Tai peoples

Tai

Tai/Dai women in Yunnan, China.
Regions with significant populations
China (mainly Dai people), Burma (Shan people), Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and India (Ahom people)
Languages
Tai–Kadai languages, languages of resident countries
Religion
Theravada Buddhism, animism, or Hinduism

Tai peoples refers to the population of descendants of speakers of a common proto-Tai language, including sub-populations which no longer speak a Tai language. Some 8-10 million people in Northeast India (not limited to Assam) descent from Ahom people but may have intermarried with others and now speak Assamese. Additional tens of thousands in India speak Tai languages (mostly in Arunachal Pradesh). Aside from India, Tai peoples can generally be identified through their language.

Names

Main article: Tai languages

Speakers of the many languages in the Tai branch of the Tai–Kadai language family are spread over many countries in Southern China, Indochina and Northeast India. Unsurprisingly, there are many terms used to describe the distinct Tai peoples of these regions.

In China, Southwestern Tai peoples are called by the very large umbrella term "Dai people", distinguishing them from the other speakers from the Tai branch of Tai–Kadai, who are known as the Rau.

Endonyms outside of China vary greatly; most common are variants of Tai, which may be taken to mean human; the more restricted term Lao is of unknown origin.[1]

The name "Lao" is used almost exclusively by the majority population of Laos, the Lao people, and two of the three other members of the Lao-Phutai subfamily of Southwestern Tai: Isan speakers (occasionally), the Nyaw or Yaw and the Phu Thai.

In contrast, the term T(h)ai predominates among Southwestern Thai speakers: Northern branch:

Chiang Saen branch:

Southern group

Origins

In a paper published in 2004, Linguist Laurent Sagart hypothesized that the proto-Tai–Kadai language originated as an Austronesian language that migrants carried from Taiwan to mainland China. Afterwards, the language was then heavily influenced by local languages from Sino-Tibetan, Hmong–Mien, or other families, borrowing much vocabulary and converging typologically.[2][3] Peoples speaking Tai languages migrated southward over the mountains into Southeast Asia, perhaps prompted by the coming of the Han Chinese to south China.

Linguistic heritage is not synonymous with genetic heritage, because of language shift where populations learn new languages. Tai people tend to have very high frequencies of Y-DNA haplogroup O2a with moderate frequencies of Y-DNA haplogroups O2a1 and O1. However, it is believed that the O1 Y-DNA haplogroup is associated with both the Austronesian people and the Tai. The prevalence of Y-DNA haplogroup O1 among Austronesian and Tai peoples also suggests a common ancestry with speakers of the Austroasiatic, Sino-Tibetan, and Hmong–Mien languages some 30,000 years ago in China. Y-DNA haplogroup O2a is found at high frequency among most Tai peoples, which is a trait that they share with the neighboring ethnic Austroasiatic peoples of Yunnan in southern China. Y-DNA haplogroups O1 and O2a are subclades of O Y-DNA haplogroup, which itself is a subclade of Y-DNA haplogroup K, a genetic mutation that is believed to have originated 40,000 years ago, somewhere between Iran and Central China.[4]

Recent studies suggest that while modern speakers of Tai languages are largely genetic descendants of the progenitor of the O2a haplogroup, the Proto-Tai language (along with the Proto-Austronesian language) may be distantly related to the Ongan languages of the Andaman Islands, and together with Austronesian and Ongan languages, the Tai-Kadai languages may be a relic of the language(s) spoken by descendants of the progenitor of Y-DNA haplogroup D (Blevins 2007).

