Apatani (Apa Tani, Tanw) is a Tani language, a branch of the

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. ...

languages, spoken in India.

Classification

Post & Kanno (2013) and Macario (2015)Macario, Florens. 2015. The genetic position of Apatani within Tibeto-Burman.
North East Indian Linguistics 7
', 213-233. Canberra, Australian National University: Asia-Pacific Linguistics Open Access. notes that Apatani has various words that do not reconstruct to Proto- Tani, pointing to a possible non-Tani substratum in Apatani. Macario (2015) lists the following divergent Apatani forms that do not reconstruct to Proto-Tani.

Geographical distribution

Lower Subansiri district Lower Subansiri district (Pron:/su:bənˈsɪɹi/) is one of the 25 administrative districts of the state of Arunachal Pradesh in northeastern India. History The district was formed when Subansiri district was bifurcated into Upper and Lower Su ...

Arunachal Pradesh Arunachal Pradesh (, ) is a state in Northeastern India. It was formed from the erstwhile North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA) region, and became a state on 20 February 1987. It borders the states of Assam and Nagaland to the south. It shares ...

, Apatani is spoken in 7 villages in Ziro valley, namely Hong, Hari, Biilla, Dutta, Hija, Mudang-Tage, and Bamin Michi (''Ethnologue'').

Writing system

Like most endangered oral languages, Apatani did not have a standardized

orthography An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation. Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and ...

, until recently, and there was some debate among the Apatanis on which

script Script may refer to: Writing systems * Script, a distinctive writing system, based on a repertoire of specific elements or symbols, or that repertoire * Script (styles of handwriting) ** Script typeface, a typeface with characteristics of ha ...

should be used to transcribe it. In view of this, Tanw Supuñ Dukuñ, the apex Tanii organization, recommended the constitution of the Apatani Language Development Committee (ALDC). The Apatani Cultural and Literary Society (ACLS) constituted the ALDC to recommend a writing system of the language. A year-long discussion and study by ALDC resulted in the recommendation of an alphabet based on

Roman script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern Ital ...

. The recommendation was accepted by the ACLS and the administrative approval for its use was given by the Tanw Supuñ Dukuñ, or the Apatani Apex Council.

Apatani (Tanii) Language Development

Language development is gradual process and in case of Apatani (Tanii) Language the development has been unrestrained so far. Yet, Tanii (Apatani) People have been writing Tanii using English Alphabets. And what began as a means to communicate through writing has now grown into a writing system that has emerged as a simple and easy means of communication for Tanii people. Apatani (Tanii) People live at a beautiful tiny valley known to the world as Ziro, located at Central Arunachal Pradesh. The total indigenous population is merely around 60,000 strong but Apatanis (Tanii) are known for their fervor when it comes to preservation and promotion of their unique culture that they closely share with their surrounding Tribes belonging to same Tani Group. Currently, there are some positive initiatives with regard to Tanii Language development. The most relevant ones are revision project by Popi Sarmin Society (the pioneer in Tanii Script development)
Apatani-English Dictionary
and Talking Apatani Dictionary. There are some differences on usage of some basic symbols and their usage. However, these developments are positive sign and they are giving momentum to public awareness regarding the urgent need for Tanii Language Development and Preservation.

Orthography

Tanii words can be written meaningfully using English consonants and vowels "as is". Currently, the writing system is under rapid development and there are various proposals that has been put forward and active research work is ongoing. In the meantime, people may write using the system as proposed by the ALDC (Apatani Language Development Committee) or use the simplified system with minimum change and retaining English consonants, vowels and sounds. So far, the only government of Arunachal Pradesh approved Apatani Script ("order No.EDA.41/96-97 Pt. dated Itanagar the 2nd Nov, 2010") is developed by the Popi Sarmiň Society and KIIJE TANII AGUN CHINSA is being used for elementary third language studies at schools in Ziro. As any language, Apatani or Tanii language is evolving while it interacts with various languages such as English, Hindi, Assamese, etc. and as such it may not be correct to conclude on any specific writing structure as of now. For Tanw language, it a work in progress.

References

External links

dictionary
by P.T. Abraham
Dictionary of the Apatani Language
by Pascal Bouchery Tanw Aguñ

Apatani Talking Dictionary

{{Languages of Northeast India Languages of Arunachal Pradesh Tani languages Endangered languages of India Endangered Sino-Tibetan languages