<Article>Phonology of Burmese loanwords in Jinghpaw

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to provide a preliminary descriptive account of the phonological properties of Burmese loans in Jinghpaw especially focusing on their segmental phonology. Burmese loan phonology in Jinghpaw is significant in two respects. First, a large portion of Burmese loans, despite the fact that the contact relationship between Burmese and Jinghpaw appears to be of relatively recent origin, retains several phonological properties of Written Burmese that have been lost in the modern language. This fact can be explained in terms of borrowing chains, i.e. Burmese → Shan → Jinghpaw, where Shan, which has had intensive contact with both Burmese and Jinghpaw from the early stages, transferred lexical items of Burmese origin into Jinghpaw. Second, the Jinghpaw lexicon also contains some Burmese loans reflecting the phonology of Modern Burmese. These facts highlight the multistratal nature of Burmese loans in Jinghpaw. A large portion of this paper is devoted to building a lexicon of Burmese loans in Jinghpaw together with loans from other relevant languages whose lexical items entered Jinghpaw through the medium of Burmese.