Zotung (Zobya) is a language spoken by the
Zotung people
Zotung people are one of the ethnic groups in Chin State in Myanmar also known as Burma. It is located in central and southern Chin State. Zotunges are a very distinct ethnic people in Burma. It is very difficult to get historical records of these ...
, in
Rezua
Rezua ( my, ရေဇွာ; also spelt Razua) is a town located in Matupi District of Chin State, Myanmar (Burma). The name Rezua comes from the name Razawh after the (Rezua Bawi) chief of Rezua clan moved their village from Arphaephu Chia to the ...
Township,
Chin State
Chin State (, ) is a state in western Myanmar. The Chin State is bordered by Sagaing Division and Magway Division to the east, Rakhine State to the south, Bangladesh to the south-west, and the Indian states of Mizoram to the west and Manipur t ...
,
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 a
continuum
Continuum may refer to:
* Continuum (measurement), theories or models that explain gradual transitions from one condition to another without abrupt changes
Mathematics
* Continuum (set theory), the real line or the corresponding cardinal number ...
of closely related
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 Linguistics, linguistic phenomena:
One usage refers to a variety (linguisti ...
s and
accents Accent may refer to:
Speech and language
* Accent (sociolinguistics), way of pronunciation particular to a speaker or group of speakers
* Accent (phonetics), prominence given to a particular syllable in a word, or a word in a phrase
** Pitch acce ...
. The language does not have a standard written form since it has dialects with multiple variations on its pronunciations. Instead, Zotung speakers use a widely accepted alphabet for writing with which they spell using their respective dialect. However, formal documents are written using the Lungngo dialect because it was the tongue of the first person to prescribe a standard writing, Sir Siabawi Khuamin.
Phonology
Zoccaw or Zo alphabet
:Aa AWaw Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Yy Zz
Vowels
A AW E I O U Y
-a /a/~ weak form /ɔː/~/aʊː/
-aw /ɔː/~/auː/
-e /eː/~/ɛ/~ weak form /œ/
-i /iː/ weak form /ɨ/
-o /o/~/oʊː/~ weak form /ə/
-u /uː/~ weak form /ʊ/
-y /ɪ/~/ɨː/~/ʏː/
Diphthongs and triphthongs:
-ae /æ/~/ɛː/
-ai /aiː/~ weak form /æ/
-au /aʊː/~weak form /oʊ/
-awi /ɔiː/~/oɪ/~/ʏi/
-awe /ʊeː/~/øː/~/œː/
-ei /eɪ/~/e/~/eiː/
-eu /eʊː/~ weak form /œ/
-ia /iːɑ/~/iɑ/~ weak forms /ja/~/jɛ/
-oi /ɔiː/~/oiː/~/ʏː/
-ou /ə/~/œː/~/ʌː/
-ua /uaː/~weak forms /ʋa/~/uə/
-ue /ueː/~/ʋe/
-ui /uiː/~/iː/~/ʏː/
Etymologically, the long vowel counterparts of /aː/, /eː/, /iː/, /oː/, /ɔː/, and /uː/ have mutated or shifted towards several new vowels. Zotung vowels such as /æː/, /ɔː/, /aʊː/, /ɛiː/ and /œː/ correspond to a single vowel /aː/ or /ɒː/ in more conservative Kuki-Chin languages. For instance, where Mizo and Laizo have mál /ˈmaːl./, râlkap /ˈraːlkap/, nâsa /ˈnaːʂaː/, pakhat /paˈkʰaːt/, and sazûk /saˈzuːk/, the correspondents in Zotung would be mæl /ˈmæːl/, rolkaw /ˈrɔːlko/, náwsaw /ˈnaʊːʂɔ/, can-kheit /ˈθaːn χɛiːt./, and sazúk /sœˈzuːk/
Consonants
B, C*, D, F, G, H*, J, K, L, M, N, P, R, S*, T*, V, Z*
''C'' before ''a, aw, o, u,'' and ''y'' is pronounced like a dental fricative /θ/~/ð/. ''C'' and ''s'' are palatalized before ''e'' and ''i'' resulting in words like ''ciate'' /ˈtsʲaːte/ and ''seryn'' (ʃɛˈɾœn). ''H'' is not pronounced in some dialects in certain words, for example: mango ''thæhai'' /tʲæˈʔæː/. ''T'' is rhotacized in some dialects that results in words like ''khate'' /ˈkʰatɛ/ and ''tukiaccu'' /tˠuˈkʲeðu/ being pronounced /kʰaˈɾɛ/ and /təˈkeirʊ/. ''Z'' has a very wide pronunciation range. It can be pronounced like the voiced fricative /ʒ/ /z/ /j/ or the English /dʒ/''.''