Tai groups and names in China

Chinese Pinyin Tai Lü Tai Nüa Thai Conventional Area(s)
傣仂
（西雙版納傣族自治州） 		Dǎilè
(Xīshuāngbǎnnà Dǎi)		 tai˥˩ lɯː˩ ไทลื้อ Tai Lü, Tai Lue Xishuangbanna Tai Autonomous Prefecture (China)
傣那
（德宏傣） 		Dǎinà
(Déhóng Dǎi)		 tai˥˩ nəː˥ tai
le6 		ไทเหนือ, ไทใต้คง Tai Nüa, Northern Tai, Upper Tai, Chinese Shan Dehong (China); Burma
傣擔 Dǎidān tai˥˩ dam˥ ไทดำ, ลาวโซ่ง, ผู้ไท Tai Dam, Black Tai, Tai Lam, Lao Song Dam*, Tai Muan, Tai Tan, Black Do, Jinping Dai, Tai Den, Tai Do, Tai Noir, Thai Den Jinping (金平) (China), Laos, Thailand
傣繃 Dǎibēng tai˥˩pɔːŋ˥ ไทเมา Tay Pong Ruili (瑞丽), Gengma (耿马) (China),
along the Mekong
傣端 Dǎiduān tai˥˩doːn˥ ไทขาว White Tai, Tày Dón, Tai Khao, Tai Kao, Tai Don, Dai Kao, White Dai, Red Tai, Tai Blanc, Tai Kaw, Tày Lai, Thai Trang Jinping (金平) (China)
傣雅 Dǎiyǎ tai˥˩jaː˧˥ ไทหย่า Tai Ya, Tai Cung, Cung, Ya Xinping (新平), Yuanjiang (元江) (China)
傣友 Dǎiyǒu tai˥˩jiu˩ ไทยโยว Yuanyang (元阳) (China),
along the Red River
* lit. "Lao [wearing] black trousers"

Other Tai peoples and languages

Listed below are various lesser-known Tai peoples and languages.[5]

In Burma, there are also various Tai peoples that are often categorized as part of a larger Shan ethnicity (see Shan people#Tai groups).

Diaspora

Throughout Asia

In other parts of Asia, substantial Thai communities can be found in Japan, Taiwan and the United Arab Emirates.

Tai of North America

The United States is home to a significant population of Thai, Lao, Tai Kao, Isan, Lu, Phutai, Tai Dam, Tay and Shan people. There are a significant number of Thai and Lao people living in Canada as well.

Tai of Europe

The most significant communities of Tai peoples in Europe are in the Lao communities of the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Switzerland, the Isan communities of the United Kingdom and Iceland, the Thai communities of Finland, Iceland and Norway, the Tai Dam and Tay communities of France, and the Southern Thai community of the United Kingdom.

Thai of Oceania

There is a sizable Thai community in Australia, as well as a Northeastern Thai community in New Zealand.

Lao of Argentina

In recent times, large numbers of Lao and Hmong have migrated to Argentina as refugees.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Raendchen, Jana (October 10, 2005). "The socio-political and administrative organisation of müang in the light of Lao historical manuscripts" (PDF 316 KB). In paper 31. The Literary Heritage of Laos: Preservation, Dissemination and Research Perspectives, Vientiane: National Library of Laos. The Literary Heritage of Laos Conference, 2005. Website content written by Harald Hundius and David Wharton, Lao translation by Oudomphone Bounyavong, edited by Harald Hundius. Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin Preußischer Kulturbesitz: Digital Library of Lao Manuscripts. image 4, page 404. Retrieved September 12, 2013. Traditionally, these people called themselves according to the place of their settlement, combining the term “Tai” (man) with the place name, as for example Tai Müang Phuan, Tai Müang Swa (Luang Phabang). Though it is sure that the name “Lao” is the short form of Tai Lao, the very origin of the name “Lao” is not clear.
  2. ↑ http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/09/09/06/PDF/THE_HIGHER_PHYLOGENY_OF_AUSTRONESIAN.pdf Sagart, L. 2004. The higher phylogeny of Austronesian and the position of Tai–Kadai. Oceanic Linguistics 43.411-440.
  3. ↑ Stratification in the peopling of China: how far does the linguistic evidence match genetics and archaeology?
  4. ↑ Y-DNA Human Migration
  5. ↑ http://asiaharvest.org/index.php/people-group-profiles/china/
  6. ↑ Chazee, Laurent. 1998. Rural and ethnic diversities in Laos with special focus on the northern provinces. Presented for the Workshop on "Rural and Ethnic diversities in Laos with special focus on Oudomxay and Sayabury development realities", in Oudomxay province, 4-5 June 1998. SESMAC projects Lao/97/002 & Lao/97/003: Strengthening Economic and Social Management Capacity, Sayabury and Oudomxay provinces.

External links

Media related to Tai peoples at Wikimedia Commons

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