Mày language

Mày
Native toVietnam
EthnicityMay
Native speakers
600 (2013)
Language codes
ISO 639-3None (mis)
Glottologmayy1239
ELPMay

Mày is a Vietic language spoken by the May people of Minh Hóa district, Quảng Bình province, Central Vietnam. It is a member of the Cheut language cluster, which belongs to the Vietic branch of the Austroasiatic family. With only several hundred speakers, May is a critically endangered language, with only about half of the estimated ethnic population of 1,228 people able to speak the language.

Distribution

May is spoken in the villages of Ca Oóc, Bai Dinh, and Cha Lo. The villages are located in Minh Hóa district, Quang Binh province (in the communities or xã of Dân Hóa (formerly Trung Hóa), Thượng Hóa, Hóa Tiến, and Hóa Thanh). Dân Hóa is the only monolingual May village, while the others are mixed with various other ethnic groups.

Phonology

Consonants

Initials

May initials
Labial Alveolar Retroflex Alveopalatal Palatal Velar Laryngeal
Obstruent Occlusive plain p t ʈ c k ʔ
aspirated pʰ tʰ kʰ
Implosive ɓ ɗ ʄ
Fricative voiceless ʂ ɕ h
voiced β ʑ (ɣ)
Resonant Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
lateral l
trilled ɽ
  • Among the onset fricatives, the phonemic status of voiced velar /ɣ/ is unclear since it is exclusively found in borrowed lexemes.
  • Voiceless occlusives may undergo voicing and lenition in the phonetic syntagma after an open syllable: /k-/ → [ɣ], /t-/ → [z], /p-/ → [β].
  • Voiceless occlusive onsets may become more voiced even if not in the absolute beginning position of the phonological word. Cf. ɴ̩kɯ̆ŋ¹ [ŋɣɯ̆ŋ¹] hɛk³ "datura, devil's trumpet".
  • In the fortis position, the implosive onsets are heard as prenasalized [ᵐɓ-], [ⁿɗ-], and [ᶮʄ-]. Eg. ʄăm¹ [ᶮʄăm¹] "vegetables" with an interval of prenasalization of onset reaches 109 ms as recorded via Praat. Prenasalization may occur with preglottalization and insertion of a schwa overtone. Eg. ɓuəi̯⁴ [ᵐɓuəi̯⁴/ˀᵊᵐɓuəi̯⁴] "period, part of the day".
  • Onsets /ʑ-/ and /ɕ-/ are characterized as having unstable places of articulation. Accordingly, /ʑ-/ may be heard as either an alveopalatal fricative [ʑ] or a palatal [j].
  • Retroflex and alveopalatal fricative onsets tend to undergo affrication, both in monosyllabic and sesquisyllabic words:
/ɽ-/ → [ɖɽ]: ɽɔ̤c⁴ [ɖ͡ɽɔ̤ːc] "gut, instestine"; ɴ̩ɽi¹ [ɴ̩ɖɽiː] "pestle";
/ʂ-/ → [ʈ͡ʂ]: ʂɯ̆k³ [ʈʂɯ̆k] "strong";
/ɕ-/ → [t͡ɕ]: ɕik³ [t͡ɕiːk] "trace"; ɕɤ̆t³ [t͡ɕɤ̆t] "to more (not far)";
/ʑ-/ → [d͡ʑ]: ʑɔ̤l⁴ [d͡ʑɔːl] "to hang"; ɗok³ ʑa̤m² [d͡ʑa̤ːm] "sugarcane".

Codas

May codas
Labial Alveolar Retroflex Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive p t c k ʔ
Fricative h
Nasal m n ɲ ŋ
Lateral l
Flap ɽ
Approximant i̯ (~ i̯̥) u̯
  • Voiced nasal codas m, n, ɲ, ŋ and voiceless obstruents -p, -t, -c, -k are actually checked or unreleased -m̚, -n̚, -ɲ̚, -ŋ̚, -p̚, -t̚, -c̚, -k̚.
  • Nasal codas may be phonetically realized as either one of four variants: voiced (PT-1), voiceless (PT-2), voiced glottalized (PT-3), and voiceless glottalized (PT-4). The phonetic variations of nasal codas in May play no phonological role as prosodic types condition them.
  • The existence/lack of laryngeal coda /-h/ affects the prosodic type of certain words, and there is a trend of dropping -h, which results in tone contour alternation. Eg. ʈɯh¹ ~ ʈɯ² "front, previously."
  • Flap coda -ɽ is often realized as a devoiced flapped [ɽ̊] or a retroflex lateral [ɭ].

Vowels

May vowels (Babaev & Samarina 2021):

Vowels
Front Central Back
Close long i ɯ u
short ǐ ɯ̌ ǔ
Close-mid long e ɤ o
short ě ɤ̌ ǒ
Middle long ɛ ɔ
short ɛ̌ ɔ̌
Open long a
short ǎ
Diphthongs [ie] [ɯɤ] [uo]

Morphology

Pronouns

May pronouns often have shorter forms without ʔa. They are syntactically distinct. The full forms occupy the Subject/Agent role in transitive verb phrase that is located at the absolute beginning of the phrase and the direct object role after a transitive verb. The shorter forms are used to denote possessive constructions and pronominal dative/benefactive objects.

Personal pronouns
Singular Dual Plural General
Exclusive Inclusive Exclusive Inclusive
1st person [ʔa]ho [ʔa]ɲal [ʔa]tɛ [ta]pa, tupa [ʔa]meŋ, [ʔa]miŋ
2nd person [ʔa]mi [ʔa]mal pani
3rd person [ʔa]hăn [ʔa]ɽɛ̤m [ʔa]pa

Word derivation and syntactic functions

May has a limited inventory of affixes and clitics. Some morpheme clitics may host multiple functions that could only be distinguished by context.

Syntax

As an isolating language, May can only utilize word order and particles. The use of clitics and affixes is generally limited and does not undermine the analytical grammar structure. The basic word order of May is SVO. The basic word order in a verbal clause is S-V-P-OBL. Depending on speeches, the word order may undergo ellipsis in cases that the speech is comprehensive enough to the listener.

Pu1

grandfather

ho1

1SG

[k]acit3

to.kill

klu1

buffalo

Pu1 ho1 [k]acit3 klu1

grandfather 1SG to.kill buffalo

"My grandfather killed buffalo."

Pʰaʝ

must

li

take

cɤ

BEN

pa=ho

OBL=1SG

hal

two

poŋ

CLF

päɽ

flower

ʔaliŋ

top

kɤ̌i

tree

heh

DIST

Pʰaʝ li cɤ pa=ho hal poŋ päɽ ʔaliŋ kɤ̌i heh

must take BEN OBL=1SG two CLF flower top tree DIST

"Pick for me two flowers from that tree."

Notes

  1. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:15)
  2. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:19)
  3. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:15)
  4. ↑ Babaev, Kirill Vladimirovich [Бабаев, Кирилл Владимирович]; Samarina, Irina Vladimirovna [Самарина, Ирина Владимировна]. 2019. Язык май. Материалы Российско-вьетнамской лингвистической экспедиции / Jazyk maj. Materialy Rossijsko-vetnamskoj lingvisticheskoj ekspeditsii. Moscow: Издательский Дом ЯСК. ISBN 978-5-907117-34-1. (in Russian). p.16.
  5. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:36)
  6. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:39)
  7. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:42)
  8. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:43)
  9. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:57)
  10. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:58)
  11. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:59)
  12. ↑ Babaev & Samarina (2021:60)

References