Nihali language

Nihali, also known as Nahali or erroneously as Kalto, is a moribund language isolate that is spoken in west-central India (in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra), with approximately 2,000 people in 1991 out of an ethnic population of 5,000.[3] The Nihali tribal area is just south of the Tapti River, around the village of Tembi in Nimar district (Burhanpur) of Madhya Pradesh.[4] Speakers of the Nihali language are also present in several villages of the Buldhana district in Maharashtra such as Jamod, Sonbardi, Kuvardev, Chalthana, Ambavara, Wasali, and Cicari. There are dialectal differences between the Kuvardev-Chalthana and the Jamod-Sonbardi varieties.[5]

Nihali
RegionJalgaon Jamod, on the border of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh
Ethnicity5,000 Nihali
Native speakers
2,500 (2016)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3nll
Glottologniha1238
ELPNihali[2]
Distribution of Nihali

The language has a very large number of words adopted from neighboring languages, with 60–70% apparently taken from Korku (25% of vocabulary and much of its morphology), from Dravidian languages, and from Marathi, but much of its core vocabulary cannot be related to them or other languages, such as the numerals and words for "blood" and "egg". Scholars state that less than 25% of the language's original vocabulary is used today.[5] There are no longer any surviving monolingual speakers of the language. Those well-versed in modern Nihali are likely to speak varieties of Hindi, Marathi or Korku as well.[6]

For centuries, most Nihali have often worked as agricultural labourers, for speakers of languages other than their own. In particular, Nihali labourers have often worked for members of the Korku people, and are often bilingual in the Korku language. Because of this history, Nihali is sometimes used by its speakers only to prevent native Korku speakers and other outsiders from understanding them.[7]

Linguistic situation

Franciscus Kuiper was the first to suggest that Nihali may be unrelated to any other Indian language, with the non-Korku, non-Dravidian core vocabulary being the remnant of an earlier population in India. However, he did not rule out that it may be a Munda language, like Korku. Kuiper suggested that Nihali may differ from neighbouring languages, such as Korku, mostly in its function as an argot, such as a thieves' cant.[4] Kuiper's assertions stem, in part, from the fact that many oppressed groups within India have used secret languages to prevent outsiders from understanding them.[8]

Linguist Norman Zide describes the recent history of the language as follows: "Nihali's borrowings are far more massive than in such textbook examples of heavy outside acquisition as Albanian." In this respect, says Zide, modern Nihali seems comparable to hybridised dialects of Romani spoken in Western Europe. Zide claims that this is a result of a historical process that began with a massacre of Nihalis in the early 19th century, organised by one of the rulers of the area, supposedly in response to "marauding". Zide alleges that, afterwards, the Nihalis "decimated in size", have "functioned largely as raiders and thieves ... who [have] disposed of ... stolen goods" through "outside associates". Zide adds that Nihali society has "long been multilingual, and uses Nihali as a more or less secret language which is not ordinarily revealed to outsiders" and that early researchers "attempting to learn the language were, apparently, deliberately rebuffed or misled".[9]

Some Korku-speakers refuse to acknowledge the Nihali as a distinct community, and describe the emergence of the Nihalis as resulting from a disruption of Korku civil society.[8]

The Nihali live similarly to the Kalto. That and the fact that Kalto has often been called Nahali led to confusion of the two languages.

Phonology

Vowels
Front Back
i i: u u:
e e: o o:
a a:

Lengthening of vowels is phonemic. The vowels [e] and [o] have lower varieties at the end of morphemes.

Nasalization is rare and tends to occur in borrowed words.

Phonemes of Nihali
Labial Dental/
Alveolar
Retroflex Palatal Velar
Nasal m n ɳ ɲ
Plosive/
Affricate
voiceless p t ʈ k
voiceless aspirated ʈʰ tʃʰ
voiced b d ɖ ɡ
voiced aspirated ɖʱ dʒʱ ɡʱ
Fricative s ʂ ʃ h
Rhotic r ɽ
Approximant ʋ l j

There are 33 consonants. Unaspirated stops are more frequent than aspirated stops.[5]

Lexicon

Below are some Nihali basic vocabulary words without clear external parallels (in Korku, Hindi, Marathi, Dravidian, etc.) listed in the appendix of Nagaraja (2014).

