Tamang language

Tamang
तामाङ, རྟ་དམག་ / རྟ་མང་
Native to	Nepal, India, Bhutan
Ethnicity	Tamang
Native speakers	1.35 million in Nepal (2011 census)[1] 17,500 in India (2001 census)
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Tamangic Tamang
Writing system	Tibetan script, Devanagari
Official status
Official language in	Nepal Sikkim, India
Language codes
ISO 639-3	Variously: taj – Eastern Tamang tdg – Western Tamang tmk – Northwestern Tamang (not distinct) tge – Eastern Gorkha Tamang
Glottolog	nucl1729[2]

Selected ethnic groups of Nepal; Bhotia, Sherpa, Thakali, Gurung, Kirant, Rai, Limbu, Nepal Bhasa, Pahari, Tamang

Tamang (Devanagari: तामाङ; tāmāng) is a term used to collectively refer to a dialect cluster spoken mainly in Nepal, Sikkim, West Bengal (Mainly Darjeeling Districts - पश्चिम बङ्गाल राज्यको दार्जीलिङ जिल्लाको बिभिन्न भूभाग), Some parts of Assam and North East Region. It comprises Eastern Tamang, Northwestern Tamang, Southwestern Tamang, Eastern Gorkha Tamang, and Western Tamang. Lexical similarity between Eastern Tamang (which is regarded as the most prominent) and other Tamang languages varies between 81% to 63%. For comparison, lexical similarity between Spanish and Portuguese, is estimated at 89%.^[3] Tamang likely split from the Tibetan languages some time before the 7th century.^[4]

Dialects

Ethnologue divides Tamang into the following varieties due to mutual unintelligibility.

• Eastern Tamang: 759,000 in Nepal (2000 WCD). Population total all countries: 773,000. Sub-dialects are as follows.
  • Outer-Eastern Tamang (Sailung Tamang)
  • Central-Eastern Tamang (Temal Tamang)
  • Southwestern Tamang (Kath-Bhotiya, Lama Bhote, Murmi, Rongba, Sain, Tamang Gyoi, Tamang Gyot, Tamang Lengmo, Tamang Tam)
• Western Tamang: 323,000 (2000 WCD). Sub-dialects are as follows.
  • Trisuli (Nuwakot)
  • Rasuwa
  • Northwestern dialect of Western Tamang (Dhading) — separate ISO code. Population 55,000 (1991 census). Spoken in the central mountainous strip of Nuwakot District, Bagmati Zone.
  • Southwestern dialect of Western Tamang
• Eastern Gorkha Tamang: 4,000 (2000 WCD). Sub-dialects are as follows.
  • Kasigaon
  • Kerounja

The Tamang language is the most widely spoken Sino-Tibetan language in Nepal.

Geographical distribution

Ethnologue gives the following location information for the varieties of Tamang.

Eastern Tamang

• Kathmandu District
• Janakpur Zone: Sindhuli District, Ramechhap District, and Dolkha District
• Bagmati Zone: Kavrepalanchok District, western Sindhupalchowk District, Lalitpur District, Bhaktapur District, and eastern Nuwakot District
• Narayani Zone: Makwanpur District and Chitwan District
• Sagarmatha Zone: Okhaldhunga District, western Khotang District, and Udayapur District

Southwestern Tamang

• Bagmati Zone: southern Dhading District
• Narayani Zone: Chitwan District, northwestern Makwanpur District, Bara District, Parsa District, and Rautahat District
• western and northwestern Kathmandu District area

Western Tamang

• Bagmati Zone: western Nuwakot District, Rasuwa District, and Dhading District
• central mountainous strip of Nuwakot District, Bagmati Zone (Northwestern Tamang)
• northeastern Sindhupalchok District, Bagmati Zone: Bhote Namlan, and Bhote Chaur, on Trishuli river west bank toward Budhi Gandaki river
• northwestern Makwanpur District, Narayani Zone: Phakel, Chakhel, Khulekhani, Markhu, Tistung, and Palung
• northern Kathmandu District: Jhor, Thoka, and Gagal Phedi

Eastern Gorkha Tamang

• south and east of Jagat, northern Gorkha District, Gandaki Zone

Grammar

Some grammatical features of the Tamang languages include:

• A canonical word order of SOV
• Use of postpositions;
• The genitives follow nouns;
• question word medial;
• It is an ergative–absolutive language;
• CV, CVC, CCV, V, CCVC;

Phonetically Tamang languages are tonal.

Writing system

Tamangic languages use Tam-Yig which is similar to Tibetan scripts and Devanāgarī. In many situations, however, Tamang is written in Devanāgarī proper.

See also

• Tamang (ethnic group)
• Gurung (ethnic group)
• Languages of Nepal
• Languages of Bhutan

References

1. Eastern Tamang at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
   Western Tamang at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
   Northwestern Tamang (not distinct) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
   Eastern Gorkha Tamang at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
2. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Nuclear Tamang". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
3. Ethnologue report for Spanish
4. Zeisler, Bettina (2009). Aboh, Enoch; Smith, Norval, eds. "Reducing phonological complexity and grammatical opaqueness: Old Tibetan as a lingua franca and the development of the modern Tibetan dialects.". Complex processes in new languages: 75–95.

External links

• Counting in Tamang
• ELAR archive of Tamang