Makyam Naga (Lasam, Macham Naga, Makyan, Pongnyun, Paung Nyuan) is a
Sino-Tibetan
Sino-Tibetan, also cited as Trans-Himalayan in a few sources, is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 billion native speakers of Chinese languages. ...
language spoken in
Burma
Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...
. It is closely related to other
Konyak languages
The Konyak languages, or alternatively the Konyakian or Northern Naga languages, is a branch of Sino-Tibetan languages spoken by various Naga peoples in southeastern Arunachal Pradesh and northeastern Nagaland states of northeastern India. They ...
.
Classification
Makyam belongs to the Khiamniungic subgroup within the
Konyak–Chang group of languages (Naw Sawu 2016:6). It is closely related to
Leinong than to
Khiamniungan.
*Khiamniungic
**''
Khiamniungan Naga''
**Leinong-Makyam
***''
Leinong Naga''
***''Makyam Naga''
Distribution
Makyam is spoken in 13 villages of northeast
Lahe Township
Lahe Township ( my, လဟယ်မြို့နယ်) is a township located within the Naga Self-Administered Zone of Sagaing Division, Myanmar. The principal town is Lahe.
Towns and villages
Languages
The following languages are spoken ...
and
Hkamti Township
Hkamti Township or Khamti Township ( my, ခန္တီးမြို့နယ်) is a township in Hkamti District in the Sagaing Region of Burma (Myanmar). ,
Sagaing Division
Sagaing Region ( my, စစ်ကိုင်းတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; formerly Sagaing Division) is an administrative region of Myanmar, located in the north-western part of the country between latitude 21° 30' north and lo ...
, Myanmar (''Ethnologue''). Main dialect variation is between the western Makyan villages and Kuku villages.
Makyam is spoken in the following 18 villages, which are located just to the east of Lahe town in
Lahe Township
Lahe Township ( my, လဟယ်မြို့နယ်) is a township located within the Naga Self-Administered Zone of Sagaing Division, Myanmar. The principal town is Lahe.
Towns and villages
Languages
The following languages are spoken ...
,
Sagaing Division
Sagaing Region ( my, စစ်ကိုင်းတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; formerly Sagaing Division) is an administrative region of Myanmar, located in the north-western part of the country between latitude 21° 30' north and lo ...
, Myanmar. They add up to a total of 1,026 households and 4,994 persons (Naw Sawu 2016:8). Old village names are given in parentheses.
*San Tong (Nouk Hai)
*Makyam (Ngaung Ke)
*Kha Lai (Khun Old Kha Lai)
*New Kha Lai (Pyan Kha Lai)
*Long Khin (Long Nouk)
*Lun Htaung
*Wutha (Zay Tam Nouk)
*Kuku Nokkon (Khaunouk Hai)
*Myang Kuku (Khaunouk Suam)
*Ahang Kuku
*Taw Law (New Wutha)
*Pin Htaung Lon Shout
*Lepandar
*Zi Phyu Kone, Kham Ti Township
*Sin Te
*Ma Kyam Kha
*Lahe
*Ma Kaw Rain
The majority of Makyam speakers can also speak
Leinong, as the two languages are spoken in the same area (Naw Sawu 2016:10).
References
Further reading
*Naw Sawu. 2016.
Descriptive Phonology of Makyam Naga'. M.A. dissertation. Chiang Mai: Payap University.
Sal languages
Languages of Myanmar
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