Body parts
headpe(ː)ñ
hair (head)kuguso
eyejikit
earcigam
nosecoːn
toothmenge
mouthkaggo
handbakko
shoulderṭ/tagli
bellybhaːwri
intestineskoṭor
navelbumli
livergadri
bloodcorṭo
bonepaːkṭo
skinṭoːl
Animals and plants
birdpoe; pyu
eggkalen
snakekoːgo
fishcaːn
lousekeːpe
mosquitokaːn
fly (insect)eḍ(u)go
treeaːḍḍo
Natural phenomena
waterjoppo
rainmaːnḍo
stonecaːgo, caːrgo
saltcoːpo
Material culture, kinship
road, pathḍãːy, ḍa(ː)y
houseaːwaːr
namejumu, jyumu
Verbs

(In Nihali, many verbs are suffixed with -be.)

eatṭ/tyeː-
drinkḍelen-
biteharu-
blowbigi-, bhigi-
diebetto-, beṭṭo-
killpaḍa-
laughhaːgo-
cry, weepaːpa-
goeːr-, eṛe
comepaːṭo, pya
givebeː-
seeara-
hearcakni

Pronouns and demonstratives

The personal pronouns in Nihali are (Nagaraja 2014: 34):

singulardualplural
1st person jotye:koingi
2nd person nena:kola
3rd person eṭeyhiṭkeleṭla < eṭey + la

Nagaraja (2014: 139) notes that Nihali has a different demonstrative paradigm than that of Korku.

NihaliKorku
'what' nanco:(ch)
'who' nanije
'why' naway, nawa:sanco:- ~ co:ch
‘when’ meran ~ miranco:-la
‘where’ mingayṭone ~ ṭongan 'at where'
‘how much’ m(i)yanco-ṭo
‘how’ naw-kico-phar
‘whose’ nan-inje-konṭe ‘whose child’
‘which (book)’ nu-san(pustak) ṭone-bukko ‘which (book)’

Morphosyntax

Nihali morphosyntax is much simpler than that of Korku and other Munda languages, and is unrelated to that of Munda languages (Nagaraja 2014: 144). Word order is SOV.

See also

References

  1. Seidel, Frank (2015-10-09), Describing endangered languages, Culture and Language Use, 17, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, pp. 277–312, doi:10.1075/clu.17.12sei, ISBN 978-90-272-4452-9, retrieved 2020-12-14
  2. Endangered Languages Project data for Nihali.
  3. "Did you know Nihali is threatened?". Endangered Languages. Retrieved 2016-05-04.
  4. Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus Kuiper, "Nahali: a comparative study", Mededeelingen der Koninklijke Nederlandsche Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afd. Letterkunde, N.V. Noord-Hollandsche Uitg. Mij., 1962 (5, Pt 25)
  5. Nagaraja, K.S. (2014). The Nihali Language. Manasagangotri, Mysore-570 006, India: Central Institute of Indian Languages. p. 7. ISBN 978-81-7343-144-9.CS1 maint: location (link)
  6. Nagaraja, K.S. (2014). The Nihali Language. Central Institute of Indian Languages. p. 3. ISBN 978-81-7343-144-9.
  7. Nagaraja, K.S (2014). The Nihali Language. Manasagangotri, Mysore-570 006: Central Institute of Indian Languages. p. 250. ISBN 978-81-7343-144-9.CS1 maint: location (link)
  8. Anderson, Gregory (2008). The Munda Languages. New York, New York: Routledge. p. 772. ISBN 978-0-415-32890-6.
  9. Norman Zide, "Munda and non-Munda Austroasiatic languages". In Current Trends in Linguistics 5: Linguistics in South Asia, p 438
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