Digraphs: ''ch, kh, ph, hr, rh, th''
''Ch-'' is seldom used in native words other than family or clan names. ''Ch-'' evolved from the palatalized soft ''t'' that preceded the vowels ''e'' and ''i''. For example, ''chihno'' “death” was originally ''thihna'' or ''thihnak. Kh-'' in formal speech is a palatalized ''k'' sound. However, it is pronounced as /x/~/χ/ in informal speech. ''Hr-'' is a rare digraph representing /r̥/. It has evolved into /ɦ/ or /ʀ/ in some dialects. ''Rh-'' is not used in the vernacular writing.
Zotung is rich with consonant clusters that have etymologically remained the same, but they are written with schwas or other vowels to make a disyllable.
They are found in native words such as ''tynkrin (firmly), cintling, ablyn (all), sparo'' as well as in loan words like ''Biathlam (Revalation), Kris (Christ), naiklab (nightclub), Griekram (Greece) and Bethlem (Bethlehem).''
Consonants
Zotung has the following consonants, with the first symbol being its orthographical form and the second one its representation in the
IPA
IPA commonly refers to:
* India pale ale, a style of beer
* International Phonetic Alphabet, a system of phonetic notation
* Isopropyl alcohol, a chemical compound
IPA may also refer to:
Organizations International
* Insolvency Practitioners ...
:
[Weidert, Alfons, ''Component Analysis of Lushai Phonology'', Amsterdam Studies in the Theory and History of Linguistic Science, Series IV – Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, volume 2, Amsterdam: John Benjamins B.V., 1975.]
# The glottal and glottalised consonants appear only in final position.
Distribution
In 2009 VanBik lists the following Zotung villages: Aikap, Lotaw, Lovaw, Ccangho, Pangva, Ramcci, Sihanthung, Zawngnak, Angraw, Polei, Vuakkhipaw, Lavoikum, Darcung, Khawboi, Setlai, Lungkhin, Leipi, Calthawng, Langly, Sensi, Khawtua, Tuinia, Rovaw, Rezua, Ccawtui, Ransae, Etang, Thandya, Tuibyn, Hrinthang, Siangaw, Lungthlialia, Thawlang, Hunglei, Raso, Tuilaw, Tingsi, Zesaw, Thesi, Lungring, Sungpi, Votui, Kailung, Belae, Lungngo, Sempi, Tuphae, Lungdua, Suiton, Daidin, Din, Voiru, Narbung.
[VanBik, Kenneth. 2009. ''Proto-Kuki-Chin: A Reconstructed Ancestor of the Kuki-Chin Languages''. STEDT Monograph 8. .]
In 2017 there were 55 villages in 61 locations:
4 villages in
Gangaw township
Gangaw Township is a township of Gangaw District in the Magway Division of Myanmar. The principal town is Gangaw
Gangaw ( my, ဂန့်ဂေါမြို့, ) is a town of Gangaw Township in Gangaw District in the Magway Division in M ...
,
Magway Region
Magway Region ( my, မကွေးတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; formerly Magway Division) is an administrative divisions of Myanmar, administrative division in central Myanmar. It is the second largest of Myanmar's seven divisions, ...
;
3 villages in
Hakha township
Hakha Township ( my, ဟားခါးမြို့နယ်) is a township of Hakha District in the Chin State of Burma. It surrounds the city of Hakha, the state capital. It became part of Falam District until Hakha District was formed by the ...
,
Chin State
Chin State (, ) is a state in western Myanmar. The Chin State is bordered by Sagaing Division and Magway Division to the east, Rakhine State to the south, Bangladesh to the south-west, and the Indian states of Mizoram to the west and Manipur t ...
;
1 village in
Thantlang township
Thantlang Township ( my, ထန်တလန်မြို့နယ်) is one of the nine townships in Chin State. Thantlang is the administrative town of inclusive nine circles (also called mountain ranges) attributed to the geographical and dial ...
