Tai Lue ( New Tai Lü: , Tai Tham: , ''kam tai lue'', ) or Xishuangbanna Dai is a Tai language of the Lu people, spoken by about 700,000 people in

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

. This includes 280,000 people in China (

Yunnan Yunnan; is an inland Provinces of China, province in Southwestern China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 47.2 million (as of 2020). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the Chinese provinces ...

), 200,000 in Burma, 134,000 in Laos, 83,000 in

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 ...

and 4,960 in

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

. The language is similar to other

Tai languages The Tai, Zhuang–Tai, or Daic languages (Ahom language, Ahom: 𑜁𑜪𑜨 𑜄𑜩 or 𑜁𑜨𑜉𑜫 𑜄𑜩 ; ; or , ; , ) are a branch of the Kra–Dai languages, Kra–Dai language family. The Tai languages include the most widely spo ...

and is closely related to Kham Mueang or Tai Yuan, which is also known as

Northern Thai language Northern Thai (), also called Kam Mueang (, กำเมือง) or Lanna, is the language spoken by the Northern Thai people of Thailand. It is a Southwestern Tai languages, Southwestern Tai language. The language has approximately six mill ...

. In Yunnan, it is spoken in all of

Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture Xishuangbanna, sometimes shortened to Banna, is one of the eight autonomous prefectures of Yunnan Province. The autonomous prefecture for Dai people is in the extreme south of Yunnan province, China, bordering both Myanmar and Laos. Xishuangbanna ...

, as well as

Jiangcheng Hani and Yi Autonomous County Jiangcheng Hani and Yi Autonomous County (; Hani language, Hani: ) is an autonomous county under the jurisdiction of Pu'er City, in southern Yunnan, China, bordering Laos to the south and Vietnam to the southeast. It is one of the two counties in ...

Pu'er City Pu'er is a prefecture-level city in southern Yunnan Province, China. Pu'er City governs 9 counties, 1 district, 103 townships (towns), and a total population of 2.65 million. The urban administrative center of Pu'er is Simao District, which is ...

. In Vietnam, Tai Lue speakers are officially recognised as the Lự ethnic minority, although in China they are classified as part of the

Dai people The Dai people ( Burmese: ရှမ်းလူမျိုး; ; ; ; , ; , ; zh, c=, p=Dǎizú) are several Tai-speaking ethnic groups living in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture and the Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture ...

, along with speakers of the other

apart from Zhuang.

Phonology

Tai Lue has 21 syllable-initial consonants, 9 syllable-finals and six tones (three different tones in checked syllables, six in open syllables).

Consonants

Initials

The initials - and - are palatalized before

front vowel A front vowel is a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages, its defining characteristic being that the highest point of the tongue is positioned approximately as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction th ...

s (which in the language are , , and ) and become and , respectively. For example, "hard" and "ten" are pronounced as and respectively. (Some textbooks denote as ).

Finals

Vowels

Each vowel quality occurs in long-short pairs: these are distinct phonemes forming distinct words in Tai Lue. Generally, vowels in open syllables (without codas) occur as long whereas ones in

closed syllables A syllable is a basic unit of organization within a sequence of speech sounds, such as within a word, typically defined by linguists as a ''nucleus'' (most often a vowel) with optional sounds before or after that nucleus (''margins'', which are ...

are short (except and ).

Diphthongs

Additionally, Tai Lue uses several diphthongs:

Tones

Contrastive tones in unchecked syllables

The table below presents six phonemic tones in unchecked syllables, i.e. closed syllables ending in sonorant sounds such as , and and open syllables. There are six tones for unchecked syllables, although only three are allowed in checked syllables (those ending with -p, -t or -k).

Contrastive tones in checked syllables

The table below presents two phonemic tones in checked syllables, i.e. closed syllables ending in a

glottal stop The glottal stop or glottal plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many Speech communication, spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic ...

and obstruent sounds which are , and .

Grammar

Pronouns

Tai Lü Dictionary
– Webonary

Syntax

Word order is usually subject–verb–object (SVO); modifiers (e.g. adjectives) follow nouns.

Interrogatives

Vocabulary

As in Thai and Lao, Tai Lue has borrowed many

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

and

Pali Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a Classical languages of India, classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages, Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pali Canon, Pāli Can ...

words and

affixes In linguistics, an affix is a morpheme that is attached to a word stem to form a new word or word form. The main two categories are derivational and inflectional affixes. Derivational affixes, such as ''un-'', ''-ation'', ''anti-'', ''pre-'' et ...

. Among the Tai languages in general, Tai Lue has limited intelligibility with Shan and Tai Nua and shares much vocabulary with, the other

Southwestern Tai languages The Southwestern Tai or Thai languages are a branch of the Tai languages of Southeast Asia. Its languages include Central Thai (Siamese), Northern Thai (Lanna), Lao (including Isan), Shan and others. Classification The internal classificatio ...

. Tai Lue has 95%

lexical similarity In linguistics, lexical similarity is a measure of the degree to which the word sets of two given languages are similar. A lexical similarity of 1 (or 100%) would mean a total overlap between vocabularies, whereas 0 means there are no common words. ...

with Northern Thai (Lanna), 86% with Central Thai, 93% with Shan, and 95% with Khun. Below, some Thai Lue words are given with standard Central Thai equivalents for comparison. Thai words are shown on the left and Tai Lue words, written in

Tai Tham script Tai Tham script (''Dharma, Tham'' meaning "scripture") is an abugida writing system used mainly for a group of Southwestern Tai languages i.e., Northern Thai language, Northern Thai, Tai Lue language, Tai Lü, Khün language, Khün and Lao langu ...

