Khmer Abugida

Khmer Abugida

Kristina Guevarra ENG 592 12 May 2016





Introduction The language of Khmer is the primary language of the Kingdom of Cambodia, in Southeast Asia. While the language is originally traced to the Austro-Asiatic language family, Khmer orthography utilizes an abugida that has evolved from the Indian Brahmi script. An abugida is a phonographic writing system where all of the vowels are indicated in the orthography, but they are usually indicated through the use of diacritics that occur alongside the consonant graphemes (Rogers 205). Of the 14.2 million native speakers of Khmer, 12.9 million are in Cambodia. The Austro-Asiatic language family encompasses 168 languages, which are spread out across Southeast Asia. Of these 168 languages, 147 are in the branch of Mon-Khmer. While the exact origins of this language family are unknown, it is estimated that the original speakers may have migrated from southern China between 4000 and 4500 years ago. (Austro-Asiatic). Khmer speakers were introduced to the abugida writing system with the introduction of Hinduism by Indians during the pre-Angkorian period. The written script of Khmer descended from the Pallava script of 5th century Southern India and Southeast Asia. Pallava descended from the ancient Indian Brahmi script. The Indic-based orthographic systems of Mon and Khmer both date back to around A.D. 600 (Hartmann 8). Frequent interactions with Indian language groups led to many Sanskrit loan words during the spread of Hinduism during the first millennium A.D., followed by the introduction of Pali loan words during the spread of Buddhism, through to the 13th century.





Classification of Khmer Khmer is currently classified as a member of the Mon-Khmer branch of the Austro-Asiatic family of languages. Due to the use of an Indic script and a large number of borrowings from Indo-European languages such as Pali and Sanskrit, Cambodian students were taught that their language was related to Sanskrit and Pali until the middle of the twentieth century. A link to other Mon, Cham, and Vietnamese languages was first proposed in 1852, and Wilhelm Schmidt first proposed the Austro-Asiatic family of Southeast Asian languages in 1907 (Headley 431). Origin The earliest known documents found in Cambodia are written in Sanskrit, which appear two centuries earlier than Khmer. For the following millennia, Sanskrit fulfilled the role of the cultural language of the country, appearing in poetry, philosophy, and numerous temple carvings between the 5th and 14th century A.D. (Bhattacharya and Golzio 6). Ancient inscriptions found in temples dating back to the sixth century C.E. were written in both Sanskrit and Old Khmer (Smith 15). The Khmer inscriptions are primarily for listing property and assets, while the Sanskrit inscriptions describe the deeds of kings and their temples (Roveda 17). Khmer script is considered to be a Further Indian script, along with numerous other scripts found in Southeast Asia that were influenced by Indian religious and cultural influences in the region. Thailand and Laos have similar writing systems that have been adapted to their Sino-Tibetan languages, while Myanmar’s writing system was based on Southern Indian scripts (Nakanishi 70). Khmer is unique among these languages in that it is non-tonal. Despite a lack of





tones, Khmer has the largest inventory of letters of any language, at 74 (Robinson 169). Khmer makes up for a lack of tones with a very comprehensive vowel inventory, as indicated by the 24 unique vowel diacritics and 14 independent vowels. Many of the vowel diacritics can be further broken down into separate first-series and second-series phonological values. Sanskrit inscriptions have been found throughout mainland Southeast Asia dating back to the sixth-century C.E., when the Gupta dynasty maintained control of a large portion of the Indian subcontinent. As their power and influence grew, their influence spread outward towards Southeast Asia. Merchants and religious leaders disseminated Indian culture, religions, and the Sanskrit writing system throughout the region. (Smith 11-14) As the Khmer people adopted Hinduism and Buddhism, they also incorporated the Indian writing system, which they modified to fit their own language’s phonological structure. Since the earliest known examples of the Khmer script co-occur with Sanskrit inscriptions, the exact origin of the Khmer script is unknown. The first known Indianized kingdom of Southeast Asia, Funan, dates back to the first century C.E., and it is located in the same area as the first Khmer kingdom, ChenLa (550-802 C.E.). The earliest known Khmer inscription dates to 611 C.E., and it is believed to have been derived from the ancient South Indian Brahmi abugida. (Huffman, Lambert, and Proum 4) The political elites of Southeast Asia invited the Brahmins of India to their lands around the first and second centuries C.E., in an attempt to use Hinduism as a means of solidifying their position as leaders (Vecchia 50).





