Kradai languages

Kradai Daic, Tai-Kadai
Geographic distribution:	Southern China, Southeast Asia, Hainan
Genetic classification:	One of the world's primary language families, with proposed affinities to Austronesian and Sino-Tibetan
Subdivisions:	Hlai Kra Kam-Sui Ong Be Tai
ISO 639-2 and 639-5:	tai
Distribution of the Kradai language family.      Kra      Kam-Sui      Bê      Hlai The Tai languages are:      Northern Tai      Central Tai      Southwestern Tai

The Kradai or Kra-Dai languages, also known as Daic, Kadai,^[1] or Tai-Kadai, are a language family of highly tonal languages found in southern China and Southeast Asia. The diversity of the Kradai languages in southeastern China, especially on Hainan, suggests that this is close to their homeland. The Tai branch moved south into Southeast Asia only in historic times, founding the nations that later became Thailand and Laos in what had been Austroasiatic territory.

External relationships

The Kradai languages were formerly considered to be part of the Sino-Tibetan family, but outside of China they are now classified as an independent family. They contain large numbers of words that are similar in Sino-Tibetan languages. However, these are seldom found in all branches of the family, and do not include basic vocabulary, indicating that they are old loan words (Ostapirat 2005).

Several Western scholars have presented suggestive evidence that Kradai is related to or a branch of the Austronesian language family. There are a number of possible cognates in the core vocabulary. Among proponents, there is yet no agreement as to whether they are a sister group to Austronesian in a family called Austro-Tai, a backmigration from Taiwan to the mainland, or a later migration from the Philippines to Hainan during the Austronesian expansion.

In China, they are called Zhuang-Dong languages and are generally considered to be related to Sino-Tibetan languages along with the Miao-Yao languages. It is still a matter of discussion among Chinese scholars whether Kra languages such as Gelao, Qabiao, and Lachi can be included in Zhuang-Dong, since they lack the Sino-Tibetan similarities that are used to include other Zhuang-Dong languages in Sino-Tibetan.

Internal classification

Kradai consists of five well established branches, Hlai, Kra, Kam-Sui, Tai, and the Ong Be (Bê) language:

• Ong Be (Hainan; Lin'gao in Chinese)
• Kra languages (called Kadai in Ethnologue and Ge-Yang in Chinese)
• Kam-Sui languages (mainland China; Dong-Shui in Chinese)
• Hlai languages (Hainan; Li in Chinese)
• Tai languages (southern China and Southeast Asia)

Based on the large number of vocabulary they share, the Kam-Sui, Be, and Tai branches are often classified together. (See Kam-Tai.) However, this is negative evidence, possibly due to lexical replacement in the other branches, and morphological similarities suggest instead that Kra and Kam-Sui be grouped together as Northern Kradai on the one hand, and Hlai with Tai as Southern Kradai on the other (Ostapirat 2006).

The position of Ong Be in this proposal is undetermined.

Origin and migrations

The study^{[clarification needed]} of over 100 East Asian populations including 30 Kradai-speaking peoples had reached the following conclusions. First, the Kradai-speaking populations show a great deal of genetic similarity although admixture with local populations did occur after its expansion.^{[citation needed]}

Secondly, a significant proportion^[vague] of southern Chinese populations carry a signature of Kradai-speaking populations.^{[citation needed]}

Thirdly, Taiwanese Aborigines are more similar^{[clarification needed]} to Kradai-speaking populations than they are to the other Austronesian populations, that is, the Malayo-Polynesians.^{[citation needed]}

Fourthly, the clustering of subfamilies of Kradai-speaking populations correlates well with that based on their genetic similarity indicating limited gene flow between them after their separation.^{[citation needed]}

Kradai-speaking populations originated in the southern part of East Asia and then migrated northwards and eastwards with Kam-Sui probably being the oldest.^{[citation needed]}

References

• Edmondson, J.A. and D.B. Solnit eds. 1997. Comparative Kadai: the Tai branch. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington. ISBN 0883120666
• Blench, Roger. 2004. Stratification in the peopling of China: how far does the linguistic evidence match genetics and archaeology? Paper for the Symposium "Human migrations in continental East Asia and Taiwan: genetic, linguistic and archaeological evidence". Geneva June 10-13, 2004. Université de Genève.
• Sagart, Laurent. 2004. The higher phylogeny of Austronesian and the position of Tai-Kadai. Oceanic Linguistics 43. 411-440.
• Ostapirat W (2005). "Kra-dai and Austronesian: notes on phonological correspondences and vocabulary distribution." pp 107–131 in Sagart L, Blench R & Sanchez-Mazas A (eds.) The peopling of East Asia: putting together archaeology, linguistics and genetics. London/New York: Routledge-Curzon.

Further reading

• Diller, A., J. Edmondson, & Yongxian Luo, ed., (2005). The Tai-Kadai languages. London [etc.]: Routledge. ISBN 070071457X
• Edmondson, J. A. (1986). Kam tone splits and the variation of breathiness.
• Edmondson, J. A., & Solnit, D. B. (1988). Comparative Kadai: linguistic studies beyond Tai. Summer Institute of Linguistics publications in linguistics, no. 86. [Arlington, Tex.]: Summer Institute of Linguistics. ISBN 0883120666
• Somsonge Burusphat, & Sinnott, M. (1998). Kam-Tai oral literatures: collaborative research project between. Salaya Nakhon Pathom, Thailand: Institute of Language and Culture for Rural Development, Mahidol University. ISBN 9746614509

Notes