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Languages of South Asia
Languages of the Andamans

History
The recent genetic and anthropological data place the human habitation of the
Andamans around 70,000 years before the present.
Currently, the Andamanese tribes and their languages are highly endangered.
The earliest study of the Islands dates back to 1790, but it was from 1869
onwards that serious study of the ethnography of the islanders began.

The population of the Andamans was 314,239 in 2001.

Locals: Bengali, Hindi, Kharia, Kurux, Karen, Malayali, Mundari, Tamilian, and
Telugu.
Andamanese Tribals: Great Andamanese, Jarawa, Onge and Sentinelese.
Migrants or Settlers: from the mainland migrated in the last 15 years.

The entire area of the Andaman islands is divided into five island clusters.
Apart from Ritchie Archipelago, North Sentinel, and Little Andaman, the large
main islands are collectively called the Great Andamans.
The close proximity of these islands gives a picture of practically one island.

The Number of Tribes
Various studies in the past, both linguistic and genetic, suggest that the
Andamanese languages might be the last representative of pre-Neolithic
Southeast Asia.
Analysis of their mitochondrial DNA have led scientists to conclude that
Andamanese have closer affinities to Asian than to African populations and that
they are descendants of early Palaeolithic (old-stone age) colonizers of Southeast
Asia.
Geographical isolation probably aided the survival of ancient human lineages in
the Andamanese.

Living Andamanese tribes can be grouped into four major groups, i.e. the Great
Andamanese, the Jarawa, the Onge and the Sentinelese.
Barring the Sentinelese, the other tribes have been exposed to the Mainlanders.
All attempts to establish contact with Sentinelese have failed so far.
The Jarawa came to be known to the mainlanders very recently; the first contact,
as is generally believed, was established in 1997.

The demographic scale of these Islanders is inversely related to the period of
contact with the mainlanders.
The longer and deeper the contact, the smaller the population.
An estimated population of 3000 to 3500 Great Andamanese 9in the early part of
the nineteenth century was reported to have reduced to 625 by the twentieth
century (Census 1901).
Since then, the population has declined drastically to 37.

The main reasons for such a decline has been a disturbance in the ecological
balance, a high rate of diseases brought in by the contact with non-tribals and
high rate of infant mortality.
It was as late as 1968 that the Andaman Government, on the recommendation of
the anthropologists made a policy decision of resettling the surviving tribes in an
island called Strait Island, about 68 nautical miles from Port Blair.
They have been totally dependent on the authorities for food, clothing and
shelter ever since.

While the Great Andamanese diminished in number due to ailments and diseases
brought in by contact, the other important tribe, i.e. the Jarawa declined by what
could be termed as genocide by the colonial rule.
The Indian government decided to build a Grand Trunk road cutting through the
thick forests of the Jarawa, thus wiping out all the survival modes of the tribes.
In retaliation, the tribes fought with arrows and bows but could not withstand
the modern guns.

The common story that researchers have heard at various government offices
was that these tribes were electrocuted as and when they came near the
construction sites demarcated by electric wiring.
The very name JARAWA meaning stranger was given by Aka Bae, one of the ten
tribes of the Great Andamanese.
The Jarawas refer to themselves by the term ang [i:ng] meaning we people.

The two tribes, Jarawa and Great Andamanese have had a long history of
animosity and fights among them.
This was especially true of the times when the Great Andamanese occupied the
north and the middle of the island [19th century] and the Jarawa were settled in
the southern part of the island.

The third important tribe, only 94 in number as of 2002, is the Onge, settled in
the island called the Little Andaman south of the Great Andaman.
There are two settlements of Onge in the island since 1976.
Onges are far away from any feeling of personal possession and thus any catch of
turtle or dugong [sea cow or water pig, an endangered species] is distributed
to all, old people, women and children alike.

Their knowledge of the various medicinal qualities of the different parts of the
meat guides them in deciding which part to offer to whom.
No child below fifteen speaks the native language.
This is the only tribe where the younger generation is even losing a passive
knowledge of their mother tongue.

Among the southern dwellers of the island is the Sentinelese.
A rough estimate by the Government of India lists them as a population of 100.
However, no one has done a head count yet and the tribe is hostile to foreign
intervention even today.

Fear of extinction as a community and availability of marriageable boys within

the community is forcing women to marry outside the Great Andamanese tribe.
Many women do not mind having children from the locals.
The Great Andamanese are being wiped out as a viable tribe.

The Great Andamanese Language
As of today, the Great Andamanese speak a mixed version of 10 language
varieties of the same language family.
No two speakers speak the same language variety as each one of them has
descended from mixed marriages of different tribes within the same langauge
family.
Mutual intelligibility between these languages helps the communication media
going.