, Chin State;
1 village in
Mindat township
Mindat Township ( my, မင်းတပ်မြို့နယ်) is a township located in Mindat District in the Chin State of Myanmar. The township is located between latitude 21.19 and 21.47, longitude 93.23 and 94.29. The third highest pe ...
, Chin State;
46 villages in
Matupi township
Matupi Township ( my, မတူပီမြို့နယ်; also Madupi Township) is a township of Matupi District in the Chin State of Burma (Myanmar). , Chin State.
Lost Zotung villages:
Lawngko, nearby (very close with) Kailung;
Tuitaw, between Lotaw and Lungngo;
Tongbu, moved into
Mara land and became Mara.
Grammar
Zotung grammar (Zotung: byazeirnázia) is the study of the
morphology
Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to:
Disciplines
* Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts
* Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies ...
and
syntax
In linguistics, syntax () is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences. Central concerns of syntax include word order, grammatical relations, hierarchical sentence structure ( constituency) ...
of Zotung, a
Kuki-Chin language
The Kuki-Chin languages (also called Kuki-Chin-Mizo, Kukish or South-Central Tibeto-Burman languages) are a branch of 50 or so Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in northeastern India, western Myanmar and southeastern Bangladesh. Most speakers of the ...
spoken in the
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
and
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...
. Zotung is an
agglutinative
In linguistics, agglutination is a morphological process in which words are formed by stringing together morphemes, each of which corresponds to a single syntactic feature. Languages that use agglutination widely are called agglutinative langu ...
language with some elements of
fusionality. It is becoming more
innovative
Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a new or changed entity ...
in that fusional elements have increased. Its
synthetic nature allows for free
word order
In linguistics, word order (also known as linear order) is the order of the syntactic constituents of a language. Word order typology studies it from a cross-linguistic perspective, and examines how different languages employ different orders. C ...
, although the dominant arrangement is
subject-object-verb (SOV). There are definite
articles
Article often refers to:
* Article (grammar), a grammatical element used to indicate definiteness or indefiniteness
* Article (publishing), a piece of nonfictional prose that is an independent part of a publication
Article may also refer to:
G ...
and a morphological indefinite article depending on the source.
Subject pronoun
In linguistics, a subject pronoun is a personal pronoun that is used as the subject of a verb. Subject pronouns are usually in the nominative case for languages with a nominative–accusative alignment pattern. On the other hand, a language with ...
s and
object pronoun
In linguistics, an object pronoun is a personal pronoun that is used typically as a grammatical object: the direct or indirect object of a verb, or the object of a preposition. Object pronouns contrast with subject pronouns. Object pronouns in Eng ...
s are often dropped due to its
polypersonal agreement
In linguistics, polypersonal agreement or polypersonalism is the agreement of a verb with more than one of its arguments (usually up to four). Polypersonalism is a morphological feature of a language, and languages that display it are called pol ...
s found in the plural conjugation of verbs.
Syntax
The primary word order is
SOV however, almost all nouns undergo
declension
In linguistics, declension (verb: ''to decline'') is the changing of the form of a word, generally to express its syntactic function in the sentence, by way of some inflection. Declensions may apply to nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and ar ...
resulting in a fairly free word order. One can say “Kae beikinnka hlaw kasak” literally “I in church song I sing”. But it can also be said as “Kae kasak hlaw beikinnka” literally “I sing song in church” without losing its original meaning. Sentences in Zotung can be formed in many different constructions, the most common being
dative construction
The dative construction is a grammatical way of constructing a sentence, using the dative case. A sentence is also said to be in dative construction if the subject and the object (direct or indirect) can switch their places for a given verb, wit ...
s. This construction uses the dative case of nominals and pronominals. Dative constructions can occur with almost all verbs. An example is giving below:
:''Kae θu kakía/Kae kakía nynn'' ("I am cold")
:''Ynkía'' (literally means, "cold is to/on me")
The first example implicates that the speaker has a cold personality or a body that is cold all around, rather than feeling physically cold. The subject on the first sentence is in the nominative case. The second sentence uses a dative polypersonal conjugation without the transient copula verb ''thuavo''. This construction is always used to mean one feels physically. It is still a productive construction that can be used with almost all verbs. Its use is a bit different in set proverbs like ''namo nih kezym'' ("I trust in you", lit. "to you I have my belief").
