Sak languages
| Sak | |
|---|---|
| Luish | |
| Kado | |
| Native to | Myanmar, Bangladesh, China |
| Region | Northwestern Rakhine State |
| Ethnicity | Kadu |
|
Native speakers
|
40,000 (2007) |
|
Sino-Tibetan
|
|
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
Individual codes: zkd – Kadu zkn – Kanan ckh – Chak lba – Lui (old generic name) |
| Glottolog | sakk1239 |
Sak, also known as Gadu, Gamaan, Kado, Kantu, Kadu-Ganaan, Kato, Kudo, Maw, Mawteik, Puteik, Asak, Thet, Andro, Sengmai, Chakpa, Phayeng, Katu, Gado, Woni, That, and Kadu is a Sino-Tibetan language of the Sal branch spoken in Myanmar and China. The various varieties are generally considered separate Sak or Luish languages: Kado (Settaw, Mawkhwin, and Mawteik [extinct] dialects; 30,000 speakers), and Kanan (Nanza; 9,000 speakers). Andro and Sengmai are extinct and known only from a glossary recorded in 1859, their speakers having switched to Meithei. The Kado/Kanan speak Burmese and Chakma Bengali. There are also various unattested varieties of Lui or Loi mentioned in nineteenth-century accounts that appear to have been the same language.
The ancient Pyu language may belong here.
Statistics for Kadu-speaking villages are as follows (Ethnologue).
There is low mutual intelligibility among the Kadu dialects.
Kadu has twenty consonants: /p, t, k, ʔ, pʰ, tʰ, kʰ, tɕ, tɕʰ, sʰ, s, ɕ, h, m, n, ɲ, ŋ, l, y, w/. The final consonants need to be nasals /m, n, ŋ/ or voiceless stops /p, t, k, ʔ/.
Kadu vowels consist of eight monophthongs /a, e, i, o, u, ɔ, ɛ, ɘ/ and a diphthong /ai/.
Kadu is a tonal language, which means it make use of pitch in one form or another to distinguish between words that would otherwise be homophonous. In this language, there are three tones; high, mid, and low.
C1C2V1V2C3
C: Consonant
V: Vowel
C1: necessary, this can be any Kadu consonant except unvoiced nasals.
C2: optional, this can be only /l, w, y/.
V1: necessary, this can be any Kadu vowel, however, /ɘ/ appears only in the form of CɘC.
V2: optional.
C3: optional, this can be only /p, t, m, n, ʔ, ŋ/.
The Kadu have never had a writing system of their own.
Kadu is an SOV language.
Abstract nouns such as freedom, love, experience, and anger are not attested in the Kadu noun class. They are usually expressed by verbs or adjectival verbs.
The language has two categories of nouns:
...
Wikipedia