The domination of one linguistic group over the other is entirely missing.
Todays Great Andamanese speech is a kind of levelling of different linguistic
systems.
The linguistic system of Great Andamanese appears to be close to Koineization.
Koineization refers to the linguistic processes that occur when different
dialects or closely related subsystems come into contact. (Siegel 1993:6)

Lico, Female, age 44, [Jero+Puchikar, Khora]
Naw Junior, male, age 55, [Bo+ Sare, claims to speak Jero]
Peje, male, age 53, [Jero+Khora]
Jo, male, age 25 [Jero+Sare]
Bo,female, age 29, [Bo+Jero]
Golat, male, age 45 [Khora+Jero]

The statistical predominance of Jero speakers has helped Jero features to
penetrate into other varieties of Great Andamanese.
Though the languages of the Andamanese family had been away from the Indian
areal pressures, yet we find, surprisingly, an abundance of aspirated and
retroflex consonants.

Great Andamanese offers a four way phonemic contrast with nasals, while
aspiration contrast is limited to voiceless sounds only.

The discovery of the occurrence of voiced and voiceless bilabial fricatives [] and
[] as well as sporadic occurrence of labialised laretal [lw] are interesting as
these sounds are not known to exist in any other language of the Andaman nor in
any other Indian language.

The following sounds pairs are in free variation at the intra-community level.
[~p~f]
[~l~w~lw]
[kh~x]
[s~]

The sounds in free variation vary from speaker to speaker thus confirming the
hypothesis that speakers of the language family are not descendents of the
speakers of the same language.

Great Andamanese has a seven-vowel system of [i, e, , a, u, o, ], and offers a

very large combination of diphthongs.

Morphophonemics
1. The final consonant of genitive morpheme of CVC nature drops if the following
morpheme begins with a consonant.
hr-boi > h-boi
my husband
hr-ut-julu > h-tu-juluin front of me

2. Two identical vowels are not allowed adjacent to each other.
bi-ikko > bekku burnt

3. Degemination of consonant results in compensatory length of the previous
vowel.
bekku > be:ku burnt

4. The language offers a strong tendency of vowel harmony.
/uosem/ > /uosom/ listen to me carefully

Pronouns
First person plural has the distinction of exclusive/inclusive, --/ma/ or /mo/ and
/meam/
A four-way distinction in third person pronouns in terms of proximate, distant
[visible], remote [invisible], and a reference to something/someone in
intermediate position between proximate and very proximate are maintained.

Pronouns

Singular

Plural

1st person [exclusive]

hu

ma

1st person [inclusive]

me

2nd person [exclusive]

ni ~ a

ole

2nd person [honorific]

eli

2nd person [inclusive]

ale

3rd person [distant, visible]

una

3rd person [distant, invisible]

u ~ o

niyo

3rd person [proximate, intermediate]

khudi

____

3rd person [proximate, very close]

khidi

_____

The Jarawa Language
The absence of bilabial aspirated sound leaves a gap in the symmetrical
distribution of plosives.

Jarawa provides a nine vowel system.

Front open vowel [] and mid [e] vary freely.

Morphophonemics

1. The voicing rule
cj /V+---V
ni-wa-caa > ni-wa-jaa your house

2. The final vowel of the personal prefix is dropped if the word it attaches to
begins with a vowel
n+ejale>[n-ejale] forehead
n+obaa > [n-obaa] palm

But
n+pahuga > beard
The Jarawa Language-Morphophonemics

3. The Vowel Harmony Rule applies to personal prefix
[-round] [round]/---+ (C)V
Thus
[on-o] finger
[n-ila] waist
[on-u] leg

The Onge Language

The current speech of Onge does not attest voiceless bilabial unaspirated [p] and
voiceless aspirated retroflex [h].
Fricative [s] was also missing.
The inventory of vowels in Onge matches with that of Jarawa.

Morphophonemics
1. Epenthetic semivowel [y] is inserted intevocalically.
/ia/ bow is rendered as [iya].

2. The following vowel coalescence rule applies when personal pronouns are
prefixed to any lexical item.
mi + a > ma mine, to me
gi+ ejeka > gejeka from him

BODY DIVISION CLASSES-Great Andamanese

The BODY DIVISION CLASSES indicate seven divisions of the human body.
They not only classify body part terms but also individuate noun reference and
event semantics.
These classes have realizations in bound morphemes and are termed BODY
CLASS markers in the Great Andamanese grammar.

