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Nuristani Kalasha
Waigali
Kalaṣa-alâ
Native to	Afghanistan
Region	Nuristan Province
Native speakers	12,000 (2011)
Language family	Indo-European Indo-Iranian Nuristani Nuristani Kalasha
Early forms	Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-Iranian Proto-Nuristani
Language codes
ISO 639-3	wbk
Glottolog	waig1243
ELP	Waigali
Linguasphere	58-ACC-a
Nuristani Kalasha is classified as Definitely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

Nuristani Kalasha (Kalaṣa-alâ), also known as Waigali, is a Nuristani language spoken by about 10,000 people in the Nuristan Province of Afghanistan. The native name is Kalaṣa-alâ 'Kalasha-language'. "Waigali" refers to the dialect of the Väi people of the upper part of the Waigal Valley, centered on the town of Waigal, which is distinct from the dialect of the Čima-Nišei people who inhabit the lower valley. The word 'Kalasha' is the native ethnonym for all the speakers of the southern Nuristani languages.

Nuristani Kalasha belongs to the Indo-European language family, and is in the southern Nuristani group of the Indo-Iranian branch. It is closely related to Zemiaki and to Tregami, the lexical similarity with the latter being approximately 76% to 80%.

It shares its name with the Indo-Aryan Kalasha language (Kalaṣa-mun), spoken in Pakistan's southern Chitral District, but the two languages belong to different branches of Indo-Iranian. Speakers of Nuristani Kalasha (Kalaṣa-alâ) are sometimes called "Red Kalasha", while the speakers of Indo-Aryan Kalasha are called “Black Kalasha.” The Kalash people are very close to the Nuristani people in terms of culture and historic religion. According to linguist Richard Strand the Kalasha of Chitral apparently adopted the name of the Nuristani Kalasha, who at some unknown time had extended their influence into the region of southern Chitral.

Name

The name Kalasha-ala comes from Kalaṣa [kalaˈʂa], a term denoting the Kalash people, which also covers the distantly related Indo-Aryan Kalasha language (Kalaṣa-mun), hence the language is called "Nuristani Kalasha". The name "Waigali" comes from Vägal [væˈɡal] < Vâigal [vaːi̯ˈɡal], from Vä [ˈvæ] < Vâi [ˈvaːi̯] "Vai" and gal [ˈɡal] "valley".

Dialects

According to linguist Richard Strand, Nuristani Kalasha contains several dialects spoken among the Väi, Vai, or Vä peoples, the Čima-Nišei people, and the Vântä people. Within the Väi, the Väi-alâ, Ameš-alâ, and Ẓönči-alâ subdialects are spoken. Among the Čima-Nišei, the Nišei-alâ and Čimi-alâ subdialects are spoken. The exact dialect of the Vântä is unclear, but is most probably Nišei-alâ. For this article, most cited forms will be based on the Nišei dialect (Nišei-alâ).

Phonology

Symbols in brackets are foreign sounds.

1. /ɳ/ becomes intervocalically.
2. /w/ becomes before /ɹ, ɹ̃/ and next to front vowels.
3. Post-consonantally, /ɽ/ retroflexes the following vowels in the word, sounding like a /ɹ/ before or after the vowel. Post-consonantally before a front vowel, /ɽ/ simply turns to /ɹ/.

Vocabulary

Pronouns

Numbers

1. ev
2. dü
3. tre
4. čatâ
5. pũč
6. ṣu
7. sot
8. oṣṭ
9. nu
10. doš

References

1. ^ Nuristani Kalasha at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
2. Halfmann, Jakob. "Terminological Proposals for the Nuristani languages". In: Himalayan Linguistics , 2021. ; https://escholarship.org/uc/item/59p9w3r6
3. Grünberg, A.L. (1999). "Zemiaki jazyk/dialekt". In Edelman, D.I. (ed.). Jazyki mira: Dardskie i nuristanskie jazyki. Moscow: Indrik. p. 123. ISBN 585759085X.
4. Acta orientalia: ediderunt societates orientales Batava, Danica, Norvegica. E.J. Brill. 2006.
5. "Richard Strand's Nuristân Site: The Sound System of Nišei-alâ". nuristan.info. Retrieved 2023-06-06.

Bibliography

• Strand, Richard F. (2022). "Ethnolinguistic and Genetic Clues to Nûristânî Origins". International Journal of Diachronic Linguistics and Linguistic Reconstruction. 19: 267–353.

External links

• Strand, Richard F. (1997). "Nuristan: Hidden Land of the Hindu-Kush". Retrieved 2012-01-16.
• Strand, Richard F. (1998). "The Kalaṣa of Kalaṣüm". Retrieved 2012-01-16.
• Strand, Richard F. (2011). "Kalaṣa-alâ Lexicon". Retrieved 2012-01-16.
• Strand, Richard F. (2011). "The Sound System of Kalaṣa-alâ". Retrieved 2015-05-07.

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