Tamang language
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Tamang | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Nepal, India, Bhutan | |
| Region: | South Asia | |
| Total speakers: | 1 million approx. | |
| Language family: | Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman Himalayish Tamang |
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| Writing system: | Tibetan script, Devnagari | |
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |
| ISO 639-2: | – | |
| ISO 639-3: | – | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
Tamang (Devnagari:तामाङ) is a term used to collectively refer to a group of languages spoken in parts of Nepal and Sikkim. It comprises Eastern Tamang, Northwestern Tamang, Southwestern Tamang, Eastern Gorkha Tamang, and Western Tamang. Lexical similarity between Eastern Tamang (which is regarded as the most prominent) and other Tamang languages varies between 81% to 63%; lexical similarity between Spanish and Portuguese, for instance, is estimated at 89%[citation needed].
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[edit] Classification
According to ethnologue.com Tamang languages are classified as follows:
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- Tibeto-Kanauri
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- Tibetic
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- Tamangic
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- Tamang, Eastern [taj]
- Tamang, Eastern Gorkha [tge]
- Tamang, Northwestern [tmk]
- Tamang, Southwestern [tsf]
- Tamang, Western [tdg]
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ISO 639-3 identifiers are given in brackets.
[edit] Dialects
The Tamang language has further been subdivided into the following dialects-
- Eastern Tamang: 759,257 in Nepal (2000 WCD). Population total all countries: 773,257;
- Western Tamang: 322,598 (2000 WCD);
- Southwestern Tamang: 109,051 (1991 census);
- Northwestern Tamang: 55,000 (1991 census);
- Eastern Gorkha Tamang: 3,977 (2000 WCD).
Tamang language is the largest Tibeto-Burman language in Nepal.
[edit] Grammar
Some grammatical features of Tamang languages are
Phonetically Tamang languages are tonal.
[edit] Writing system
Tamang languages use Devanāgarī and Tibetan scripts.
[edit] See also
Gurung (ethnic group)
