S'gaw Karen or S'gaw K'nyaw, commonly known simply as Karen, is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken by the S'gaw Karen people of Myanmar and Thailand. A Karenic branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family, S'gaw Karen is spoken by over 2 million people in Tanintharyi Region, Ayeyarwady Region, Yangon Region, and Bago Region in Myanmar, and about 200,000 in northern and western Thailand along the border near Kayin State. It is written using the S'gaw Karen alphabet, derived from the Burmese script, although a Latin-based script is also in use among the S'gaw Karen in northwestern Thailand. Additionally, the Kwekor script is used in Hlaingbwe Township.
Various divergent dialects are sometimes seen as separate languages: Paku in the northeast, Mopwa (Mobwa) in the northwest, Wewew, and Monnepwa.
S'gaw belongs to the Karenic branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. The S'gaw language has been used as the official language in the Kayin State of Myanmar and of the Karen National Union (KNU) organization who have waged a war against the Burmese government since early 1949. A Bible translation was published in 1853. The first issue of the Karen-language monthly periodical, The Morning Star (Hsa Too Ghaw), was published in 1842.
Christian missionaries, from the 19th century onward, have had a profound and lasting impact on the S'gaw Karen language, especially in the areas of literacy, orthography, and education. Jonathan Wade, an American Baptist missionary, is credited with developing the first written script for the S'gaw Karen language in 1831âÂÂ1832, adapting the MonâÂÂBurmese script to fit S'gaw Karen phonology. Another American Baptist missionary, Francis Mason, led the work of producing the first translation of the Bible into S'gaw Karen. The full S'gaw Karen Bible was completed in 1853, becoming one of the earliest and most widely read texts in the language. The Bible and other texts helped standardize vocabulary and orthography and provided a basis for literacy instruction. With a newly-devised script and a growing body of texts, missionaries established schools and seminaries that taught reading and writing in S'gaw Karen, often alongside English and Burmese. As a result, literacy rates among Christian Karen rose, and S'gaw Karen gained prestige as a language of education and religion. Additionally, they compiled grammars, dictionaries, and textbooks, documenting the S'gaw Karen language in ways that were previously nonexistent. These linguistic resources continue to be used today in both academic research and community-based education. Missionaries working particularly on the S'gaw Karen language include Jonathan Wade, Francis Mason, and Emilie Ballard.
S'gaw is spoken in the Ayeyarwady delta area, in the Ayeyarwady, Bago, Kayin, and Rangon Regions. S'gaw speakers are frequently interspersed with Pwo Karen speakers.
S'gaw dialects are:
Paku is spoken in:
Paku dialects are Shwe Kyin, Mawchi, Kyauk Gyi, Bawgali, the names of which are based on villages.
Mobwa is spoken in 9 villages at the western foot of the Thandaung Mountains in Thandaung township, Kayin State. There are also some in Taungoo township, Bago Region.
Mobwa dialects are Palaychi (Southern Mobwa) and Dermuha (Southern Mobwa).
Karen people in the Andaman Islands: S'gaw Karen is also spoken in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Union Territory of India. The total population in the Andamans is about 2000 people, living in eight villages in the Mayabunder and Diglipur tehsils of the North and Middle Andaman district:
The S'gaw Karen language has at least 3 dialects. They are mutually intelligible to each other; however, there may be words that sound unfamiliar to one another.
The following displays the phonological features of present S'gaw Karen:
Ken Manson (2009) proposed a Karen tone box to help understand Karenic tonal diversity and classify Karenic languages. It is similar to William Gedney's Tai tone box (see Proto-Tai language#Tones). The tone box contains diagnostic words for use during field elicitation.
The S'gaw Karen alphabet consists of 25 consonants, 9 vowels, 5 tones and 5 medials. The Karen alphabet was derived from the Burmese script as created by the help of the American Baptist missionary Jonathan Wade in the early 1830s. The Karen alphabet was created for the purpose of translating the Bible into the Karen language. S'gaw Karen script is written from left to right and requires no spaces between words, although modern writing usually contains spaces after each clause to enhance readability.
Vowels can never stand alone and if a word starts with a vowel syllable, use the vowel carrier "á¡" which is silent in order to write words that start with vowel.
In S'gaw Karen, every syllable consists of a vowel, either alone, or preceded by a single or double consonant. A syllable always ends in a vowel. Every syllable may be pronounced in six different tones, the meaning varying according to the tone in which it is pronounced.
The number of tones and their pronunciation varies depending on the dialect. Below are the pronunciations of the tones in S'gaw Karen according to Gilmore (1898).
When one consonant follows another with no vowel sound intervening, the second consonant is represented by a symbol, which is joined to the character representing the first consonant.
The examples of writing the Karen alphabet are:
The Karen Latin alphabet has 24 consonants, 9 vowels and 5 tones. The tones are written with alphabetic letters.
In terms of linguistic typology, S'gaw Karen is an isolating language with scarce bound morphology and where most syllables can occur as independent words. The word order is subjectâÂÂverbâÂÂobject, which differs from other Tibeto-Burman languages, most of which are verb final.
S'gaw Karen nouns are intrinsically neutral as to number, gender, and definiteness. Plural reference is achieved by using the plural marker /tÃÂpðà/.
Like many East and Southeast Asian languages, S'gaw Karen uses classifiers to count objects expressed by count nouns, and measure words to quantify substances expressed by mass nouns.
S'gaw Karen has two demonstratives, /ÃÂi/ 'this' and /nè/ 'that', which follow the noun or the classifier phrase, if present.
S'gaw Karen distinguishes between intransitive, transitive, and ditransitive verbs. Transitive and ditransitive verbs require one and two objects, respectively, while intransitive verbs do not take objects. As an isolating language, S'gaw Karen lacks case inflection in nouns. The function of a noun is determined by its position in the clause; generally, subjects precede the verb while objects follow it.
S'gaw Karen verbs do not inflect for tense or aspect; instead, these grammatical categories are expressed using separate words.
Perfect aspect is expressed by the particle /lÃÂ/, which indicates a change in the situation.
Prospective aspect is indicated by /kÃÂ-/, which precedes the verb. Sentences with are often translated using the future tense in English.
To negate a verb, the verb prefix /tÃÂ-/ and the final particle /bÃÂ / are used.
S'gaw Karen makes extensive use of verb serialization to express various grammatical meanings, such as causativity and benefaction.
Causative events, where a subject causes an object to perform an action or be in a state, are expressed using one of the verbs // 'make, cause' or // 'let, have (someone do something)' before the main verb. Which verb to use depends on whether or not the causer has direct and full control over the action; if not, and the causee has some control, is used (indirect causation), otherwise is used (direct causation).
Benefaction refers to the performance of actions for someone's sake. In S'gaw Karen, benefactive clauses contain the verb // 'get', which follows the main verb or verb compound.
S'gaw Karen personal pronouns are distinguished according to person and number, except for the third person, which sometimes has the same form for the singular and the plural. Additionally, all pronouns are gender-neutral; for example, the third-person pronoun /ÃÂÃÂ-/ has the meanings 'he, his', 'she, her', 'it, its', 'they, their'. Below is a table showing the subject/possessive forms ( 'I; my', etcetera) and object forms ( 'me', etcetera) of the pronouns.
S'gaw Karen uses prepositions to indicate things such as the location, source, goal, or instrument of an action or situation. The most common S'gaw Karen prepositions are // 'at, to, from', // 'at', // 'to', // 'like, as', and // 'with'.
When the source or goal of an action is a person, the locational word /ÃÂò/ is used.