Avar language




























































Avar
Avaric

Магӏарул мацӏ, Авар мацӏ
Maǥarul macʼ, Awar macʼ
Native to
Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey
Ethnicity Avars
Native speakers
1,000,000 (2010)[1]
Language family

Northeast Caucasian

  • Avar–Andic
    • Avar


Writing system

Cyrillic (current)
Georgian, Arabic, Latin (historical)
Official status
Official language in

Dagestan (Russia)
Language codes
ISO 639-1
av – Avaric
ISO 639-2
ava – Avaric
ISO 639-3 Either:
ava – Avaric
oav – Old Avar
Linguist List

ava – Avar
 
oav – Old Avar
Glottolog
avar1256[2]

This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For a guide to IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Avar[1][2] (Магӏарул мацӏ Maǥarul macʼ, [maʕarul mat͡sʼ], "language of the mountains") or (Авар мацӏ Awar macʼ [awar mat͡sʼ] "Avar language"), also known as Avaric,[3][4] is a language that belongs to the Avar–Andic group of the Northeast Caucasian family primarily spoken in Dagestan.




Contents






  • 1 Geographic distribution


  • 2 Status


  • 3 Dialects


  • 4 Morphology


  • 5 Phonology


  • 6 Writing system


  • 7 Orthography


  • 8 History


  • 9 Samples


  • 10 See also


  • 11 References


  • 12 External links





Geographic distribution


It is spoken mainly in the western and southern parts of the Russian Caucasus republic of Dagestan, and the Balaken, Zaqatala regions of north-western Azerbaijan.[1] Some Avars live in other regions of Russia. There are also small communities of speakers living in the Russian republics of Chechnya and Kalmykia; in Georgia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Jordan, and the Marmara Sea region of Turkey. It is spoken by about 762,000 people worldwide. UNESCO classifies Avar as vulnerable to extinction.[5]



Status


It is one of six literary languages of Dagestan, where it is spoken not only by the Avar, but also serves as the language of communication between different ethnic groups.



Dialects


There are two main dialect groups:[citation needed] the northern, which includes Khunzakh, Kazbek, Gunib, Gumbet and others;[which?] and the southern, which includes Andalal, Gidatl', Antsukh, Charoda, Tlyarata, Tsumada, Tsunta and others.[which?]



Morphology


Avar is an agglutinative language, of SOV order.


Adverbs do not inflect, outside of inflection for noun class in some adverbs of place: e.g. the /b/ in /ʒani-b/ "inside" and /t͡se-b-e/ "in front". Adverbs of place also distinguish locative, allative, and ablative forms suffixally, such as /ʒani-b/ "inside", /ʒani-b-e/ "to the inside", and /ʒani-sa/ "from the inside". /-go/ is an emphatic suffix taken by underived adjectives.



Phonology














































































































































































































Consonant phonemes of Avar[6]


Labial

Dental

Alveolar

Palatal

Velar

Uvular

Pharyngeal

Glottal
central

lateral
lenis

fortis
lenis
fortis
lenis
fortis
lenis
fortis
lenis
fortis

Nasal

m

n













Plosive

voiced

b

d







ɡ






voiceless

p

t







k






ʔ

ejective












kːʼ





Affricate

voiceless


t͡s

t͡sː

t͡ʃ

t͡ʃː


t͡ɬː





q͡χː



ejective


t͡sʼ

t͡sːʼ

t͡ʃʼ

t͡ʃːʼ


(t͡ɬːʼ)





q͡χːʼ



Fricative

voiceless


s



ʃ

ʃː

ɬ

ɬː


x



χ

χː

ʜ


voiced


z


ʒ







ʁ


ʕ

ɦ

Trill




r











Approximant

w





l


j







There are competing analyses of the distinction transcribed in the table with the length sign ⟨ː⟩. Length is part of the distinction, but so is articulatory strength, so they have been analyzed as fortis and lenis.[citation needed] The fortis affricates are long in the fricative part of the contour, e.g. [tsː] (tss), not in the stop part as in geminate affricates in languages such as Japanese and Italian [tːs] (tts). Laver (1994) analyzes e.g. t͡ɬː as a two-segment affricate–fricative sequence /t͡ɬɬ/ (/tɬɬ/).[7] Avar has five vowels, /a, e, i, o, u/.



Writing system


There were some attempts to write the Avar language in the Georgian alphabet as early as the 14th century.[8][9] The use of Arabic script for representing Avar in marginal glosses began in the 15th century. The use of Arabic, which is known as ajam, is still known today.[9]


As part of Soviet language re-education policies in 1928 the Ajam was replaced by a Latin alphabet, which in 1938 was in turn replaced by the current Cyrillic script. Essentially, it is the Russian alphabet plus one additional letter called palochka (stick, Ӏ). As that letter cannot be typed with common keyboard layouts, it is often replaced with a capital Latin letter i ( I ), small Latin letter L ( l ), or the numerical digit 1.