Nouns
Gender
Some nouns have
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
; however, nouns with gender are usually sex specific nouns such as animals or natural landscapes like hills, caves or species of organisms. Most of these nouns have endings like ''-nung, -pi,'' ''-paw, -ly'' that tell if they are feminine or masculine such as ''Luikunung'' (Name of a hill), ''Saepaw'' (Elephant), ''Sapi'' (Female offspring of an animal). Agreement in gender for adjectives can be observed such as with the neuter adjective ahoy. It has two other forms namely, masculine and common gender ''hoivo'' and feminine ''hoino''. The initial a- indicates the common or neuter gender and -p- and -n- indicate masculine and feminine gender. Animacy and inanimacy are distinguished in the various usages of certain pronouns. The third person accusative ''amo'' cannot be used with inanimate nouns so therefore the pronoun is dropped and the clitic a- conjugation is used for both the nominative and accusative cases. This is also true to some extent for the second person personal pronouns. The animate determiner pronoun ''hom''- cannot be used for inanimate nouns. ''Pawmou, ymmo'' and ''vavoma'' are used with inanimate nouns instead.
Initial a-
The initial a- is found in some nouns: ''arak'' (ale), ''amyn'' (scent), ''arran'' (branch), ''askare'' (wing). It is used on a very limited number of nouns that are inanimate and cannot stand alone without the prefix. When it is used with a noun that can stand alone, it denotes the genitive case and shows belonging of the object to a person as in ''arru'' (its bone), ''amitàe'' (its eyes), ''alemæ'' (its tail). The prefix can also be used to show definiteness in a very limited amount of nouns as in:
The prefix is also used to form the adjectival form of verbs as in below
Athín leitetu umkukholeilango
It is also used with verbs to form the adjectival form:
* khyapaw (to be bitter), akhak (bitter)
* niapaw (to be oily), anian (oily)
* thoupo (to be fatty), athau (fat/fatty)
Vowel harmony
To some extent, Zotung uses
vowel harmony
In phonology, vowel harmony is an Assimilation (linguistics), assimilatory process in which the vowels of a given domain – typically a phonological word – have to be members of the same natural class (thus "in harmony"). Vowel harmony is t ...
when endings are attached to words. An example is one of the most common ending in the language ''-traw,'' a diminutive/comparative ending. When a word with closed and/or mid vowel uses the ending ''-traw,'' it changes to ''-tri'' as in ''imonuntro (''newborn girl'')'' and ''syntri (''a little while'').'' Some limited amount of nouns with a closed vowel change to a more open vowel. An example is the word for ape ''zawngpo/ zongpaw'' which changes to ''zuapo/zuapaw'' in some dialects retaining the difference. Another example is ''vo/vaw'' meaning a stream. When the augmentative ending ''-pii'' is added, the root changes to ''va'' resulting in ''vapii'', river.
Verbs
Zotung verbs are heavily
inflected
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defini ...
and are highly irregular with many exceptions. They consist of a
stem
Stem or STEM may refer to:
Plant structures
* Plant stem, a plant's aboveground axis, made of vascular tissue, off which leaves and flowers hang
* Stipe (botany), a stalk to support some other structure
* Stipe (mycology), the stem of a mushro ...
or base and various
conjugation
Conjugation or conjugate may refer to:
Linguistics
* Grammatical conjugation, the modification of a verb from its basic form
* Emotive conjugation or Russell's conjugation, the use of loaded language
Mathematics
* Complex conjugation, the chang ...
endings indicating
person
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, ...
,
tense,
aspect
Aspect or Aspects may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Aspect magazine'', a biannual DVD magazine showcasing new media art
* Aspect Co., a Japanese video game company
* Aspects (band), a hip hop group from Bristol, England
* ''Aspects'' (Benny Carter ...
,
mood, and more. One way for fusional inflection in verbs is through a process known as
stem alternation (Zotung: Rulenná). Each verb has at least two stems, formally named stem I, stem II, and so on. Each stem differs from each other by
apophony
In linguistics, apophony (also known as ablaut, (vowel) gradation, (vowel) mutation, alternation, internal modification, stem modification, stem alternation, replacive morphology, stem mutation, internal inflection etc.) is any alternation wit ...
, their
vowel length
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, f ...
