Jarai (; vi, Cho-Rai, , , , , , or ; km, ចារ៉ាយ, ) is a
Malayo-Polynesian
The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages, with approximately 385.5 million speakers. The Malayo-Polynesian languages are spoken by the Austronesian peoples outside of Taiwan, in the island nations of Southeas ...
language spoken by the
Jarai people
Jarai people or Jarais ( vi, Người Gia Rai, , or ; km, ចារ៉ាយ, ) are an ethnic group in Vietnam's Central Highlands ( Gia Lai and Kon Tum Provinces, with smaller populations in Đắk Lắk Province), as well as in the Cambodian ...
of
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
and
Cambodia
Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailan ...
. The speakers of Jarai number approximately ,
[ not including other possible Jarai communities in countries other than Vietnam and Cambodia such as United States of America. They are the largest of the upland ethnic groups of Vietnam's Central Highlands known as ]Degar
Montagnard () is an umbrella term for the various indigenous peoples of the Central Highlands of Vietnam. The French term () signifies a mountain dweller, and is a carryover from the French colonial period in Vietnam. In Vietnamese, they a ...
or Montagnards, and 25 per cent of the population in the Cambodian province of Ratanakiri.
The language is in the Chamic
The Chamic languages, also known as Aceh–Chamic and Achinese–Chamic, are a group of ten languages spoken in Aceh (Sumatra, Indonesia) and in parts of Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Hainan, China. The Chamic languages are a subgroup of Malay ...
subgroup of the Malayo-Polynesian languages, and is thus related to the Cham language
Cham (Cham: ꨌꩌ) is a Malayo-Polynesian languages, Malayo-Polynesian language of the Austronesian languages, Austronesian family, spoken by the Cham people, Chams of Southeast Asia. It is spoken primarily in the territory of the former Kingdo ...
of central Vietnam.
A number of Jarai also live in the United States, having resettled there following the Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...
.
Classification
The Jarai language belongs to Chamic
The Chamic languages, also known as Aceh–Chamic and Achinese–Chamic, are a group of ten languages spoken in Aceh (Sumatra, Indonesia) and in parts of Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Hainan, China. The Chamic languages are a subgroup of Malay ...
branch of the Malayo-Polynesian languages
The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages, with approximately 385.5 million speakers. The Malayo-Polynesian languages are spoken by the Austronesian peoples outside of Taiwan, in the island nations of Southeas ...
. Although often classified as a Mon-Khmer language
The Austroasiatic languages , , are a large language family in Mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. These languages are scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China and are t ...
until the 20th century, the affiliation of Jarai to the Chamic sister languages Cham
Cham or CHAM may refer to:
Ethnicities and languages
*Chams, people in Vietnam and Cambodia
**Cham language, the language of the Cham people
***Cham script
*** Cham (Unicode block), a block of Unicode characters of the Cham script
*Cham Albania ...
and Rade Rade may refer to:
* E De people, a people group in Southeast Asia also called "Rhade" or "Rade"
* places in Lower-Saxony, Germany:
** Rade, Neu Wulmstorf, a village in the district of Harburg
* places in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany:
** Rade, Stei ...
, and a wider connection to Malay
Malay may refer to:
Languages
* Malay language or Bahasa Melayu, a major Austronesian language spoken in Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore
** History of the Malay language, the Malay language from the 4th to the 14th century
** Indonesi ...
was already recognized as early as 1864.
Geographic distribution and dialects
Jarai is spoken by some 262,800 people in Cambodia and Vietnam (Simons, 2017) where it is recognized as an official minority language, although in Cambodia it has not its own writing in the Khmer scripts. Additionally there are some hundreds of Jarai speakers in United States from the Jarai refugees settled in that country after the Vietnamese War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
. Jarai dialects can be mutually unintelligible. Đào Huy Quyền (1998)[Đào Huy Quyền (1998). ''Nhạc khí dân tộc Jrai và Bahnar usical instruments of the Jrai and Bahnar'. Hanoi: Nhà xuất bản trẻ.] lists the following subgroups of Jarai dialect
The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena:
One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...
s and their respective locations.
*Jarai Pleiku
Pleiku is a city in central Vietnam, located in the Central Highlands region. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province. Many years ago, it was inhabited primarily by the Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups, sometimes known as the Montagnards or De ...
: in the Pleiku
Pleiku is a city in central Vietnam, located in the Central Highlands region. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province. Many years ago, it was inhabited primarily by the Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups, sometimes known as the Montagnards or De ...
area.
*Jarai Cheoreo: in AJunPa (Phú Bổn).
*Jarai ARáp: in northwestern Pleiku
Pleiku is a city in central Vietnam, located in the Central Highlands region. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province. Many years ago, it was inhabited primarily by the Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups, sometimes known as the Montagnards or De ...
, southwestern Kon Tum
Kon Tum is the capital city of Kon Tum Province in Vietnam. It is located inland in the Central Highlands region of Vietnam, near the borders of Laos and Cambodia.
History
After the People's Army of Vietnam invaded South Vietnam on March 30, 1 ...
.
*Jarai H’dRung: in northeastern Pleiku
Pleiku is a city in central Vietnam, located in the Central Highlands region. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province. Many years ago, it was inhabited primarily by the Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups, sometimes known as the Montagnards or De ...
, southeastern Kon Tum
Kon Tum is the capital city of Kon Tum Province in Vietnam. It is located inland in the Central Highlands region of Vietnam, near the borders of Laos and Cambodia.
History
After the People's Army of Vietnam invaded South Vietnam on March 30, 1 ...
.
*Jarai Tbuan: western Pleiku
Pleiku is a city in central Vietnam, located in the Central Highlands region. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province. Many years ago, it was inhabited primarily by the Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups, sometimes known as the Montagnards or De ...
