Tani languages


Tani, or Abor–Miri–Dafla ), is a branch of Sino-Tibetan languages spoken mostly in Arunachal Pradesh, India and neighboring regions.

Background

The Tani languages are spoken by about 600,000 people of Arunachal Pradesh, including the Adi, Apatani, Galo, Mising, Nyishi, Hill Miri, Tagin, and of the East Kameng, West Kameng, Papumpare, Lower Subansiri, Upper Subansiri, West Siang, East Siang, Upper Siang, Lower Dibang Valley and Lohit districts of Arunachal Pradesh and Dhemaji, North Lakhimpur, Sonitpur etc. districts of Assam. In Arunachal Pradesh alone the Tani-speaking area covers some 40,000 square kilometers, or roughly half the size of the state. Scattered Tani communities spill over the Sino-Indian border into adjacent areas in Mêdog, Mainling, and Lhünzê counties of Tibet, where together with the non-Tani Idu and Taraon they form the Lhoba nationality.

Classification

The Tani languages are conservatively classified as a distinct branch in Sino-Tibetan. Their closest relatives may be their eastern neighbors the Digaro languages, Taraon and Idu; this was first suggested by Sun, but a relationship has not yet been systematically demonstrated. Blench suggests that Tani has a Greater Siangic substratum, with the Greater Siangic languages being a non-Sino-Tibetan language family consisting of Idu-Taraon and Siangic languages.
Mark Post observes that Tani typologically fits into the Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area, which typically has creoloid morphosyntactic patterns, rather than with the languages of the Tibetosphere. Post also notes that Tani culture is similar to those of Mainland Southeast Asian hill tribe cultures, and is not particularly adapted to cold montane environments.
A provisional classification in Sun, who argued that Tani is a primary branch of Tibeto-Burman, is:
To Eastern Tani, van Driem adds the following possible languages:
Milang has traditionally been classified as a divergent Tani language, but in 2011 was tentatively reclassified as Siangic.
Proto-Tani was partially reconstructed by Sun. A large number of reconstructed roots have cognates in other Sino-Tibetan languages. However, a great deal of Proto-Tani vocabulary have no cognates within Sino-Tibetan, and most Tani grammar seems to be secondary, without cognates in grammatically conservative Sino-Tibetan languages such as Jingpho or the Kiranti languages. Post suggests that Apatani and Milang have non-Tani substrata, and that as early Tani languages had expanded deeper into Arunachal Pradesh, mixing with non-Tani languages occurred.
Mark Post proposes the following revised classification for the Tani languages.
Sun lists the following 25 lexical isoglosses between Western Tani and Eastern Tani.
GlossProto-Western TaniProto-Eastern Tani
urine*sum*si
blind*mik-čiŋ*mik-maŋ
mouth*gam*nap-paŋ
nose*ñV-pum*ñV-buŋ
wind *rji*sar
rain *mV-doŋ*pV-doŋ
thunder*doŋ-gum*doŋ-mɯr
lightning*doŋ-rjak*ja-ri
fish*ŋo-i*a-ŋo
tiger*paŋ-tə*mjo/mro
root*ma*pɯr
old man*mi-kam*mi-ǰiŋ
village*nam-pom*duŋ-luŋ
granary*nam-suŋ*kjum-suŋ
year*ñiŋ*tak
sell*pruk*ko
breath*sak*ŋa
ferry/cross*rap*koŋ
arrive*-ki*pɯŋ
say/speak*ban±man*lu
rich*mi-tə~mi-ta*mi-rem
soft*ñi-mjak*rə-mjak
drunk*kjum-
back *-kur*lat²
ten*čam*rjɯŋ