies.1:225–243.
- Todoriki, Masahiko ( chờ 々 lực chính ngạn ) (2011).Nhất cổ の khả năng tính の あるトゥバ ngữ ngữ vựng について[On the earliest possible Tuvan vocabulary].Bulletin of the Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia(Thesis). Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of Tokyo. pp. 238–220.hdl:2261/43632.ISSN0563-8089.
Further reading
[edit]- Anderson, Gregory D. S. (2004).Auxiliary Verb Constructions in Altai-Sayan Turkic.Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.ISBN3-447-04636-8.
- Anderson, Gregory D. S.; Harrison, K. David (1999).Tyvan.Languages of the World/Materials 257. Lincom Europa.ISBN978-3-89586-529-9.
- Harrison, K. David (2005). "A Tuvan Hero Tale, with Commentary, Morphemic Analysis, and Translation".Journal of the American Oriental Society.125:1–30.
- Krueger, John R. (1977). Krueger, John R. (ed.).Tuvan Manual.Uralic and Altaic Series Volume 126. Editor Emeritus: Thomas A. Sebeok. Indiana University Publications.ISBN978-0-87750-214-2.
- Mawkanuli, Talant. 1999. "The phonology and morphology of Jungar Tuva", Indiana University PhD dissertation.
- Nakashima, Yoshiteru ( trung 嶋 thiện huyNakashima Yoshiteru). 2008 "Tyva Yapon Biche Slovar', トゥヴァ ngữ ・ Nhật Bản ngữ tiểu từ điển"Tokyo University of Foreign Studies,http:// aa.tufs.ac.jp/project/gengokensyu/08tuvan6.pdf(Archive)
- Ölmez, Mehmet; Tuwinischer Wortschatz mit alttürkischen und mongolischen Parallelen, Wiesbaden 2007,ISBN978-3-447-05499-7
- Rind-Pawloski, Monika. 2014. Text types andevidentialityin Dzungar Tuvan.Turkic Languages18.1: 159–188.
- (in Mongolian)Sečenbaγatur, Qasgerel, Tuyaγ-a [Туяa], Bu. Jirannige, Wu Yingzhe, Činggeltei. 2005.Mongγul kelen-ü nutuγ-un ayalγun-u sinǰilel-ün uduridqal[A guide to the regional dialects of Mongolian]. Kökeqota: ÖMAKQ.ISBN7-204-07621-4.
- Takashima, Naoki ( cao đảo thượng sinhTakashima Naoki). 2008 "Kiso Tuba-go bunpō cơ sở トゥヴァ ngữ văn pháp",Tokyo University of Foreign Studies,http:// aa.tufs.ac.jp/project/gengokensyu/08tuvan1.pdf(Archive)
- Takashima, Naoki. 2008 "Tuba-go kaiwa-shū トゥヴァ ngữ hội thoại tập",Tokyo University of Foreign Studies,http:// aa.tufs.ac.jp/project/gengokensyu/08tuvan3.pdf(Archive)
- Taube, Erika. (1978).Tuwinische Volksmärchen.Berlin: Akademie-Verlag. LCCN: 83-853915
- Taube, Erika. (1994).Skazki i predaniia altaiskikh tuvintsev.Moskva: Vostochnaia literatura.ISBN5-02-017236-7
- Oelschlägel, Anett C. (2013).Der Taigageist. Berichte und Geschichten von Menschen und Geistern aus Tuwa. Zeitgenössische Sagen und andere Folkloretexte / Дух-хозяин тайги –Современные предания и другие фольклорные материалы из Тувы / Тайга ээзи – Болган таварылгалар болгаш Тывадан чыгдынган аас чогаалының өске-даа материалдары.[The Taiga Spirit. Reports and Stories about People and Spirits from Tuva. Contemporary Legends and other Folklore-Texts.] Marburg: tectum-Verlag.ISBN978-3-8288-3134-6
External links
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