Kanjari (also known as Kangar Bhat, Kangri, Kuchbandhi or "the Gypsy language"[2]) is an unclassified Indic tribal language of India associated with the Kanjar tribe. It is written using the Devanagari script. Kanjari is spoken in Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.[2] It may be one of the Punjabi languages.[3] UNESCO classifies Kanjari as an endangered language. Some may use the word to describe Karina.[4]
| Kanjari | |
|---|---|
| कंजरी | |
| Native to | India |
Native speakers | 210,000 (2011)[1] |
Indo-European
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | kft |
| Glottolog | kanj1259 |
Syntax
editGeorge Abraham Grierson noted several grammatical features for Kanjari in the first Linguistic Survey of India:[5]
- The final "ō" of adjectives is usually kept before an inflected noun, which suggests that adjectives are not inflected and that gender is weak. For example, tēro naukrī ("thy service").
- Some pronouns are similar to Rajasthani languages, such as the demonstrative pronouns jō and jī. However, other pronouns are similar to the Dravidian languages, such as ūr ("he") compared to Tamil īr and Gondi ōr.
- Overall, verb conjugations and words "broadly agree" with the patterns of Eastern Rajasthani languages, but some characteristics point to a "certain Dravidian element" being present in Kanjari.
Vocabulary
edit| Kanjari | English | Cognate |
|---|---|---|
| lug | die | |
| lugai | beat | |
| chūbkō | son | |
| rib | house | |
| tig | see | |
| pāḍō | bull | māḍu (Tamil) |
| tiūr | give | tara (Tamil) |
| ghamēlā | sun | kham (Romani) |
| jhūkal | dog | jukel (Romani) |
References
edit- ^ Kanjari at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ^ a b Mhaiske, Vinod M.; Patil, Vinayak K.; Narkhede, S. S. (2016). Forest Tribology And Anthropology. p. 185. ISBN 9789386102089.
- ^ Frawley, William J. (2003). International Encyclopedia of Linguistics (2 ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 267. ISBN 0199771782.
- ^ "Kanjari". World Atlas of Languages. UNESCO. Retrieved 3 January 2023.
- ^ a b Grierson, George Abraham (1903–1928). Linguistic survey of India. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing. pp. 96–101. Retrieved 3 January 2023.
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