Sani () is one of the

Loloish languages The Loloish languages, also known as Yi in China and occasionally Ngwi or Nisoic, are a family of fifty to a hundred Sino-Tibetan languages spoken primarily in the Yunnan province of China. They are most closely related to Burmese and its rela ...

spoken by the

Yi people The Yi or Nuosu people,; zh, c=彝族, p=Yízú, l=Yi ethnicity historically known as the Lolo,; vi, Lô Lô; th, โล-โล, Lo-Lo are an ethnic group in China, Vietnam, and Thailand. Numbering nine million people, they are the sev ...

of China. It is one of six Yi languages recognized by the Chinese government, under the name Southeastern Yi. Sani is spoken in Shilin, Luliang, Luxi, Shizong, Yiliang,

Malong The malong is a traditional Filipino-Bangsamoro rectangular or tube-like wraparound skirt bearing a variety of geometric or okir designs. The malong is traditionally used as a garment by both men and women of the numerous ethnic groups in the mai ...

, Luquan, and

Mile The mile, sometimes the international mile or statute mile to distinguish it from other miles, is a British imperial unit and United States customary unit of distance; both are based on the older English unit of length equal to 5,280 Engli ...

counties by about 120,000 speakers.Wang Chengyou ��成有 2003. ''Yiyu Fangyan Bijiao Yanjiu'' ��语方言比较研究 Chengdu: Sichuan People's Press ��川民族出版社 The Sani call themselves . Their language is distinct from the closely related Samei, whose speakers call themselves ''Sani'' . Another group known as the ''Sa'' 撒 ( autonym: Sani 撒尼) lives in Qiubei County (Yunnan 1960).Yunnan minzu shibie zonghe diaocha zubian 云南民族识别综合调查组编 (1960).
Yunnan minzu shibie zonghe diaocha baogao 云南民族识别综合调查报告
'. Kunming: Yunnan minzu shibie zonghe diaochazu 云南民族识别综合调查组. Yunnan (1960) considers it to be similar to Sani of

Shilin County Shilin Yi Autonomous County (: Sani: ) is an autonomous county, under the jurisdiction of Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province, China. Etymology Lunan Yi Autonomous County () is the former name of Shilin, and usually be called for short as ...

. Population: 1443.

Innovations

Pelkey (2011:378) defines two innovations that Sani and

Axi AXI or ''variation'', may refer to: * Automated X-ray inspection * Advanced eXtensible Interface of ARM for Advanced Microcontroller Bus Architecture (AMBA) * AXI car, the right-hand-drive version of the DMC DeLorean * Aeron International Airlines ...

both share with each other. #Exclusive devoicing of tone category 1 proto-voiced initials (even if there is voiced retention in tone category 2). These words include 'fly (v.)', 'wing', 'bridge', and 'liquor'. #Dominant -e/-ɛ reflexes of *-ak rhymes.

References

*Pelkey, Jamin. 2011. ''Dialectology as Dialectic: Interpreting Phula Variation''. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. *Ma Xueliang 马学良. 1951. ''Sani Yiyu yanjiu'' 撒尼彝语研究. Beijing: Commercial Press 商务印书馆. {{Lolo-Burmese languages Loloish languages Languages of China