Writing Conventions In written Khmer, there is typically no spacing between different words in a sentence. However, there are many incidences where a space, or /kliǝ/, could occur: (Huffman, Lambert, and Proum, 54) 1. Between clauses within a sentence 2. Before/after proper names 3. Before/after numbers 4. Before/after symbols marking a full stop 5. Between coordinate words in a list 6. Between sentences in a group 7. After preposed adverbial words The direction of writing is from left to right. There is no distinction between uppercase and lowercase symbols. A full stop is indicated by the symbol ‘ ។ ’ at the end of a connected sequence of words, while the end of a chapter or text is indicated with a ‘ ៕.’ There are two common scripts found in Khmer writing. The most common type, /ʔaksɑː chɔɔ/ is used for running texts in a wide variety of publications. The second type, /ʔaksɑ muːl/, is a more elaborate, rounded text that is typically used for signs and titles. The following text illustrates a sample of the elaborate text (/ʔaksɑ muːl/) followed by the common text (/ʔaksɑː chɔɔ/). They both spell out the same thing: /ʔaʔsɑː kʰmaːe/ ‘Khmer script.’

(“Khmer Script”)





Consonants Khmer consists of a set of 33 consonant symbols, arranged in groups related to the place of articulation, from the back to front of the mouth. There are two series of consonants, which determine the phonological value of the vowel sound attached to the consonant in absence of a vowel diacritic. The series is indicated by the final sound of the consonant as listed below. The -aa consonants are of the first series, while the -ɔɔ consonants are in the second series. The phonetic representation for each consonant is listed below. When the consonant occurs in the ultimate position in a word, the final -aa/ɔɔ sound is eliminated. Word-final /r/ is deleted.

មក

/mɔːk/ ‘to come’

ឈរ

/chɔː/ ‘to stand’





បង

/bɒːŋ/ POL: addressing older person

ចត

/jɒːt/ ‘to park’



Subscript Consonants Khmer allows for a wide variety of prevocalic consonant clusters in syllables, including CCVC, CCCVC, CCVV, CCVVC, and CCCVVC (Huffman, Lambert, and Proum, 11). The second (and third in medial position) consonant symbol is represented by a subscript form, which is referred to as /cǝǝŋ qaqsɑɑ/ or ‘consonant feet’ (35). These subscripts typically occur below the initial consonant. Some of them wrap around the rear from the bottom (e.g.: /j, s, l/), and one preceded the initial consonant (/r/). In a consonant cluster, the consonant represented by the superscript is the initial sound. Two-consonant clusters occur in initial, medial, and final position in Khmer. Three-consonant clusters are limited to medial position. When there are three consonants, two subscripts are attached to the leading consonant in the order of their pronunciation. The majority of these clusters begin with a nasal, which is attached to the coda of the preceding syllable. The two remaining subscripts are attached to the following syllable, with a medial stop followed by a final /r/ (40). The following chart illustrates each consonant in its regular form with a subscript of the same consonant besides it, creating a geminate cluster:









Khmer Vowels

Independent vowels: There are 15 symbols in Khmer that represent an independent vowel, which occur infrequently in the languages. These graphemes are referred to as: /sraq pɨɲ tuǝ/. The rarity of these characters is reflected by the inconsistent pronunciation among native Khmer speakers, where variation is common (Huffman, Lambert, and Proum, 29).



អ

ʔa

អា

ʔaː

ឥ

ei

ឦ

eː

ឧ

oː

ឩ

ʔuː

ឪ

ow

ឫ

rə

ឬ

rʉʉ

ឭ

lə

ឮ

lʉʉ

ឯ

ae

ឰ

ai

ឱ

ao

ឳ

ʔoː



Dependent vowels diacritics: The majority of Khmer vowels are represented with diacritics that occur preceding, following, above, and below the consonant graphemes. These diacritics are referred to as /sraq/ (25). 1st

2nd

ា

aː

iə

ុ

o

u

ៀ

iə

1st

2nd

1st

2nd

ិ

e

i

ី

ូ

ou

uː

ួ

េ

ei

eː

ែ

ae

1st

2nd

əi

iː

ឹ

ə

ɨ

ឺ

ើ

aə

eː

ឿ

ɛː

ៃ

ay

ɨy

ោ

ao

oː

ាំ

am

oə̯m

ះ

ah

eə̯h

ោះ

ɑh

ŭəʰ

uə

ៅ

au

əw

ុំ

om

um

ំ

ɒm um

េះ

eh

ih

ុះ

oh

uh

ិះ

eh



ih

1st

2nd

əɨ

ɨː ɨə



Other Orthographic Symbols Khmer also contains diacritics that allow for further phonemic variation. The following diacritics are added to the consonant symbols ក (1st series: /kɒː/ ) and ម (2nd series: /mɔː/ ). [(Huffman, Lambert, and Proum, 47-57) (Nakanishi 74)]

ក់

/bɑntɑq/

Occurs above final consonant to indicate shortened vowel in syllable

ម៉

/museqkǝtŏǝn/

Converts a 2nd series consonant (Xɔː) to a 1st series (Xɒː)

