Ladakhi Language

The Ladakhi language is a Tibetic language spoken in the Indian union territory of Ladakh. It is the predominant language in the Buddhist-dominated district of Leh. Though a member of the Tibetic family, Ladakhi is not mutually intelligible with Standard Tibetan.

Ladakhi has several dialects: ''Lehskat'' after Leh, where it is spoken; shamskat, spoken in the northwest of Leh; ''Stotskat'', spoken in the Indus valley and which is tonal unlike the others; ''Nubra'', spoken in the north of Leh , Changthang language which is spoken in a changthang region and Zanskari language which is spoken in zanskar region of Ladakh

Name

The Ladakhi language () is also called Bhoti or Bodhi.
However, since Bhoti and Bodhi sound like “Buddhist” and can alienate Ladakhi Muslims who speak the same language, most Ladakhis usually refer to their language as Ladakhi.

Classification

Nicolas Tournadre considers Ladakhi, Balti, and Purgi to be distinct languages on the basis of mutual intelligibility (Zangskari is not as distinct). As a group they are termed Ladakhi–Balti or Western Archaic Tibetan.

Zangskari is a dialect of Ladakhi spoken in Zanskar and also spoken by Buddhists in the upper reaches of Lahaul (Himachal Pradesh) and Paddar (Paldar).
It has four subdialects, Stod, Zhung, Sham, and Lungna. It is written using the Tibetan script by Buddhists and the Arabic script by Muslim and Christian Ladakhis.

Phonology

Consonants

* can fricative sounds as allophones that occur within free variation.
* has an allophone of a retracted velar stop .
* can have allophones when occurring initially before a voiceless consonant.

Vowels

* Allophones of in word-final position are heard as .
*Allophones of are heard as .
*Allophones occur in free variation.

Script

Ladakhi is usually written using Tibetan script with the pronunciation of Ladakhi being much closer to written Classical Tibetan than most other Tibetic languages. Ladakhis pronounce many of the prefix, suffix and head letters that are silent in many other Tibetic languages, in particular the Central Tibetan. This tendency is more pronounced to the west of Leh, and on the Pakistani side of the Line of Control, in Baltistan. For example, a Tibetan would pronounce ''sta'' 'axe' as á but a Lehpa would say ta and a purgi would pronounce tare While a Tibetan would pronounce འབྲས་ (’bras) 'rice' as �ʈɛ́ʔ Lehpa say �as and the purgii pronounce it as ras

The question of whether to write colloquial Ladakhi in the Tibetan script or to write only a slightly Ladakhified version of Classical Tibetan is controversial in Ladakh. Muslim Ladakhis speak Ladakhi but most do not read the Tibetan script and most Buddhist Ladakhis can sound out the Tibetan script but do not understand Classical Tibetan, but some Ladakhi Buddhist scholars insist that Ladakhi must be written only in a form of Classical Tibetan. A limited number of books and magazines have been published in colloquial Ladakhi.

Written Ladakhi is most often romanised using modified Wylie transliteration, with a ''th'' denoting an aspirated dental ''t'', for example.

Recognition

A section of Ladakhi society has been demanding inclusion of a newly named language, Bhoti, to be added to the 8th Schedule of the Indian Constitution. They claim that Bhoti is spoken by Ladakhis, Baltis, Tibetans, and throughout the Himalayas from Baltistan to Arunachal Pradesh.

References

External links

*A. H. Francke 190
A Sketch of Ladakhi Grammar
'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal'' 70.1

{{Ladakh

Bodic languages
Languages of Gilgit-Baltistan
Languages of Ladakh
Culture of Ladakh
Languages written in Tibetan script