Thavyung

There are 450 carriers in Thailand, about 250 in Laos, 1,500 people belong to the Phonsoong people ^[1] . The language developed in isolation from the neighboring Laotian , Phutai and Tai Nyo. In the languages ​​of Thawyng there is an opposition of pure phonation and aspirate phonation similar to glottalized terminals ^[2] .

Sociolinguistic Information

The unstable status of the language was aggravated by the low social status of the people, official sanctions for its use in schools, and also due to labor migration to more developed regions where Thienyng languages ​​are not used ^[2] .

Phonetics and phonology

Vowels

There are 10 simple vowels and two diphthongs ([ i a ] and [ u a ]) in thawyung:

The longitude of vowels by carriers is not stable, there are very few examples where the vowel length would be discriminative, for example, [ ʔ ɔ ŋ ] “father” and [ ʔ ɔ ŋ ] “wasp”; [ c a̤ w ] “we” and [ c a ː w ] “cooked rice”.

Consonants

In the 20th consonant, they can all be initial in a syllable, but only 12 can be final, in the table below they are marked in bold.

There are some changes in the finals of the Lao Thawyung variety ^[2] :

- [ n ] → [ l ]

[ m ṵ ː n ] → [ m u l ] "break into small pieces"

[ k a h a̰ ː n ] → [ k a h a ː l ] "tiger"

- [ n ] → [ ɲ ] or [ n ]

[ k u ː n ] → [ k u ː ɲ ] "man"

(katun) [ b u ː n ] → [ b u ː ɲ ] or [ b u ː n ] "ash"

- [ ŋ ] → [ ɲ ] or [ ŋ ]

[ p i ŋ ] → [ p i ɲ ] or [ p i ŋ ] “shoot”

- [ t ] → [ c ] or [ t ]

[ l o̰ t ] → [ l o̰ c ] "penis"

[ k ^h a l a̰ ː t ] → [ k ^h a l a ː c ] or [ k ^h a l a ː t ] “scrape”

In Thai-Lao borrowings, elderly carriers, instead of [ f ], pronounce [ p ^h ], since this sound was not in Phonetics of Thawyung; young carriers say [ f ]:

• [ f à ː k ] → [ f à ː k ] or [ ʔ a f à ː k ] "ask to take something for someone."

Similarly, in the speech of young people the following changes occur ^[2] : [ s ] → [ t ^h ], [ s ] → [ t ] → [ c ], [ s ] → [ k ^h ], [ s ] → [ k ], [ s ] → [ j ], [ k ^h ] → [ k a ], [ t ^h ] → [ k ^h ], [ t ] → [ k ], [ p ] → [ t ].

Phonotactics

Thavyung vowels can have one of three phonations : simple, pure (a); creaking (a̰); aspiration (a̤).

There are three tones : rising, falling and medium.

Structure of a syllable

A word can consist of 1–3 syllables, most often words are disyllable; stress on the last syllable. The stressed syllable can be both open and closed, and the one in front of it is almost always open. Also, the vowel in the pre-stressed (or minor) syllable is always reduced. The minor syllable itself periodically disappears, even in the speech of the same carrier:

• [ ʔ a p ɛ̰ n ] → [ p n ] “fly”;
• [ p ^h a l ɔ̰ ŋ ] → [ l ɔ̰ ŋ ] “forget”.

The structure of the syllable:

• mandatory initial consonant;
• mandatory vowel;
• optional final consonant;
• optional suprasegmental phoneme .

Initials [ k ] and [ k ^h ] often fall out or turn into a laryngeal bow.