The Mày language is an small Chuet language spoken in Minh Hóa district, Quảng Bình province,

Central Vietnam Central Vietnam ( vi, Trung Bộ or ), also known as Middle Vietnam or The Middle, formerly known as by South Vietnam, and Annam under French Indochina, is one of the three geographical regions within Vietnam. The name Trung Bộ was used by ...

by the May. It is a member of the Chuet languages, a Southeast

Vietic The Vietic languages are a branch of the Austroasiatic language family, spoken by the Vietic peoples in Laos and Vietnam. The branch was once referred to by the terms ''Việt–Mường'', ''Annamese–Muong'', and ''Vietnamuong''; the term '' ...

subgroup of the

Austroasiatic 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 ...

family. The basic word order of May is SVO. May lexicons are made up of unstressed components that give the language original Austroasiatic characteristics that could be described as sequisyllabic. The language’s singularities include the initiating existence of coda ''-ɽ'' that derived proto-Vietic *-s, which stands behind a consonant nucleus. Compared to dominantly ''-l/-h/-i̯'' of many other Vietic languages. Along with other distinctive features, May is considered a conservative Vietic language. The May language has not been properly studied and deconstructed. One problem with the language is that the May are willing to speak other languages rather than their own. With the expansion of the Vietnamese language as the national lingua franca of Vietnam and ignorance on indigenous languages, the impact of Vietnamese on May and globalization put the language in an essential endangered position. A syntax of May was cataloged by preeminent scholars Kirill Babaev and Irina Samarina in their 2018 Russian monograph, after the 2013 Russian–Vietnamese Linguistic Expedition to Quảng Bình with the help of Dr. Ta Van Thong and Dr. Le Van Truong, along with translation of databases made by Alexander Yefimov and

Paul Sidwell Paul James Sidwell is an Australian linguist based in Canberra, Australia who has held research and lecturing positions at the Australian National University. Sidwell, who is also an expert and consultant in forensic linguistics, is most nota ...

Notes

{{authority control Languages of Laos Vietic languages Languages of Vietnam Endangered Austroasiatic languages