Itsari (Icari, Itsari:
) is a language in the
Dargin dialect continuum spoken in
Dagestan
Dagestan ( ; ; ), officially the Republic of Dagestan, is a republic of Russia situated in the North Caucasus of Eastern Europe, along the Caspian Sea. It is located north of the Greater Caucasus, and is a part of the North Caucasian Fede ...
,
Russia
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...
spoken in the village
Itsari, as well as in
Kizlyarsky District
Kizlyarsky District () is an administrativeLaw #16 and municipalLaw #6 district (raion), one of the forty-one in the Republic of Dagestan, Russia. It is located in the north of the republic. The area of the district is . Its administrative cente ...
,
Druzhba, and other villages and cities, both in and outside of Dagestan, by about 2,000 people.
It is often considered a divergent dialect of
Dargwa. ''
Ethnologue
''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensive catalogue of languages. It w ...
'' lists it as a dialect of Dargwa but recognizes that it may be a separate language.
Its closest relative is
Sanzhi, which has only about 200 speakers and is considered to be an
endangered language
An endangered language or moribund language is a language that is at risk of disappearing as its speakers die out or shift to speaking other languages. Language loss occurs when the language has no more native speakers and becomes a " dead langua ...
, as parents are now teaching their children Russian for practical purposes.
Usage
In the village of Itsari, the Itsari language is used for all purposes except writing, as the residents of Itsari use
standard written Dargwa or
Russian
Russian(s) may refer to:
*Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
*A citizen of Russia
*Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages
*''The Russians'', a b ...
as their written language. The younger population is shifting to Russian as their primary language.
Phonology
Vowels
Itsari has phonemic
pharyngealization
Pharyngealization is a secondary articulation of consonants or vowels by which the pharynx or epiglottis is constricted during the articulation of the sound.
IPA symbols
In the International Phonetic Alphabet, pharyngealization can be indicate ...
, as is evidenced by the minimal pair 'lamb' 'candle'.
Consonants
References
{{NEC-lang-stub
Northeast Caucasian languages