Danau, also spelt Danaw (), is a

Mon–Khmer language The Austroasiatic languages , , are a large language family in Mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. These languages are scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China and are t ...

of Myanmar (Burma). It is the most divergent member of the

Palaungic The nearly thirty Palaungic or Palaung–Wa languages form a branch of the Austroasiatic languages. Phonological developments Most of the Palaungic languages lost the contrastive voicing of the ancestral Austroasiatic consonants, with the disti ...

branch (Sidwell 2010). Danau is spoken by about 5,000 people near

Aungban Aungban ( my, အောင်ပန်းမြို့) is a major trading town in the southern Shan State of Myanmar that supplies agricultural yield to the rest of the country. It is located in Kalaw Township which is part of Taunggyi Distric ...

Kalaw Township Kalaw Township ( my, ကလောမြို့နယ်) is a township of Taunggyi District in the Shan State of Myanmar. The principal town is Kalaw. This township contains Kalaw, Aungban and Heho Heho ( my, ဟဲဟိုး) is a small to ...

Shan State Shan State ( my, ရှမ်းပြည်နယ်, ; shn, မိူင်းတႆး, italics=no) also known by the endonyms Shanland, Muang Tai, and Tailong, is a state of Myanmar. Shan State borders China (Yunnan) to the north, Laos ( ...

. Danaw was classified as a "critically endangered" language in

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

's 2010 ''

Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger The UNESCO ''Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger'' is an online publication containing a comprehensive list of the world's endangered languages. It originally replaced the ''Red Book of Endangered Languages'' as a title in print after a ...

.''

Name

Danau is the Burmese pronunciation of the ethnonym; the Danau themselves pronounce the name of their ethnic group and language as . A common variant is .

Speakers

The Danau are a little known ethnic group in Myanmar. Even in the nearby town of

, it is common for people to confuse this group with the local Danu majority. According to historical accounts, the Danu had served as archers for King

Alaungpaya Alaungpaya ( my, အလောင်းဘုရား, ; also spelled Alaunghpaya or Alaung-Phra; 11 May 1760) was the founder of the Konbaung Dynasty of Burma (Myanmar). By the time of his death from illness during his campaign in Siam, this f ...

, who founded the

Konbaung Dynasty The Konbaung dynasty ( my, ကုန်းဘောင်ခေတ်, ), also known as Third Burmese Empire (တတိယမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်) and formerly known as the Alompra dynasty (အလောင်းဘ ...

in the 18th century. The Danu settled in the

Pindaya Pindaya ( my, ပင်းတယမြို့ ''Pìñṯáyá myoú'') is a town in the Shan State of Burma. It is located in the west of the state in Pindaya Township in Taunggyi District. Mainly famous for its limestone caves called Pindaya Ca ...

region after returning from wars in Thailand, and speak a variant of Burmese that is characterised by minor differences in pronunciation. The Danau, on the other hand speak a completely different Austroasiatic language, which nevertheless has numerous words borrowed from Burmese (and also ultimately from

Pali Pali () is a Middle Indo-Aryan liturgical language native to the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pāli Canon'' or '' Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of '' Theravāda'' Buddh ...

via Burmese). The Danau live primarily in the villages of Taungbohla, Thaethit, Htinyugon, Chaunggya and Naung In, within a short distance of the towns of Aungban and Heho. As these villages are surrounded by Pa'O villages, Danau people tend to speak Pa'O as well as Burmese. In spite of the small size of the Danau-speaking population, the language is vigorous and being taught to children. The current situation is in contrast to the prediction made by the linguist Gordon H. Luce in 1965, when he called Danau a 'dying' language. The Danau people are primarily farmers, growing sesame, turmeric, ginger, chilli, groundnut and potato for local consumption and for sale at nearby markets.

Phonology

Danau is a tonal language with four tones according to some sources, while others, including native speakers, identify three tones.Si, Aung (2014) Danau. In: ''The Handbook of Austroasiatic Languages.'' M. Jenny & P. Sidwell (eds.). pp. 1104-1141. Brill, Leiden.

References

External links

* ELAR archive o
Documentation of Danau
{{Austro-Asiatic languages Palaungic languages Languages of Myanmar

Name

Speakers

Phonology

References

Further reading

External links