Digaro languages


The Digaro, Northern Mishmi, or Kera'a–Tawrã languages are a possible small family of possibly Sino-Tibetan languages spoken by the Mishmi people of southeastern Tibet and Arunachal Pradesh.
The languages are Idu and Taraon. Lexical similarities are restricted to certain semantic fields, so a relationship between them is doubtful.

External relationships

They are not related to the Southern Mishmi Miju languages, apart from possibly being Sino-Tibetan. However, Blench and Post suggests that they may not even be Sino-Tibetan, but rather an independent language family of their own.
Blench classifies the Digaro languages as part of the Greater Siangic group of languages.

Names

Autonyms and exonyms for Digaro-speaking peoples, as well as Miju, are given below.
Taraon nameKaman nameIdu nameAssamese name
Taraon peopleda31 raŋ53tɕi31 moŋ35tɑ31 rɑŋ35Digaru;
Digaru Mishmi
Kaman peopletɕɑu53kɯ31 mɑn35mi31 tɕu55Midzu
Idu peopledju55;
dju55 ta31 rɑŋ53;
dɑi53		min31 dɑu55;
hu53		i53 du55Chulikata Mishmi
Zha people 扎人tɕɑ31 kʰen55tɕɑ31 kreŋ35——
Tibetan peoplelɑ31 mɑ55;
mei53 bom55		dɯ31 luŋ35;
hɑi35 hɯl55		ɑ31 mi53;
pu53;
mi31 si55 pu53		—

Registers

, Tawra, Kman, and Meyor all share a system of multiple language registers, which are :
  1. ordinary speech
  2. speech of hunters: lexical substitution, the replacement of animal names and others by special lexical forms, and sometimes short poems
  3. speech of priests/shamans: more complex, involving much language which is difficult to understand, and also lengthy descriptions of sacrificial animals
  4. poetic/lyrical register
  5. mediation register
  6. babytalk register