Orthography


The Avar language is usually written in the Cyrillic script. The letters of the alphabet are (with their pronunciation given below in IPA transcription):[6][10]










































































А а
/a/
Б б
/b/
В в
/w/
Г г
/ɡ/
Гъ гъ
/ʁ/
Гь гь
/h/
ГӀ гӏ
/ʕ/
Д д
/d/
Е е
/e/, /je/
Ё ё
/jo/
Ж ж
/ʒ/
З з
/z/
И и
/i/
Й й
/j/
К к
/k/
Къ къ
/q͡χːʼ/
Кь кь
/t͡ɬːʼ/
КӀ кӏ
/kʼ/
КӀкӏ кӏкӏ
/kːʼ/
Кк кк
/kː/
Л л
/l/
ЛӀ лӏ
/t͡ɬː/
Лъ лъ
/ɬ/
Лълъ лълъ
/ɬː/
М м
/m/
Н н
/n/
О о
/o/
П п
/p/
Р р
/r/
С с
/s/
Сс сс
/sː/
Т т
/t/
ТӀ тӏ
/tʼ/
У у
/u/
Ф ф
/f/
Х х
/χ/
Хх хх
/χː/
Хъ хъ
/q͡χː/
Хь хь
/x/
Хьхь хьхь
/xː/
ХӀ хӏ
/ħ/
Ц ц
/t͡s/
Цц цц
/t͡sː/
ЦӀ цӏ
/t͡sʼ/
ЦӀцӏ цӏцӏ
/t͡sːʼ/
Ч ч
/t͡ʃ/
Чч чч
/t͡ʃː/
ЧӀ чӏ
/t͡ʃʼ/
ЧӀчӏ чӏчӏ
/t͡ʃːʼ/
Ш ш
/ʃ/
Щ щ
/ʃː/
Ъ ъ
/ʔ/
Ы ы
/ɨ/
Ь ь
 
Э э
/e/
Ю ю
/ju/
Я я
/ja/


History


The literary language is based on the болмацӏ (bolmacʼ)[citation needed]bo = "army" or "country", and macʼ = "language"—the common language used between speakers of different dialects and languages. The bolmacʼ in turn was mainly derived from the dialect of Khunzakh, the capital and cultural centre of the Avar region, with some influence from the southern dialects. Nowadays the literary language is influencing the dialects, levelling out their differences.[citation needed]


The most famous figure of modern Avar literature is Rasul Gamzatov (died November 3, 2003), the People's Poet of Dagestan. Translations of his works into Russian have gained him a wide audience all over the former Soviet Union.[citation needed]



Samples





































































English Avar Transliteration IPA
Hello! Ворчӏами! Worç’ami! /wort͡ʃ’ami/
How are you doing? Щиб хӏaл бугеб? Şşib hal bugeb? /ʃːib ʜal bugeb/
How are you? Иш кин бугеб? İş kin bugeb? /iʃ kin bugeb/
What is your name? Дуда цӏар щиб? Duda c’ar şşib? /duda t͡s’ar ʃːib/
How old are you? Дур чан сон бугеб? Dur çan son bugeb? /dur t͡ʃan son bugeb/
Where are you going? Mун киве ина вугев? Mun kiwe ina wugew? /mun kiwe ina wugew/
Sorry! Тӏаса лъугьа! T’asa łuḩa! /t’asa ɬuha/
Where is the little boy going? Киве гьитӏинав вас унев вугев? Kiwe ḩit’inaw was unew wugew /kiwe hit’inaw was unew wugew/
The boy broke a bottle. Васас шиша бекана. Wasas şişa bekana. /wasas ʃiʃa bekana/
They are building the road. Гьез нух бале (гьабулеб) буго. Ḩez nux́ bale (ḩabuleb) bugo.
/hez nuχ bale (habuleb) bugo/


See also




  • Northeast Caucasian languages

  • Languages of the Caucasus



References





  1. ^ abc Avar at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
    Old Avar at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)



  2. ^ ab Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Avar". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History..mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"""""""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration{color:#555}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration span{border-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/12px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output code.cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#33aa33;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-right{padding-right:0.2em}


  3. ^ "Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: ava". ISO 639-2 Registration Authority - Library of Congress. Retrieved 2017-07-05. Name: Avaric


  4. ^ "Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: ava". ISO 639-3 Registration Authority - SIL International. Retrieved 2017-07-05. Name: Avaric


  5. ^ "UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger". UNESCO. Retrieved 19 April 2015.


  6. ^ ab Consonant Systems of the North-East Caucasian Languages on TITUS DIDACTICA


  7. ^ Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics p. 371.


  8. ^ Simon Crisp,"Language Planning and the Orthography of Avar", Folia Slavica 7, 1–2 (1984): 91–104.


  9. ^ ab Simon Crisp, "The Formation and Development of Literary Avar", pp. 143–62, in Isabelle T. Kreindler, ed., Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Soviet National Languages: Their Past, Present and Future, Contributions to the Sociology of Language, 40 (Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1985).


  10. ^ Omniglot on the Avar alphabet, language and pronunciation




External links







  • RFE/RL North Caucasus Radio (also includes Chechen and Adyghe)


  • Avar language corpus (in English, Russian, Polish and Belarusian)

  • Avar Cyrillic-Latin text and website converter

  • Online Avar–Russian dictionary

  • Avar language information in Russian













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