Tedim language

Tedim
Tedim
Zomi; Zopau
Native to	Myanmar, India
Ethnicity	Zomi
Native speakers	(340,000 cited 1990)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman Central Tibeto-Burman (?) Kuki-Chin–Naga Kuki-Chin Northern Tedim; ; ; ; ; ;
Writing system	Latin ; Pau Cin Hau script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	ctd
Glottolog	tedi1235
ELP	Tiddim Chin

The Tedim or Zomi language is spoken mostly in Myanmar and India. In Chin State (Khamtunggam), it is spoken in Tedim and Tonzang townships, while in Sagaing Division, it is spoken in Kalay and Mawlaik townships (Ethnologue). Dialects are Sokte and Kamhau (also called Kamhao, Kamhow). It is a subject-object verb language, and negation follows the verb.

Clans

Sukte is a small Zomi clan. They generally live in the Tedim and Tonzang townships. "But there is no specific native language of Sukte. It is just a clan of Zomi." Zam Ngaih Cing (2011:170) lists some Zomi varieties as Losau, Sihzang, Teizang, Saizang, Dim, Khuano, Hualngo, Dim, Zou, Thado, Paite and Vangteh.[2]

History

Zomi language was the primary language spoken by Pau Cin Hau, a religious leader who lived from 1859 to 1948. He also devised a logographic and later simplified alphabetic script for writing materials in Zomi language.

Phonology

The phonology of Zomi language can be described as (C)V(V)(C)T order, where C represents a consonant, V represents a vowel, T represents a tone, and parentheses enclose optional constituents of a syllable.[3]

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Alveolo- palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p	t	tɕ	k	ʔ
	aspirated	pʰ	tʰ	tɕʰ	(kʰ)
	voiced	b	d		ɡ
Fricative	voiceless	f	s		x	h
Fricative	voiced	v	z
Nasal		m	n		ŋ
Approximant			l			lˀ

Approximants [j, w] can be heard as allophones of vowels /i̯, u̯/ within diphthongs.
/x/ can also be heard as an aspirated velar stop [kʰ] in free variation.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i iː		u uː
Mid	ɛ ɛː		ɔ ɔː
Open		a aː

Diphthongs
	Front	Central	Back
Close	iu̯ i̯a		ui̯ uːi̯ u̯a
Mid	ei̯ ɛːi̯ eu̯ ɛːu̯		ou̯ oi̯ ɔːi̯
Open		ai̯ aːi̯ au̯ aːu̯

Sounds /ɛ, ɔ/ may have short allophones of more close [e, o].[4]

Tone

References

Tedim at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
"But there is no language of Sukte, meaning it is only a clan of Zomi." Source: Cing, Zam Ngaih. "Linguistic Ecology of Tedim Chin." In Singh, Shailendra Kumar (ed). Linguistic Ecology of Manipur. Guwahati: EBH Publishers.
"Proposal to Encode the Pau Cin Hau Alphabet in ISO/IEC 10646" (PDF). unicode.org. Retrieved 15 September 2023.
Otsuka, Kosei (2014). Tiddim Chin. Toshihide Nakayama and Noboru Yoshioka and Kosei Otsuka (eds.), Grammatical Sketches from the Field: Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa (ILCAA), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. pp. 109–141.

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[e18-1] Tedim at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

[2] "But there is no language of Sukte, meaning it is only a clan of Zomi." Source: Cing, Zam Ngaih. "Linguistic Ecology of Tedim Chin." In Singh, Shailendra Kumar (ed). Linguistic Ecology of Manipur. Guwahati: EBH Publishers.

[3] "Proposal to Encode the Pau Cin Hau Alphabet in ISO/IEC 10646" (PDF). unicode.org. Retrieved 15 September 2023.

[4] Otsuka, Kosei (2014). Tiddim Chin. Toshihide Nakayama and Noboru Yoshioka and Kosei Otsuka (eds.), Grammatical Sketches from the Field: Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa (ILCAA), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. pp. 109–141.