Luish languages

{{For|the Anatolian languages spoken throughout the Hittite Empire, Arzawa, and the Syro-Hittite states|Luwian language}} {{Infobox language family |name=Luish |altname=Asakian |region=Burma and Bangladesh |familycolor=Sino-Tibetan |fam2=Tibeto-Burman |fam3=Sal |fam4=Jingpho–Luish |child1=Sak |child2=Kadu |child3=Ganan |child4=Chakpa † |glotto=sakk1239 |glottorefname=Luish }}

The '''Luish''', '''Asakian''', or '''Sak''' languages are a group of Sino-Tibetan languages belonging to the Sal branch. They are spoken in Burma and Bangladesh, and consist of the Sak, Kadu, and Ganan languages. In recent years, Luish languages have been influenced by Burmese and Chakma.

Although Luish languages are now widely scattered and spoken by relatively small populations, Luce (1985) suggests that the Luish languages were “once spread over the whole north of Burma, from Manipur perhaps to northern Yunnan.”

Matisoff (2013)<ref name="Matisoff2013" /> proposes the name ''Asakian'', since ''Lui'' or ''Loi'' were used by the Meithei to refer to slaves. Although many speakers of Luish languages refer to themselves as ''Sak'', ''Cak'', or similar variations, speakers of Ganan and Mokhwang Kadu do not refer to themselves as ''Sak'' or ''Asak''.<ref name="Huziwara2020">{{Cite journal |last=Huziwara |first=Keisuke |date=2020 |title=On the Genetic Position of Chakpa Within Luish Languages |journal=Himalayan Linguistics |language=en |volume=19 |issue=2 |pages=44–55 |doi=10.5070/H91150999 |doi-access=free}}</ref>

==Extinct languages== Matisoff (2013)<ref name="Matisoff2013" /> has demonstrated that the extinct Andro, Sengmai, and Chairel languages of Manipur are also Luish languages.

Andro, Sengmai, and Chairel are extinct and known only from a glossary recorded in 1859, their speakers having switched to Meitei.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Burling |first=Robbins |title=Sino-Tibetan Languages |publisher=Routledge |date=2003 |isbn=978-0-7007-1129-1 |editor-last=Thurgood |editor-first=Graham |location=London |pages=169–191 |chapter=The Tibeto-Burman Languages of Northeast India |author-link=Robbins Burling |editor-last2=LaPolla |editor-first2=Randy J.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=McCulloch |first=W. |url={{google books|OeYwAQAAMAAJ|plainurl=yes}} |title=Account of the Valley of Munnipore and of the Hill Tribes: With a Comparative Vocabulary of the Munnipore and Other Languages |date=1859 |publisher=Bengal Printing Company |location=Calcutta |language=en}}</ref> There are also various unattested varieties of ''Lui'' or ''Loi'' ('serf') mentioned in nineteenth-century accounts that appear to be Luish varieties.<ref>{{glotto|luia1234|Lui (bookkeeping)}}</ref>

It is uncertain whether the extinct Pyu language of central Myanmar is a Luish language.

Benedict (1972) and Shafer (1974) had classified the extinct Taman language of northern Myanmar as part of the Luish branch, but it has since been shown by Keisuke Huziwara (2016) to be a non-Luish language, possibly a separate branch of Tibeto-Burman.

==Classification== Matisoff (2013),<ref name="Matisoff2013">{{Cite journal |last=Matisoff |first=James A. |date=2013 |title=Re-Examining the Genetic Position of Jingpho: Putting Flesh on the Bones of the Jingpho/Luish Relationship |url=http://sealang.net/archives/ltba/pdf/LTBA-36.2.15.pdf |journal=Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area |language=en |volume=36 |issue=2 |pages=15–95}}</ref> citing Huziwara (2012),<ref name="Huziwara2012">{{Cite journal |last=Huziwara |first=Keisuke 藤原敬介 |date=2012 |title=Rui sogo no saikou ni mukete |script-title=ja:ルイ祖語の再構にむけて |trans-title=Toward a Reconstruction of Proto-Luish |journal=Kyōtodaigaku gengogaku kenkyū |language=ja |volume=31 |pages=25–131 |doi=10.14989/182194 |doi-access=free |hdl-access=free |script-journal=ja:京都大学言語学研究 |hdl=2433/182194}}</ref> provides the following Stammbaum classification for the Asakian (Luish) branch. ;Asakian *Cak **Cak **Sak *Chairel *Loi (Chakpa) **Sengmai **Andro *Kadu **Ganan **Kadu

Huziwara (2020) merges Sengmai, Andro, and Chairel as varieties of Chakpa.<ref name="Huziwara2020" />

==Reconstruction== Proto-Luish has been reconstructed by Huziwara (2012),<ref name="Huziwara2012" /> with additional Proto-Luish lexical reconstructions by Matisoff (2013).<ref name="Matisoff2013" /> Like Proto-Austroasiatic and Jingpho, Proto-Luish has a sesquisyllabic syllable structure.

Proto-Luish reconstructions by Huziwara (2012),<ref name="Huziwara2012" /> can be found at Wiktionary's list of Proto-Luish reconstructions.

==References== {{reflist}} *Benedict, Paul K. (1972). ''Sino-Tibetan: a conspectus''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. *Huziwara, Keisuke. 2016. [https://repository.kulib.kyoto-u.ac.jp/dspace/handle/2433/219018 タマン語の系統再考 / On the genetic position of Taman reconsidered]. In ''Kyoto University Linguistic Research '' 35, p. 1-34. {{doi|10.14989/219018}} *Luce, George H. (1985). ''Phases of Pre-Pagan Burma: languages and history, vol. I, II''. Oxford: Oxford University Press. *Shafer, Robert (1974). ''Introduction to Sino-Tibetan''. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowit

==Bibliography== * George van Driem (2001). ''Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region.'' Brill.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Luish languages}} Category:Sal languages Category:Languages of India Category:Languages of Myanmar