, consonant
voicing or devoicing, adding a consonant or entirely changing the lexicon. Since there has not been extensive research done in Zotung, verbs have yet to be grouped into conjugation classes.
Stem alternation
Like the other Kuki-Chin languages, Zotung utilizes
apophony
In linguistics, apophony (also known as ablaut, (vowel) gradation, (vowel) mutation, alternation, internal modification, stem modification, stem alternation, replacive morphology, stem mutation, internal inflection etc.) is any alternation wit ...
as a
grammatical inflection
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defini ...
. It is used for various purposes such as noun v. verb distinction,
grammatical mood
In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used for signaling modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying (for example, a statement of ...
s etc. The most common type of apophony is the Kuki-Chin specific vowel stem alternation where the stem vowel of a verb changes to inflect its mode. These alternations are grouped into Form I, Form II, Form III and so on. However, there is not a universally accepted way of categorizing them. An example of vowel stem alternation is given below for the verbs ''niapaw'', to drink, ''chiapo'', to kill, ''bepo'', to greet.
An example of a clause using Forms I, II, and III is given below for the verb ''niapaw'', to drink.
Form I: ''Arak na
nialanze, nah lubok yngaeseici.'' If you keep drinking ale, your brain shall rot.
Form II: ''Arakkha na
nevelan khy.'' You shall not be drinking ale anymore.
Form III: ''Arakkho na
neklei khy em?'' You have not drunken any ale,
ight
Negation
Negation usually follows the verb. There are many words to denote negation, the most common being ''lei, khy, nan,'' and ''lou''. ''Lei'' is an auxiliary adverb that is commonly used as a compound negator, similar to the French ''pas''. ''Khy'' is a simple negator used in declarative sentences such as ''khocci khy'' meaning “it is not cold”. ''Nan'' is used as an imperative negator such as in ''innlae pae nan'' meaning “do not go out”. ''Lou'' is used as an auxiliary as in ''khuara lou khy'' meaning “It has not rain”. Additionally, some determiner pronouns in the Lungngo and Calthawng dialects have a negative form leading to some instances of double negation. An example is the word for what, in its lemma form is ''pawmou'' in the standard language, ''ymmo'' in the northern dialects, and ''vavoma'' in the Rezua dialect, in their negative forms ''pawmak'' and ''ymma'' while it isn’t present in Rezua Zotung. This is due to a series of vowel mergers and simplification of grammar in regions with more trade and contact.
Noun derivation
There are many endings attached to words to convey a slightly modified meaning. They may also be realized as grammatical cases. The most common are -no, -zia, -po and -tu. “-no” is used to nominalize verbs while “-zia” is for adjectives and occasionally nouns. “-po” could be a masculine ending or an infinitive ending. When -po is an infinitive ending, the word is stressed at the last syllable. “-tu” is used to modify verbs to become a noun in the accusative case. For example,
* riapo(v. to read) – rianaw (n. reading as in scripture)
* hmuipo (v. to see) – muihnaw (n. sight, vision)
* sei (v. to sin) – seino (n. sin)
* umtu (n. an attitude) - umtuzia (n. desired attitudes)
* phuapo/phan (v. to compose) - phuatu/phantu (n. composer)
Cases
All nouns in Zotung inflect for cases. They can be inflected for the nominative, accusative, instrumental, dative, genitive, vocative, and various forms of the locative such as the inessive, intrative, adessive. The nominative case differs from dialect to dialect based on vowel harmony of the dialect’s differing vowels. Most nouns’ unmarked, lemma form are in the accusative form. The accusative can be further divided into a separate case depending on if the definite article -''kha'' is counted as a case suffix, the definite accusative. The instrumental case can also be used to show the extent of a period of time. It is inflected for in some prepositions and postpositions such as ''ciate'' (extent of time), ''ryte'' (with), ''liare'' (by). The dative has become more common and is taking over the role of the locative in younger speech. The genitive is not required when a noun acts as an adjective, but it still is sometimes used even in the adjectival form.
An example of the cases in use is:
Some case endings of proper nouns and common nouns are differentiated especially in the dative and locative cases. In the dative case, proper nouns take the ''-lan'' or ''-lam'' suffix and change according to the rules of vowel gradation. For example, the village name Thesi would become Thesilam for its dative case while Siangaw would become Siangalan.