.
Other related groups include:
*HRoi: in western Phú Yên, southern Bình Định. Mixed Ede and Jarai people.
*M’dhur: in southern Phú Yên. Mixed Ede and Jarai people.
* Hàlang: in southwestern Kon Tum
Kon Tum is the capital city of Kon Tum Province in Vietnam. It is located inland in the Central Highlands region of Vietnam, near the borders of Laos and Cambodia.
History
After the People's Army of Vietnam invaded South Vietnam on March 30, 1 ...
, and some in Laos and Cambodia. Mixed Sedang and Jarai people.
Phonology
Influenced by the surrounding Mon–Khmer languages
The Austroasiatic languages , , are a large language family in Mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. These languages are scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China and are t ...
, words of the various Chamic languages of Southeast Asia, including Jarai, have become disyllabic with the stress
Stress may refer to:
Science and medicine
* Stress (biology), an organism's response to a stressor such as an environmental condition
* Stress (linguistics), relative emphasis or prominence given to a syllable in a word, or to a word in a phrase ...
on the second syllable. Additionally, Jarai has further evolved in the pattern of Mon–Khmer, losing almost all vowel distinction in the initial minor syllable
Primarily in Austroasiatic languages (also known as Mon–Khmer), in a typical word a minor syllable is a reduced (minor) syllable followed by a full tonic or stressed syllable. The minor syllable may be of the form or , with a reduced vowel, as i ...
. While trisyllabic words do exist, they are all loanwords. The typical Jarai word may be represented:
:(C)(V)-C(C)V(V)(C)
where the values in parentheses are optional and "(C)" in the cluster "C(C)" represents a liquid consonant
In phonetics, liquids are a class of consonants consisting of voiced lateral approximants like together with rhotics like .
Etymology
The grammarian Dionysius Thrax used the Ancient Greek word (, ) to describe the sonorant consonants () of cl ...
, or a semivowel
In phonetics and phonology, a semivowel, glide or semiconsonant is a sound that is phonetically similar to a vowel sound but functions as the syllable boundary, rather than as the nucleus of a syllable. Examples of semivowels in English are the c ...
, . In Jarai dialects spoken in Cambodia, the "(C)" in the cluster "C(C)" can also be the voiced velar fricative
The voiced velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound that is used in various spoken languages. It is not found in Modern English but existed in Old English. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , ...
, a phoneme used by the Jarai in Cambodia, but not attested in Vietnam. The vowel of the first syllable in disyllabic words is most often the mid-central unrounded vowel, , unless the initial consonant is the glottal stop . The second vowel of the stressed syllable produces a diphthong.
Alphabet
During the French Indochina
French Indochina (previously spelled as French Indo-China),; vi, Đông Dương thuộc Pháp, , lit. 'East Ocean under French Control; km, ឥណ្ឌូចិនបារាំង, ; th, อินโดจีนฝรั่งเศส, ...
, they introduced a Jarai alphabet using the Vietnamese alphabet
The Vietnamese alphabet ( vi, chữ Quốc ngữ, lit=script of the National language) is the modern Latin writing script or writing system for Vietnamese. It uses the Latin script based on Romance languages originally developed by Portuguese m ...
at the beginning of the 20th century. With the introduction of the Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...
in Jarai language, using that alphabet by Christian missionaries in Vietnam after the Vietnamese War, the Jarai increased their literacy and there are today many publications for the Vietnamese Jarai. There are 40 letters
Letter, letters, or literature may refer to:
Characters typeface
* Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet.
* Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...
- 21 consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wi ...
s + 19 vowel
A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...
s / 34 phoneme
In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language.
For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-wes ...
s - 9 vowel phonemes + 25 consonant phonemes.
Vowels
There are 9 vowels:[Jensen (2013)]
Consonants
There are 24 consonants:
The implosives have also been described as preglottalized stops, but Jensen (2013) describes that the closure of glottis and oral cavity occur simultaneously.
References
Further reading
* Jensen, Joshua M. (2013). ''The Structure of Jarai Clauses and Noun Phrases''. PhD dissertation, University of Texas at Arlington.
* Lafont, Pierre-Bernard & Nguyễn Văn Trọng (1968). ''Lexique jarai, français, viêtnamien, parler de la province de Plei Ku''. Publications de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient, v 63. Paris: École française d'Extrême-Orient.
* Pittman, R. S. (1957). ''Jarai as a member of the Malayo-Polynesian family of languages''. Fargo, N.D.: Summer Institute of Linguistics
SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) is an evangelical Christian non-profit organization whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to ex ...
, University of North Dakota.
* Reed, R. (1976). ''Jorai primer, guide and writing book''. Vietnam education microfiche series, no. VE55-01/08/04. Huntington Beach, Calif: Summer Institute of Linguistics
SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) is an evangelical Christian non-profit organization whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to ex ...
.
* Rơmah Dêl (1977). ''Từ Diển Việt - Gia Rai ietnamese - Jarai dictionary'. Hà Nội: Nhà xuất bản khoa học xã hội.
* Tong Nang, N. (1975). ''An outline of Jarai grammar''. Vietnam data microfiche series, no. VD55-01. Huntington Beach, Calif: Summer Institute of Linguistics
SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) is an evangelical Christian non-profit organization whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to ex ...
.
* Siu, Lap M. (2009).
Developing the First Preliminary Dictionary of North American Jarai
'. Master of Arts thesis in Anthropology, Texas Tech University
Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas. Established on , and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the main institution of the five-institution Texas Tech University Sy ...
.
External links
A Preliminary Jarai - English Online Dictionary
Preliminary research on Jarai phonology in Cambodia
Fairly comprehensive bibliography of Jarai language research
{{Austronesian languages
Chamic languages
Languages of Vietnam
Languages of Cambodia