Language
The Brahui language is a language within the Dravidian subgroup of languages. While it does contain many similar words as the Iranic Baloch language, it also has many loan words from Indo-Aryan languages as well as the Dravidian words of its own. It is mainly spoken in the Kalat areas of Balochistan, Pakistan, although there are a considerable number of speakers in Southern Afghanistan and Iranian Balochistan. It includes three dialects including Sarawani (spoken in the north), Jhalawani (spoken in the southeast), and Chaghi (spoken in the northwest and west). According to a survey it has about 2,000,000 speakers in Pakistan (1998), 200,000 speakers in Afghanistan and 20,000 speakers in Iran, which would amount to 2,220,000 in the world. Due to its isolation, Brahui's vocabulary is only 15% Dravidian, while the remainder is dominated by Perso-Arabic, Balochi, and Indo-Aryan, while the grammar and overall morphology still resemble other Dravidian tongues. Brahui is generally written in the Perso-Arabic script and there is even a Latin alphabet that has been developed for use with Brahui.
Read more about this topic: Brahui People
Famous quotes containing the word language:
“After all, when you come right down to it, how many people speak the same language even when they speak the same language?”
—Russell Hoban (b. 1925)
“Was there a little time between the invention of language and the coming of true and false?”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“The sayings of a community, its proverbs, are its characteristic comment upon life; they imply its history, suggest its attitude toward the world and its way of accepting life. Such an idiom makes the finest language any writer can have; and he can never get it with a notebook. He himself must be able to think and feel in that speechit is a gift from heart to heart.”
—Willa Cather (18731947)