, are shown on the right.

Different words

Many words differ from Thai greatly: *ยี่สิบ → ᨪᩣ᩠ᩅ (, twenty; cf. Lao: /sáːw/, Northern Thai: /sāw/) *พูด → ᩋᩪᩢ (, to speak; cf. Northern Thai: /ʔu᷇ː/) *พี่ชาย → ᩋᩢᩣ᩠ᨿ (, older brother; cf. Lao: /ʔâːj/, Northern Thai: /ʔa᷇ːj/)

Similar words

Some words differ in tone only: *หนึ่ง → ᨶ᩠ᨦᩧ᩵ (, one) *หก → ᩉᩫ᩠ᨠ (, six) *เจ็ด → ᨧᩮ᩠ᨯ (, seven) *สิบ → ᩈᩥ᩠ᨷ (, ten) *กิน → ᨠᩥ᩠ᨶ (, to eat) Some words differ in a single sound and associated tone. In many words, the initial ร () in Thai is ฮ () in Tai Lue, as is also the case in Lao and Tai Yuan: *ร้อน → ᩁᩢᩬᩁ (, hot; cf. Lao: /hɔ̂n/, Northern Thai: /hɔ́ːn/) *รัก → ᩁᩢ᩠ᨠ (, to love; cf. Lao: /hāk/, Northern Thai: /ha᷇k/) *รู้ → ᩁᩪᩢ (, to know; cf. Lao: /hûː/, Northern Thai: /húː/)

Aspirated consonant In phonetics, aspiration is a strong burst of breath that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. In English, aspirated consonants are allophones in complementary distribution with t ...

s in the low-class consonant group(อักษรต่ำ ) become unaspirated: *เชียงราย → ᨩ᩠ᨿᨦᩁᩣ᩠ᨿ (, Chiang Rai city and

province A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

) *คิด → ᨣᩧ᩠ᨯ (, to think; cf. Northern Thai: /kɯ́t/) *พ่อ → ᨻᩳ᩵ (, father; cf. Northern Thai: /pɔ̂ː/) *ทาง → ᨴᩤ᩠ᨦ (, way; cf. Northern Thai: /tāːŋ/) (Note that the vowels also differ greatly between Tai Lue and Thai in many words, even though they are etymologically related and share the same root.) Though many aspirated consonants often become unaspirated, when an unaspirated consonant is followed by ร () the unaspirated consonant becomes aspirated: *ประเทศ → ᨷᩕᨴᩮ᩠ᩆ (, country; cf. Northern Thai /pʰa.têːt/) Other differences: *ให้ → ᩉᩨᩢ (, to give, let)

Numbers

Writing systems

Tai Lue is written in three different scripts. One is the Fak Kham script, a variety of the Thai script of Sukhothai. The second is the Tham script, which was reformed in the 1950s, but is still in use and has recently regained government support. The new script is a simplified version of the old script.

Fak Kham

An ancient script, also used in Kengtung,

Northern Thailand Northern Thailand, or more specifically Lanna, is a region of Thailand. It is geographically characterized by several mountain ranges, which continue from the Shan Hills in bordering Myanmar to Laos, and the river valleys that cut through them. ...

and Northern Laos centuries ago.

Tham

The Tham script is called 老傣文 ''lao dai wen'' (Old Dai script) in Chinese. Readable by the most people in Burma, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam.

New Tai Lue

New Tai Lue is a modernization of the Lanna alphabet (also known as the

), which is similar to the

Thai alphabet The Thai script (, , ) is the abugida used to write Thai, Southern Thai and many other languages spoken in Thailand. The Thai script itself (as used to write Thai) has 44 consonant symbols (, ), 16 vowel symbols (, ) that combine into at leas ...

, and consists of 42 initial consonant signs (21 high-tone class, 21 low-tone class), seven final consonant signs, 16 vowel signs, two tone letters and one vowel shortening letter (or syllable-final glottal stop). Vowels signs can be placed before or after the syllable initial consonant. Similar to the Thai alphabet, the pronunciation of the tone of a syllable depends on the class the initial consonant belongs to, syllable structure and

vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived or actual length (phonetics), duration of a vowel sound when pronounced. Vowels perceived as shorter are often called short vowels and those perceived as longer called long vowels. On one hand, many ...

, and the tone mark.

Related varieties

The Bajia people ( 八甲人), who number 1,106 individuals in Mengkang Village (), Meng'a Town (), Menghai County, Yunnan, speak a language closely related to Tai Lue. There are 225 Bajia people living in Jingbo Township 景播乡, Menghai County (You 2013:270). The Bajia are also known as the Chinese Dai 汉傣.

Notes

References

External links

SeaSite: Tai Lue, under construction

Tai Lue dictionary online

Li, Juan. 2022. Grammaire descriptive du tai lü (A Descriptive Grammar of Tai Lue). Paris: Sorbonne Université (PhD Dissertation).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tai Lu Language Languages of Yunnan Languages of Myanmar Languages of Laos Languages of Thailand Languages of Vietnam