Tsat, also known as Utsat, Utset, Hainan Cham, or Huíhuī (), is a
tonal language spoken by 4,500
Utsul
The Utsuls ([]; ), are a Chamic languages, Chamic-speaking East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group which lives on the island of Hainan and are considered one of the People's Republic of China's Unrecognized ethnic groups in China, unrecognized ...
people in Yanglan () and Huixin () villages near
Sanya
Sanya (; also spelled Samah) is the southernmost city on Hainan Island, and one of the four prefecture-level cities of Hainan Province in South China.
According to the 2020 census, the total population of Sanya was 1,031,396 inhabitants, li ...
,
Hainan
Hainan (, ; ) is the smallest and southernmost province of the People's Republic of China (PRC), consisting of various islands in the South China Sea. , the largest and most populous island in China,The island of Taiwan, which is slightly l ...
,
China. Tsat is a member of the
Malayo-Polynesian
The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages, with approximately 385.5 million speakers. The Malayo-Polynesian languages are spoken by the Austronesian peoples outside of Taiwan, in the island nations of Southeas ...
group within the
Austronesian language family, and is one of the
Chamic languages originating on the coast of present-day
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
.
Tonogenesis
Hainan Cham tones correspond to various Proto-Chamic sounds.
History
Unusually for an Austronesian language, Tsat has developed into a
tonal language, probably as a result of areal linguistic effects and contact with the diverse tonal languages spoken on Hainan including
varieties of Chinese
Chinese, also known as Sinitic, is a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family consisting of hundreds of local varieties, many of which are not mutually intelligible. Variation is particularly strong in the more mountainous southeast of ma ...
such as
Hainanese and
Standard Chinese,
Tai–Kadai languages
Tai or TAI may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
*Tai (comics) a fictional Marvel Comics supervillain
*Tai Fraiser, a fictional character in the 1995 film ''Clueless''
* Tai Kamiya, a fictional character in ''Digimon''
Businesses and organisation ...
such as the
Hlai languages, and
Hmong–Mien languages
The Hmong–Mien languages (also known as Miao–Yao and rarely as Yangtzean) are a highly tonal language family of southern China and northern Southeast Asia. They are spoken in mountainous areas of southern China, including Guizhou, Hunan, Yunn ...
such as
Kim Mun.
Notes
References
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External links
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Recent papers on Tsat
{{Austronesian languages
Hainan
Languages of China
Chamic languages
Tonal languages in non-tonal families