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Saraiki language
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| This December 2007 needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2007) |
| Saraiki | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Pakistan, India[1], Afghanistan[2] | |||
| Total speakers: | ~14,000,000 | |||
| Language family: | Indo-European Indo-Iranian Indo-Aryan NW zone Lahnda Saraiki |
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| Writing system: | Arabic alphabet,[3] Gurmukhi script,[3] Devanagari script[3] | |||
| Language codes | ||||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |||
| ISO 639-2: | inc | |||
| ISO 639-3: | skr | |||
|
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Saraiki (Perso-Arabic: سراییکی), also called Multani (Perso-Arabic: ملتانی, Gurmukhi: ਮੁਲਤਾਨੀ, Devanagari: मुल्तानी), is an Indo-Aryan (Indic)[4] language mostly spoken in the provinces of South Punjab in central Pakistan by about 13.9 million people (according to 1998 census) as well as by about 26,000 people in India,[5] and by a small minority in Afghanistan.[2]
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Saraiki is part of a dialect continuum with Punjabi and Sindhi. Saraiki, Punjabi and Sindhi are members of the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European family.
Saraiki is widely spoken and understood as a second language in northern and western Sindh down to the suburbs of Karachi and in the Kachhi plain of Balochistan. It is also known as Derawali in Derajat area. Saraiki is also spoken in North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and it is third popular language after Pashtu and Punjabi. Saraiki is widely spoken in southern NWFP areas specially in Dera Ismail Khan, Kulachi and in Tank District and also spoken widely in Lakki Marwat. It is mostly spoken in the south of Punjab in Dera Ghazi Khan, Multan, Mailsi, Vehari, Rahim Yar Khan, Rajan Pur and Bahawalpur in Pakistan.
In India, it is known as Multani and is spoken by the Multanis who settled mostly in the urban areas of the states of Punjab, Haryana, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi, and Gujarat after the partition of India in 1947. Their population in mainly concentrated in Delhi and in the towns of Haryana, such as Rohtak, Kaithal, Jind, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Fatehabad and Hissar.[4]
In Afghanistan, Kandahari, a dialect of Multani/Saraiki is a mother tongue of Afghan Hindus.[2]
Saraiki has three short vowels, seven long vowels and six nasal vowels.
| Bilabial | Labiodental | Dental | Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stops and affricates |
Voiceless | p pʰ | t̪ t̪ʰ | t tʰ | ʧ ʧʰ | k kʰ | ʔ | ||
| Voiced | b bʰ | d̪ d̪ʰ | d dʰ | ʤ ʤʰ | ɡ ɡʰ | ||||
| Implosives | ɓ | ɗ | ʄ | ɠ | |||||
| Nasals | m mʰ | n nʰ | ɳ | ɲ | ŋ | ||||
| Fricatives | Voiceless | f | s | ʃ | x | h | |||
| Voiced | v | z | ʒ | ɣ | |||||
| Trills | r rʰ | ||||||||
| Flaps | ɽ ɽʰ | ||||||||
| Laterals | l lʰ | ||||||||
| Semivowel | j | ||||||||
There are two writing systems for Multani / Saraiki. One is a variant of the Arabic script, which is in vogue today. Very few Saraiki speakers are literate in their own language, however, although some may be able to write other languages. However, the Hindus, especially the traders, wrote a script called Lahnda, which was written from left to right.[6][3][7] It is no longer used in present-day Pakistan, but there are still people of the generation that learned the script before the partition of India, when they had to flee, settle, and assimilate in different regions and linguistic territories of India and other places of the world. Some Indian Multanis also write in the Devanagari script.[8][3][9]
Seraiki language is spoken in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan.In reality it is spoken by seventy million people. Sikhs conquered these areas and attached some part of it with Peshawar and continuing their strategy British rulers divided this homogeneous community in to many administrative units. After partition Punjabis, Pashtons, Baluchis and Sindhis exploited Seraiki majority as slaves to produce raw material for their factories which they built in their own areas. Political autonomy was denied to them. The situation has deteriorated now and Seraiki youth demands a separate state according to 1940 Qarardad e Maqasad. (SQM)Seraikistan Qoumi Movement is headed by Hameed Asghar shaheen as President, phone# 064 2466129 and M. shahjahan Bhatti as General Secretary, phone# 03219604217. Dera Ismail Khan is the Central Secretariat of SQM. SQM demands referendum on the issue. It has published a detailed map of Seraikistan State. Let there be elections of a Constitution Assembly to decide the issue. A United States of Pakistan is the vision put forward by SQM.
- ^ Siraiki Language, Literature, Art and Culture. Siraikipoint. Retrieved on 2007-07-14.
- ^ a b c Introduction. Afghan Hindu. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- ^ a b c d e An Article about Siraiki Scripts. Siraiki Language. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- ^ a b Seraiki. Ethnologue. Retrieved on 2007-07-14.
- ^ The Multani of India. Bethany World Prayer Center. Retrieved on 2007-07-14.
- ^ People and Languages in the Pre-Islamic Indus Valley. University of Texas. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- ^ ਮੁਲਤਾਨੀ. Sri Guru Granth Sahib. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- ^ Multani poets relive memories of struggle. Indian Express. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- ^ Multani Writing. The Cyclopædia of India and of Eastern and Southern Asia. Retrieved on 2007-12-08.
- Ahsan, Wagha (1990). The Seraiki Language: Its Growth and Development. Islamabad: Dderawar Publications.
- Gardezi, Hassan N. (1996). Seraiki Language and its poetics: An Introduction. London: Sangat Publishers.
- Shackle, Christopher (1976). The Seraiki Language of Central Pakistan: A Reference Grammar. London: School of Oriental and African Studies.
- Shackle, Christopher (1977). "Siariki: A Language Movement in Pakistan". Modern Asian Studies 11 (3): 279–403.
- Ethnologue report for language code:skr
- Western Punjabi (Seraiki) Alphabet with Gurmukhi equivalents
- Wasaib.com Collection of Articles and other resources on Seraiki language & culture
- Phonemic Inventory of Seraiki Language and Acoustic Analysis of Voiced Implosives (PDF)