Sa'och (, also, "Sauch") is an endangered, nearly extinct Pearic language of

Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...

and

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

spoken only occasionally by a decreasing number of older adults. There are two dialects, one spoken in Veal Renh Village, Prey Nob District,

Sihanoukville Province Preah Sihanouk (, UNGEGN: , ALA-LC: , ), also Sihanoukville, is a province (''khaet'') in southwest Cambodia on the Gulf of Thailand. The provincial capital, also called Sihanoukville, is a deep water port city and a steadily growing and div ...

(formerly known as Kampong Som Province), Cambodia and the other in

Kanchanaburi Province Kanchanaburi (, ) is the largest of the western Provinces of Thailand, provinces (''changwat'') of Thailand. The neighboring provinces are (clockwise, from the north) Tak province, Tak, Uthai Thani province, Uthai Thani, Suphan Buri province, Sup ...

, Thailand. "Sa'och" is the Khmer

exonym An endonym (also known as autonym ) is a common, name for a group of people, individual person, geographical place, language, or dialect, meaning that it is used inside a particular group or linguistic community to identify or designate them ...

for the people and the language. The Sa'och, however, consider this label, which means "

scarlet fever Scarlet fever, also known as scarlatina, is an infectious disease caused by ''Streptococcus pyogenes'', a Group A streptococcus (GAS). It most commonly affects children between five and 15 years of age. The signs and symptoms include a sore ...

" or "pimply" in Khmer, pejorative and use the

autonym Autonym may refer to: * Autonym, the name used by a person to refer to themselves or their language; see Exonym and endonym * Autonym (botany), an automatically created infrageneric or infraspecific name See also * Nominotypical subspecies, in zo ...

"Chung" () to refer to themselves and their language.

Classification

Sa'och is an

Austroasiatic The Austroasiatic languages ( ) are a large language family spoken throughout Mainland Southeast Asia, South Asia and East Asia. These languages are natively spoken by the majority of the population in Vietnam and Cambodia, and by minority popu ...

language. Within the Austroasiatic family, Sa'och is a member of the Pearic languages, a subgroup consisting of a handful of dying languages, including Suoy,

Pear Pears are fruits produced and consumed around the world, growing on a tree and harvested in late summer into mid-autumn. The pear tree and shrub are a species of genus ''Pyrus'' , in the Family (biology), family Rosaceae, bearing the Pome, po ...

, Chong and Samre, spoken by small numbers of ethnic minorities living mostly in far western Cambodia and adjacent areas of Thailand. In traditional classifications, the Pearic languages are most closely related to Khmer dialects, but more conservative schemes place the Pearic subfamily on a level equally distant from all the branches of Austroasiatic.

History and geographical range

After the

breakup A relationship breakup, breakup, or break-up is the ending of a Interpersonal relationship, relationship. The act is commonly termed "dumping omeone in slang when it is initiated by one partner. The term is less likely to be applied to a ma ...

of the

Khmer Empire The Khmer Empire was an empire in Southeast Asia, centered on Hydraulic empire, hydraulic cities in what is now northern Cambodia. Known as Kambuja (; ) by its inhabitants, it grew out of the former civilization of Chenla and lasted from 802 t ...

, the Cambodian central government was weak and neighboring Thailand and Vietnam vied for Cambodian territory. During this time, the Sa'och maintained a semi-autonomous territory centered on Veal Renh in Kampong Saom (modern-day Sihanoukville). According to Sa'och oral history, they prospered along the coast protected by their fortified settlement of Banteay Prey.Isara (2009), pg 72 However, in the 1830s, during the Siamese-Vietnamese War for Cambodia, the Thai army defeated the Sa'och and took many prisoners of war back to Thailand where they were forced to resettle in

along the Thai-Burmese border. This resulted in two disparate communities of Sa'och speakers separated by some 800 km. The defeat and dispersal of the Sa'och led to a drastic decline in the use of the language. The Sa'och in Cambodia remained along the coast of Kampong Saom, living in their own villages such as Long Leh. The dialect that continued to evolve in Cambodia survived because the Sa'och were able to stay isolated from Cambodians, even through the

colonial era Colonial period (a period in a country's history where it was subject to management by a colonial power) may refer to: Continents *European colonization of the Americas * Colonisation of Africa * Western imperialism in Asia Countries * Col ...

