The Tamangic languages, TGTM languages, or West Bodish languages or Kaike-Ghale-Tamangic languages (

Glottolog ''Glottolog'' is an open-access online bibliographic database of the world's languages. In addition to listing linguistic materials ( grammars, articles, dictionaries) describing individual languages, the database also contains the most up-to-d ...

), are a family of

Sino-Tibetan languages Sino-Tibetan (also referred to as Trans-Himalayan) is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. Around 1.4 billion people speak a Sino-Tibetan language. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 ...

spoken in the Himalayas of

Nepal Nepal, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mainly situated in the Himalayas, but also includes parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China Ch ...

. They are called "West Bodish" by Bradley (1997), from ''Bod'', the native term for

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...

. TGTM stands for Tamang- Gurung- Thakali- Manang. Proto-TGTM has been reconstructed in Mazaudon (1994). Tamangic is united with the Bodish and

West Himalayish languages The West Himalayish languages, also known as Almora and Kanauric, are a family of Sino-Tibetan languages centered in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and across the border into Nepal. LaPolla (2003) proposes that the West Himalayish languages may b ...

in Bradley's (1997) "Bodish" and Van Driem's (2001) Tibeto-Kanauri.

Languages

The Tamangic languages are: * Tamang (several divergent varieties, with a million speakers) *

Gurung Gurung (exonym; ) or Tamu (endonym; Gurung language, Gurung: ) are a Tibetan people, Tibetan ethnic group living in the hills and mountains of Gandaki Province of Nepal. Gurungs speak Tamu kyi which is a Sino-Tibetan language derived from the ...

(two varieties with low mutual intelligibility) * Thakali (including the Seke dialect; ethnically Tamang) *

Manang Manang () is a town in the Manang District of Nepal. It is located at 28°40'0N 84°1'0E with an elevation of . According to the preliminary results of the 2011 Nepal census, the district has a population of 6,527 people living in 1,495 individua ...

language cluster: the closely related

, Gyasumdo, Nar Phu, and Nyeshangte languages. * Chantyal * Ghale languages (

Ghale Ghale is an ethnic group in Nepal with a unique cultural heritage and language, which serves as a significant aspect of their identity and social cohesion within the community. The preservation of their language and cultural traditions is crucial ...

and Kutang): spoken by ethnic Tamang, perhaps related to Tamangic. * Kaike (moribund): may be the most divergent.

Footnotes

References

* Bradley, David (1997).
Tibeto-Burman languages and classification
. In ''Tibeto-Burman languages of the Himalayas, Papers in South East Asian linguistics''. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. * George van Driem (2001) ''Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region.'' Brill. * * Mazaudon, Martine. 1994. Problèmes de comparatisme et de reconstruction dans quelques langues de la famille tibéto-birmane. Thèse d'Etat, Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle. {{Languages of Nepal *