Daai language

Dai
Region	Burma
Ethnicity	Dai Chin
Native speakers	37,000 (2010)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan (Tibeto-Burman) Kuki-Chin-Mizo Southern Kuki-Chin-Mizo languages Dai; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	dao
Glottolog	daai1236[2]

Daai (Daai Chin), which borders the Mün and Ütbü language groups, is a Kuki-Chin-Mizo language of Burma. It is spoken in 142 villages in Kanpetlet, Matupi, Mindat, and Paletwa townships in Chin State, Burma (Ethnologue).

Dialects

Ethnologue lists the following dialects of Dai Chin.

Ngxang
Nghngilo (Yang)
Ma-Tu
Shiip
Duk-Mcang
Kheng
Mkui

Phonology

Consonants

Daai has twenty-four consonant phonemes.

	Bilabial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasals	m̥ m	n̥ n		ŋ̊ ŋ
Plosives	p pʰ b	t tʰ d		k kʰ	ʔ
Fricatives		s sʰ		x ɣ	h
Lateral Fricatives		ɬ
Approximants	w	l	j

Vowels

Daai has seven vowel phonemes, each with a phonemic length contrast.

	Front	Central	Back
	Front	Central	Unrounded	Rounded
High	i iː		ɯ ɯː	u uː
Mid	ɛ ɛː	ə əː		ɔ ɔː
Low		a aː

Grammar

Daai is an isolating or analytic language. There is no inflectional morphology at the word level; case, number, and tense are marked by clitics.

Examples

Daai	English
mthan	night
mpyong	mouth
kpyak	to destroy
pha	to arrive
Nghngaai-ktheih hmin lokti.	The mango fruits became ripe.
Mat jah mata i:ma am ngleh-ei ni.	They did not visit each other's houses.

gollark: I mean, school is expensive, computers are... £200 or so for a very basic one?

gollark: Replying to https://discord.com/channels/346530916832903169/348702212110680064/747839510280405092This is somewhat bad. Although I imagine sending people computers would be cheaper than running school.

gollark: Okay, that might not be the reason.

gollark: Boris Johnson is insisting that it's critically vital and important that everyone go to school as normal, because he is an incompetent apioid.

gollark: Yes. It was (is, I guess, I don't have school yet) so horrible being able to get up at reasonable times, work in a pleasant environment, and not have to commute.

References

Dai at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Daai Chin". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.

Naing Kheng. 2017. A phonological description of the Mkuui variety of Dai Chin. Master’s Thesis.
Helga So-Hartmann. 2009. A Descriptive Grammar of Daai Chin. The Regents University of California.

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[e18-1] Dai at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)

[Glottolog-2] Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Daai Chin". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.