Additionally, there are other inconsistencies in how nouns are inflected. These mismatches could be further grouped into noun classes, if Zotung has any. For instance, nouns ending in ''-á, -aw'', or -''o'' have an irregular declension.
Some nominals have no separate ending in the nominative and dative cases. This group is mostly made up of nouns ending in -''am'' and -''an.''
Agreement
There are two prominent numbers in Zotung, singular and plural. Each of the cases have a somewhat specific plural suffix. The usual plural suffixes for the accusative in colloquial dialects are ''-ae'', ''-hae, -e,'' and ''-æ.'' The matter of which to use depends on the previous consonant, stem vowel and speaker’s preference. Most adjectives that describe a noun are also required to agree in number, and occasionally gender and case. Therefore, in the phrase below where the word meaning royalties, ''boinungeklan,'' is a feminine noun in the dative plural case, the adjective ''amoivaw'' must also be in the feminine dative plural:
amoinune boinungeklan = to the beautiful princesses
While agreement in gender for masculine, common and neuter nouns are optional, agreement in the feminine is explicitly required.
Some nouns are naturally plural so they do not require the regular plural suffixes. Such nouns are: ''zapii'' (crowd of people), ''mipi'' (people), ''ablyn'' (all that are present), ''loramsa'' (farm animals) etc.
Question clauses
Questions are formed with both intonation and particles. Intonation varies from dialect to dialect and person to person. Question particles also vary from dialect to dialect. The formal standard language based on the Lungngo dialect uses the question particles ''i, ho, khawp, tou,'' and ''mou.'' The particles ''tou'' and ''mou'' have different forms in different contexts. ''Tou'' is derived from ''ta'' but ''tou'' has become more dominant and ''ta'' has become a form of ''tou''. In all, ''tou'' has four forms: ''tou, ta, tawh,'' and ''tan''. It is used in yes/no questions. ''Mou'' is derived from ''mah,'' similar to the case with ''tou''. ''Mou'' also has four forms: ''mou, mah, maw, man''. It is used in simple questions together with the noun like in Pawciku''mou'' nah hminkha? (What is (question particle) your name)
Pronouns
In Zotung, there are separate pronouns for the nominative, accusative, dative and genitive cases that do not reflect the usual declension found in nouns. Examples in the nominative and dative are given below:
Pronouns in the dative are marked for both the subject and direct object, also known as polypersonalism. The proclitics are used with different conjugations to achieve clarity.
Conjugation
All verbs in Zotung have two or more forms. The different forms are used for different moods and the amount that is completing the action. Most verbs are only inflected in the plural. Dual number is only realized when the verb is conjugated since there are not separate dual pronouns. Some verbs that are inflected in the singular change stress. However, they aren’t shown in the orthography. An example of a regular verb conjugation in the indicative mood is given below.
Tense and aspect
Tense in Zotung is similar to other
Kuki-Chin
The Kuki-Chin languages (also called Kuki-Chin-Mizo, Kukish or South-Central Tibeto-Burman languages) are a branch of 50 or so Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in northeastern India, western Myanmar and southeastern Bangladesh. Most speakers of the ...
languages. Verbs are inflected for in the past and future tenses. The present tense is usually either in the lemma (not infinitive) form or are used with auxiliary verbs and time descriptive words. The continuous present tense can also be shown by suffixing. Regular verbs are inflected like the following:
Verbs in Zotung have around two to three infinitives and two gerunds that can be inflected for aspect and voice. The first infinitive is the one found in dictionary entries. It is formed using the stem II form of verbs plus the endings ''-o, -aw,'' or ''-á.'' This infinitive form is present in all dialects where the gerund form is used synonymously to the English -ing gerund. The second infinitive is also formed using the stem II form plus the ending -''an''. It can also function as a gerund and is used almost synonymously to the English to-infinitive. However, its use has been diminishing in northern dialects where it is being replaced with the future form of verbs. In dialects where both the future form and second infinitive are used, the future form is created using the stem I form plus the variable endings -''no'' or -''go''. The third infinitive is formed using stem I forms of verbs with the ending -''an''. It is synonymous to the English bare infinitive.
References
*Shintani Tadahiko. 2015. ''The Zotung language''. Linguistic survey of Tay cultural area (LSTCA) no. 105. Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa (ILCAA).
{{Languages of Burma
Kuki-Chin languages
Languages of Myanmar