Habei language explained

Habei
States:China
Region:Yunnan
Ethnicity:Hani
Familycolor:Sino-Tibetan
Fam2:Tibeto-Burman
Fam3:Lolo–Burmese
Fam4:Loloish
Fam5:Southern
Fam6:Bisoid
Iso3:none
Glotto:none

Habei (; also known as Mani 玛尼[1]) is a Southern Loloish language of Yunnan, China. Hsiu (2018)[2] suggests that Habei belongs to the Bisoid branch.

Background

Habei is spoken in only one village, namely Habei village 哈备村,[3] Zhemi Township 者米乡, Jinping Miao, Yao, and Dai Autonomous County, Yunnan (Jinping County Ethnic Gazetteer 2013:89, 101).[4] The Habei people refer to their village as Kuang An (况安), meaning 'old village' (< kuang 'village' + an 'old').[5]

The Habei still preserve traditional animist rituals.[1]

The Habei language has been documented by Yan (1995) and He & Liu (2011).

Names

Autonyms and exonyms for the Habei are as follows (Yan 1995:60).

Phonology

Habei has 32 onsets and 62 rimes (Yan 1995:67). The consonant inventory is similar to that of standard Hani of Lüchun County, but also has /f/ and /v/, which Lüchun Hani does not have. Final consonants are -p, -t, -k, -m, -n, and -ŋ.

There are 6 tones. In songs, only 4 tones are recognizable (Yan 1995:67).

Phrase examples

The following Habei phrase examples are from Yan (1995:69-70). Adjectives follow head nouns.

Sentence examples

The following Habei sentence examples are from Yan (1995:68-69). Habei has SOV word order.

References

Notes and References

  1. http://www.nssd.org/articles/article_detail.aspx?id=10057023 哈备村玛尼人传统思维方式探析
  2. Hsiu, Andrew. 2018. Classifications of some lesser-known Lolo-Burmese languages.
  3. Web site: 金平苗族瑶族傣族自治县者米拉祜族乡顶青村委会哈备村 . 2015-05-29 . 2018-06-12 . https://web.archive.org/web/20180612153955/http://www.ynszxc.gov.cn/villagePage/vIndex.aspx?departmentid=189370 . dead .
  4. 金平苗族瑶族傣族自治县民族志1979-2010. 金平苗族瑶族傣族自治県民族宗教事務局編. 雲南民族出版社. 2013年8月.
  5. Dao Jie [刀洁] . 2012. 哈备村:哈尼文化兼收并蓄的缩影. In Ethnic Today [今日民族], 2012(9) .