The seven divisions of the human body
There are seven distinct divisions or areas that are recognized within the human
body and each is symbolized by a monosyllabic or disyllabic body class marker
They serve as a possessive class marker, which is preceded by the appropriate
term for the body part i.e., the head noun.
The typical structure of a noun phrase with body part terminology is:
Rclass n=D
Here R is a possessor
D is the dependent noun

Seven basic zones in the partonomy of the body
Body division
classes

Partonomy of human body

BODY CLASS MARKERS

Mouth and its semantic extension

a-

Major external body parts and face-related

r-

Extreme ends of the body like toes and

fingernails

o-

Bodily products and part-whole relationship

ut-

Organs inside the body

e-

Parts designating round shape/ sexual organs

ara-

Parts for legs and related terms

o- ~ -



h=a=

pho
1sg=cl1.poss=
cavity
my mouth cavity

h= r=

co
1sg=cl2.poss=
head
my head

nao ut=hi
Nao cl4.poss=breath
Naos breath

=e=

teu
2sg=cl5.poss
pancreas
your pancreas

Of these seven classes, five are used to classify various kinship relations.
these are: a-, r-, ut-, ara-, and o-.

lico ut= thire
licho cl4.poss=child
lichos child

lico r=boi
licho cl2.poss=spouse
lichos husband

The inherency and inalienability factors
The conceptualization by the Great Andamanese is anthropocentric.
They use human categorization to describe and understand non-human
concepts.
The human body provides the most important model for expressing concepts not
only of spatial orientation, but also of relational nouns, attributive categories,
inherently related objects of actions and events, or any two objects or two events
which are conceptually dependent upon each other.

The semantics of conceptual dependency engulfs the concept of inalienability
and inherency.
Between varying degrees of inalienability lie various kinds of inherent relations.

1. Separated body parts
the separated parts of the body of an animal are obligatorily attached with a
body class marker, indicating its inanimate nature.
hence all such terms are preceded by t-
a.ra r=co Pigs head
b.ra tr=co Pigs head [cut]
c.khee ra=uli Cats tail

d.khee tara=uli
Cats tail [cut]

2. Part-to-whole relationship
The same strategy is applied to describe the part-to-whole-relationship.
a. bun tr=phir

The sharp edge of a shell
b. fc ta=pho

Mouth of a vessel
c. khidr tr= Branch of a coconut
The fact that separated body parts and parts of an object are expressed similarly
indicated the inherent relationship between a whole and its parts.

3. Other nouns
a.Associatives such as language, words, names, clan, community, e.g. r=liu his
name.
b.Ailments both physical and mental, e.g. er=ee measles.
c.Spatial terms, e.g. e=julue in front of
d.Seascape and lanscape terms, e.g. buruin ter=tekh-il in the middle of the
mountain

Modifiers
The body part semantics individuate attribution of an object (adjective) or of an
action (adverb).
Inherently relational elements are conceptually dependent and thus also define
attributes.
the inherent attribute may include inherent personal attributes such as
propensity, nature, weight, height, size, shape, state of health, temperature, blood
pressure, energy, bodily function, consciousness, courage, fear, name, and others.

Classificatory functions of body division classes in adjectives
class
number

body class
markers

semantics

examples

a-

mouth-related attribute

a= mu dumb
a= tutlup greedy

r-~ er-

external attribute

r= achil surprised
r= buoi beautiful

o- ~ on-

attributes related to limbs

on= toplo alone

o= karacay lame

ut- ~ ot-

negative attribute

ot= lile decay

ot= lkho nude

e- ~ i- ~ -

inherent attribute

e= sare salty
= bn soft

ara-

belly related attribute

ara=kaa stout/drawf
ara= kaa big bellied

o- ~ -

attribute of shape and

texture

o= balo round
o-phelaa slippery

Verbs
The body part semantics shift into event type semantic categories of various
kinds.
the body class markers combine with transitive and intransitive verbal roots.
Hence, verbs with body class marker 4, for emission ot-, would refer to an action
of motion away from the speaker such as go, exit.

Thus,
h=ut=cone-bom I am going
or, where something is being (not necessarily tangibly) generated an in
experiential verbs.
thire ut= hee-bom the child is hungry.

Elements of experience are an inherent part of the experience (hence
inalienable) and emerge involuntarily in a person.

Verbs like shake and kiss have the class marker 2, i.e. er- for major external
body parts and face related concepts.
Verbs like pound or beat to a pulp uses class marker 5, i.e., e- for internalized
objects.

Locations
Various body class markers can attach to the same nominal modifying it further
to indicate various locations of the object noun.
a.ot=cala scar left by arrow-head
b.er=cala scar on the head
c.o=cala scar on the limbs

Spatial References
Various spatial references are individuated by body division classes.
The basic division is between up/down; in/out, and periphery /centre.
Class 3 for extremities does not refer to any spatial concept.
The role of extremities to indicate spatial concepts in other languages have been
observed as virtually insignificant (Heine 1997).

Body division classes designating spatial relation

class No.

BODY CLASS
MARKER

body division

spatial relations

a-

mouth cavity

surface

r-

face

anterior, exterior

ut-

body products

posterior, superior

e-

internal parts

interior, centre

ara-

sides

periphery

lower parts

inferior