Малые индоарийские языки Северной Индии: язык куллуи

Abstract

The project aims at documenting the Indo-Aryan Kullui language. This unwritten minor language of the Himachali Pahari group is common in Kullu district in Himachal Pradesh (India). The core objective of the project is to describe Kullui through field methods in linguistics. The study includes the collection of sociolinguistic information, grammar description, compi­ling a dictionary, as well as recording texts. The project run by A.S. Krylova, Yu.V. Mazurova, E.A. Renkovskaya, E.M. Shuvannikova (Knyazeva) is carried out under the auspices of the Institute of Linguistics, the Russian Academy of Sciences. 
 During the linguistic expeditions to Himachal Pradesh, the researchers collected insights into the sociolinguistic situation: types of multilingualism, areas of use of the main languages in the region — Kullui, Hindi, English, etc.; studied the language features of different generations. The research shows the dynamics of the linguistic situation: in the older generation, especially, among women, there are cases of monolingual language — knowledge of the local language alone; the middle generation, as a rule, speaks several languages — Hindi, one or several local languages/dialects, some also know English (its Indian version). In addition, some people know Punjabi, Urdu, Nepali to some extent, which is associated with the geographic location and history of Himachal Pradesh. Young people and schoolchildren demonstrate the onset of a language shift: many people know Himachali languages and use them in everyday life; however, the use of minor languages is gradually restricted to communication with older family members. The key communication tool for the younger generation is Hindi, for educated youth — both Hindi and English.
 A detailed description of minor languages is relevant right now, while they still retain their authenticity and used by all generations. It is crucial to document them using new modern technologies (voiced dictionaries, gloss texts with audio and video recordings). Existing as a means of oral communication, Kullui and other minor languages of Himachal Pradesh currently lack standardized writing. The research team has developed a phonological transcription based on the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) for recording oral speech, as well as morphological parsing for grammatical material.