, until the Khmer Rouge rule of Cambodia when the vast majority were either killed or relocated and forced to live among Khmers. The Sa'och in Thailand were first resettled in the Si Sawat District of Kanchanaburi Province in their own villages along the

Khwae Yai River The Khwae Yai River (, , ), also known as the Si Sawat ( ), is a river in western Thailand. It has its source in the Tenasserim Hills and flows for about through Sangkhla Buri, Si Sawat, and Mueang Districts of Kanchanaburi Province, where ...

. Their dialect evolved in relative isolation in the fertile valley for almost 140 years until construction of the Si Nakharin Dam which, completed in 1980, permanently inundated the valley. In making preparations for the dam, the Thai government again forced the Sa'och to relocate, this time to the

gravel Gravel () is a loose aggregation of rock fragments. Gravel occurs naturally on Earth as a result of sedimentation, sedimentary and erosion, erosive geological processes; it is also produced in large quantities commercially as crushed stone. Gr ...

ly hills above the new reservoir. In their new villages, which were now mixed with Karen, Khmu and Thai, the Sa'och suddenly became minorities resulting in declining language use in favor of Thai. Additionally, young Sa'och are leaving the relatively barren isolated region to find work, causing an additional decline in language use. A paper published in 2009 reported that use of the Chung language in Thailand was only found among older generations remaining in the village and a few small children left in their care. Both groups of Sa'och call their language simply ''chung''. To differentiate the two dialects, researches have arbitrarily designated the dialect found in Cambodia "Chung Yul" and that of Thailand "Chung Yuy", ''yul'' and ''yuy'' being their respective words for "sky".

Phonology

Sa'och employs a phonemic inventory typical of modern Mon-Khmer languages and, along with the other Pearic languages, shows some phonological influences from the late Middle Khmer of the 17th century. Like most of the other Austroasiatic languages (outside of

Viet-Muong The Vietic languages are a branch of the Austroasiatic language family, spoken by the Vietic peoples in Laos and Vietnam. The branch was once referred to by the terms ''Việt–Mường'', ''Annamese–Muong'', and ''Vietnamuong''; the term ''V ...

) Sa'och is not a tonal language. However, also similar to the other Pearic languages, Sa'och is marked by an unusual four-way contrast of vocal

register Register or registration may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), ...

, or phonation, in its vowel system.

Consonants

Sa'och has 21 consonant phonemes. They are listed in table form below.adapted from Isara (2009), pg 73

Vowels

Sa'och contrasts nine vowel qualities which can be either short or long, yielding a total of 18 vowel phonemes. Diphthongs do not occur in native Sa'och words, but the diphthongs , , and may be found in loan words from Thai and Khmer. The vowels of Sa'och are:

Phonation

Similar to other modern and historical Austroasiatic languages such as Middle Khmer, western dialects of Khmu, and the Monic and

Katuic languages The fifteen Katuic languages form a branch of the Austroasiatic languages spoken by about 1.5 million people in Southeast Asia. People who speak Katuic languages are called the Katuic peoples. Paul Sidwell is the leading specialist on the Katuic ...

, Sa'och employs a system of phonemic

in which words contrast according to their

phonation The term phonation has slightly different meanings depending on the subfield of phonetics. Among some phoneticians, ''phonation'' is the process by which the vocal folds produce certain sounds through quasi-periodic vibration. This is the defi ...

, or voice quality. However, unlike these languages, which mostly display a two-way contrast (e.g. between clear and

breathy voice Breathy voice (also called murmured voice, whispery voice, soughing and susurration) is a phonation in which the vocal folds vibrate, as they do in normal (modal) voicing, but are adjusted to let more air escape which produces a sighing-like s ...

), Sa'och and other Pearic languages contrast four different voice qualities. In a tonal language, an entire syllable carries the tone but in "register" languages, phonation is manifested only on the vowels. The four voice qualities in Sa'och and their transcriptions, using the base vowel /aː/ as an example, are clear voice (/a/),

creaky voice In linguistics, creaky voice (sometimes called laryngealisation, pulse phonation, vocal fry, or glottal fry) refers to a low, scratchy sound that occupies the vocal range below the common vocal register. It is a special kind of phonation in which ...

(/aːˀ/), breathy voice (/a̤ː/) and breathy-creaky voice (a̤ːˀ).Isara 2009, pg ̀74

References

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Notes

{{Austro-Asiatic languages Pearic languages Endangered Austroasiatic languages Languages of Cambodia Languages of Thailand