ក៊

/trǝysap/

Converts a 1st series consonant (Xɒː) to a 2nd series (Xɔː)

កំ

/niqkəhət/

Shortens the inherent vowel and adds a nasal /m/ to the coda

កះ

/rĕǝhmuk/

Adds a final –h to the coda

ក័ក

/sanyook-saɲɲaa/ Used on some Pali/Sanskrit words: same meaning as កាក់ /kɒːk/

ម៍

/sɑmlap/

placed above a grapheme to indicate that the sound is not pronounced

ម+

/kaaqkəbaat/

high/rising intonation

Punctuation

។

/khan/

Full stop: marks a transition in theme/topic or the end of a paragraph

៕

/lbah/

Full stop: marks end of a chapter or entire text

៚

/koo-mout/

Marks end of a text (poetic and religious texts)

៙

/pnɛɛk mŏǝn/

Marks beginning of religious and literary texts

៖

/cɑmnoc pii kuuh/ Similar to a colon, indicates ‘as follows’ or ‘that is’

ៗ

/leik too/



Indicates reduplication of a word or phrase



Sample Text and Analysis

(Sak-Humphry, 2) kraoy pii prɑcum cɑp pliem louk Sare baan cih kaʔpal hah pii pnum pɨɲ tɨv kʰaet siǝm riep daəmbəy tɨv leeŋ kmuəy koat nɨŋ tɨv məəl praasaat ʔɑŋkɔɔ voat. Pii ləə kaʔpal hah koat məəl kʰəəɲ bəŋ tʊənlee saap nɨŋ tʊənlee meekoŋ hoo kat pʰuum viel tumniep dooc mriem day

after from meeting finish as soon as Mr. Sarii PST travel by airplane from Phnom Penh to province Siem Reap in order to visit nephew they and to visit temple Angkor Wat. From on airplane he observes to see lake Tonle Sap and River Mekong flowthrough countryside flat low-lying like fingers.

“After his meeting, Mr. Sarii flew on an airplane from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap to visit his nephew and Angkor Wat. From the airplane, the Mekong river and Tonle Sap looked like fingers flowing through the countryside.”





Observations: One of the first distinctions noticed by the text is the lack of space between the graphemes. This makes it difficult for a non-native reader to identify the word or morpheme boundaries. There are several dozen identifiable characters written in a row, which suggests that the graphemes represent individual sounds, rather than whole morphemes. One grapheme, which is found at the end of the passage as well as at the halfway point, could be reasonably assumed to indication some kind of punctuation. This grapheme is indeed the marker for a full stop: ‘ ។ ’ Another distinctive feature apparent from this passage is the absence of upper case/lower case graphemes, since they are all of the same approximate height. There are a number of diacritics, which occur both on the top and bottom of the main graphemes, which is a feature that is commonly found in abugidas. A closer inspection of the text reveals that diacritics occur preceding and following the graphemes. They also appear above and below the main graphemes, while sometimes wrapping halfway around the main consonant symbol. Since the spacing is on the right side of the text, it is a safe assumption to conclude that the writing is performed from left to right. Despite the lack of spaces between most graphemes, there are a few spaces in the text. In the first line, there is a space between the preposed adverbial clause and the main clause of the sentence. In the second line, there is a space between two clauses. There is also a space after the final stop mark at the end of the sentence. In the third line, there is a space between coordinate words in a list. This spacing is consistent with the rules outlined in the 'Writing Conventions' section above.





Conclusion The Khmer orthography is a very complex and iconic writing system. While it offers a myriad of options in specifying vowel sounds, consonant clusters, and punctuation, there is still some noticeable depth in the orthography. Like many other writing systems that evolved from Sanskrit and Brahmi, it is relatively conservative in retaining a link to its source and history. There are some graphemes that are always written but never pronounced (e.g. word-final /r/). The orthography does offer some clues to the reader, such as the sickle-shaped /sɑmlap/ (aka ‘to kill’), which indicates when the grapheme beneath it is not intended to be pronounced. Given the large inventory of graphemes and a wealth of writing conventions, it is certainly not one of the easiest languages to learn to read and write. However, it is a unique system that retains a clear link to the past, connecting the ancient civilizations of the Indus valley, the rich history and traditions of Hinduism and Buddhism, and the empire of Angkor. Brahmi-inspired abugidas have borne witness to the rise of great civilizations along with the evolution of humanity, and the Khmer writing system is certainly no exception. As the English language/Latin alphabet hegemony continues to expand to all corners of the planet through technology and globalization, it is of great importance to keep the vast array of orthographies alive and well. Khmer has been able to incorporate new loan words from a wide variety of languages, and it survived an attempt by colonial France to replace it with a Latin-based alphabet. Hopefully, the Khmer abugida will continue to adapt, and it will be fully integrated in whatever technological advances come along as communication continues to evolve.





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