Tai-Kadai Languages

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Tai-Kadai languages are used by more than 85 million speakers in Southeast Asia and southern China. Depending on criteria used, between forty and a hundred spoken languages can be recognized. All of these are tonal, with over two hundred different tone systems distinguished.

The two national languages of the group, Thai and Lao, sometimes called Laotian, account for well over half the total of Tai-Kadai speakers. The spelling "Thai" is used for the national language of Thailand and for some regional varieties in that country. "Tai" is used for the wider Tai subfamily of Tai-Kadai and also in the names of some specific varieties.

Thai and Lao belong to the relatively well-known Southwestern branch of the Tai subfamily. This branch is also represented in Assam in India (for example, by the Khamti language), in Yunnan in China (by Lue and Tai-Dehong), in Myanmar (by Shan and Dehong), and in Vietnam mainly south of the Red river (by Black Tai and White Tai).

The remainder of the Tai-Kadai family extends from Vietnam mainly north of the Red River (where the Nung and Tay languages are found), into the Chinese provinces of Guangxi (the Zhuang language), Guizhou (the Bouyei, Sui, and Gelao languages), and Hunan (the Kam language), to the island of Hainan (the Hlai and Be languages). Most authorities recognize a high-level Kam-Tai subfamily including the Kam-Sui languages along with the three main branches of Tai (Northern, Central, and Southwestern).

Speculation about how the rest of the family fits together includes a so-called Kadai branch, hence the family name Tai-Kadai. This branch would comprise Gelao, Laha, and other varieties in China and Vietnam still being investigated. The exact relationship of the languages on Hainan Island to the rest of the family is also under investigation.

Much basic vocabulary in Tai-Kadai languages is monosyllabic, although compounding is common. More initial consonants are distinguished than finals, usually limited to nasals, semivowels, and final stops (p, t, k, and glottal stop). Unlike most languages in the family, Thai and Lao distinguish pairs of short and long vowels, represented here as i, i.

Tonal systems have been reported, from languages with three tones (Aiton, in India) to nine (Kam, in China), or even more if stopped syllables are counted separately. Some idea of tonal shapes can be given through pairs of digits on a one-to-five scale, with the first suggesting the approximate beginning pitch level and the second digit, the ending level. Many vocabulary items in Tai-Kadai languages differ only in tone. Thus sip means "ten" in languages of the Kam-Tai subgrouping, but with low tone (11) in Thai, mid-high (44) in Lao, low-rising (24) in Dehong, high-rising (45) in White Tai, and mid-level (33) in the Lungming dialect of Zhuang.

Tai-Kadai languages in the southern and western areas, with long cultural connections to India, have been using alphabetic Indic-based writing systems for over seven hundred years. Eight such scripts are currently in use. To the north and east, varieties in contact with Chinese once used modified character-based writing but romanizations have been recently introduced.

For Thai and Lao, some vowels are written above consonants; for example, the i vowel sign in sip (ten) is written above the s letter. Other vowels are written under, after, and even before their initial consonants. Tone is shown through superscript marks. Also, consonant letters are arranged in three classes affecting tonal representation differently.

Written Thai and Lao differ somewhat. Thai spelling is etymological with proliferation of consonant letters. Modern Lao is more directly phonetic.

Like languages nearby, Tai-Kadai varieties do not use inflectional morphology; that is, they do not use endings to show tense or number. Such distinctions are assumed from context or are optionally indicated through special words or constructions. The most basic Tai-Kadai sentence orders are subject-verb and subject-verb-object, so the Thai sentence chan 24 rak 55 thoe: 33 and Lao equivalent kho':i 31 hak 33 caw 31 both mean "I love you" and here show the same basic word order as English. On the other hand, modifiers usually follow modified nouns; hence Thai ba:n 52 + yay 11 "house + big," or "a big house."

For counting and specifying objects, classifier constructions are used. (An example of a classifier in English is "head" in the sentence "three head of cattle.") Thus Thai man 33 sa:m 24 hua 24 "yam three head," or "three yams"; Lao mu: 13 ha: 31 to: 11 "pig five body," or "five pigs."

It used to be assumed that Tai-Kadai languages, being tonal, were directly related to Chinese and indeed much Chinese-derived vocabulary is present. However, basic Tai-Kadai noun-modifier order is not Chinese and there is evidence for deep relationships with the Austronesian and Austroasiatic families as well. The ultimate connections of Tai-Kadai remain a controversial topic and will be an important area for future research.

Anthony Diller

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This complete Tai-Kadai Languages contains 930 words. This article contains 970 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page).