| 1.6.4 |
It
is a general tendency in Hmar that in full sentences
the rising and falling tones are carried by the verb
and auxiliaries; other elements normally carry the
level tone. The following examples could be seen: |
|
/hú
r h/
|
‘come’ |
| /và
fé rh/
|
‘go there’ |
| /án
thàt nh/
|
‘they donot kill’ |
| /zá:m
rh/
|
‘go away’ |
| /án
zà:m/ |
‘they fled away’ |
|
Marking
of the tone is necessary when words occur in sentences.
In isolation, words may occur in level tone only. Example- |
| /fe:/ |
‘go’ |
| /hu/
|
‘come’ |
| /that/ |
‘kill’ |
|
| 1.6.5 |
The
tone of a word in a sentence may differ from that
of the same word in isolation. When other forms are
added to construct larger forms tone generally gets
altered. The following examples could be seen : |
|
| /sìem/
|
in
isolation means ‘make’, |
| /síemà
síemì/ |
calling a person ‘Siema
or Sìemi’ |
| /ròusíem/
|
when it forms a complex form with another form
preceding it, and |
| /lálróu
sìem/ |
when it forms a compound with another complex
form preceding it. |
|
The
tone of the second constituent in the last example remains
same as that in the first example as the first constituent
is a complex one and the second constituent begins as a
fresh one. |
| 1.6.6 |
Following
the above scheme of tonal representation, tones are
indicated in the examples in this Grammar. The tone
representation here represents the speech pattern
of the Hmar as spoken in Assam-Manipur area. |
|
|
|
Hmar
possesses altogether 32 speech sounds, 11 vowels of which
one has a slant towards an active diphthong /ou/ and 21
consonants. Hmar speech sounds closely resemble those of
other sister languages of Kuki-Chin group such as Mizo and
Kom. |
|
The
vowels in Hmar could be represented in the following table
as per their point and manner of articulation. It may be
seen that 5 vowels manifest both short and long varieties.
A very short dipthong /ou/ sound, represented in the alphabet
as [o] manifests only short variety. However it is conveniently
combined with other vowels to produce other dipthong sounds
where [o] tends to take the place of [ ] |
|
Front |
Central |
Back |
| high |
i i: |
|
u u: |
| high-mid |
e e: |
|
o: |
| low-mid |
|
|
|
| low |
|
a
a: |
|
|
Hmar seems to form dipthongs and tripthongs
as under:
/ie
ei ui uo ou ai au eu iei uou and uoi/ |
