The Politics of Language S Contact in the Himalaya ONNTAG EDITED BY SELMA K. SONNTAG AND MARK TURIN AND This book brings together linguisti c theory and empirical studies addressing human rights, multi lingual educati on, language ecology and endangered languages. It is essenti al reading T URIN The Politics of for students, practi ti oners, language acti vists and scholars working on language planning, multi lingual educati on, endangered languages and language politi cs. This is indeed an interdisciplinary book that is testi mony to why lesser-known languages matt er in the Himalaya ( Language Contact and beyond. EDS —Prof. Nirmal Man Tuladhar, Chair, Social Science Baha .) Although this book was writt en for a specialist audience of advanced scholars and doctoral in the Himalaya students, the authors successfully link these specifi c cases to broader issues in sociolinguisti cs, language policy and planning, and politi cal science. Hence this book will be of interest to scholars working on other contexts besides the Himalayan region; I am very pleased to see such a complex and interesti ng analysis of the politi cs of language contact. —Prof. James Tollefson, University of Washington The Politics of Language Contact in the Hima of Language Politics The This highly original and � mely collec� on brings together case studies from salient areas of the Himalayan region to explore the poli� cs of language contact. Promo� ng a linguis� cally and historically grounded perspec� ve, The Politi cs of Language Contact in the Himalayaoff ers nuanced insights into language and its rela� on to power in this geopoli� cally complex region. Edited by respected scholars in the fi eld, the collec� on comprises fi ve new research contribu� ons by established and early-career researchers who have been signifi cantly engaged in the Himalayan region. Grounded in a commitment to theore� cally informed area studies, and covering Tibet (China), Assam (India), and Nepal, each case study is situated within contemporary debates in sociolinguis� cs, poli� cal science, and language policy and planning. Bridging disciplines and transcending na� on-states, the volume off ers a unique contribu� on to the study of language contact and its poli� cal implica� ons. The Politi cs of Language Contact in the Himalaya is essen� al reading for researchers in the fi elds of language policy and planning, applied linguis� cs, and language and literary educa� on. The detailed introduc� on and concluding commentary make the collec� on accessible to all social scien� sts concerned with ques� ons of language, and the volume as a whole will be of interest to scholars in anthropology, sociolinguis� cs, poli� cal science and Asian studies. As with all Open Book publica� ons, this en� re book is available to read for free on the publisher’s website. Printed and digital edi� ons, together with supplementary digital material, can also be found at www.openbookpublishers.com laya Cover image: Edward Lear, Kinchinjunga (1877). Yale Center for Bri� sh Art, Public domain, h� p://discover.odai.yale.edu/ydc/Record/1670566. Cover design: Anna Ga� . book EDITED BY SELMA K. SONNTAG AND MARK TURIN eebook and OA edi� ons also available OPEN OBP ACCESS www.openbookpublishers.com https://www.openbookpublishers.com © 2019 Selma K. Sonntag and Mark Turin. Copyright of individual chapters is maintained by the chapters’ authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the text; to adapt the text and to make commercial use of the text providing attribution is made to the authors (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information: Selma K. Sonntag and Mark Turin (eds.), The Politics of Language Contact in the Himalaya. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2019, https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0169 In order to access detailed and updated information on the license, please visit, https:// doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0169#copyright Further details about CC BY licenses are available at, https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0/ All external links were active at the time of publication unless otherwise stated and have been archived via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine at https://archive.org/web Updated digital material and resources associated with this volume are available at https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0169#resources Every effort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notification is made to the publisher. ISBN Paperback: 978-1-78374-704-7 ISBN Hardback: 978-1-78374-705-4 ISBN Digital (PDF): 978-1-78374-706-1 ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 978-1-78374-707-8 ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 978-1-78374-708-5 ISBN XML: 978-1-78374-709-2 DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0169 Cover image: Edward Lear, Kinchinjunga (1877). Yale Center for British Art, public domain, https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/vufind/Record/1670566 Cover design: Anna Gatti. All paper used by Open Book Publishers is sourced from SFI (Sustainable Forestry Initiative) accredited mills and the waste is disposed of in an environmentally friendly way 4. The Significance of Place in Ethnolinguistic Vitality Spatial Variations Across the Kaike-Speaking Diaspora of Nepal Maya Daurio Group vitality has long been a framework for the inquiry into language maintenance and the sustainability of ethnolinguistic communities (Smith et al. 2017). Giles et al. (1977) conceptualized the vitality of an ethnolinguistic community ‘as that which makes a group likely to behave as a distinctive and active collective entity in intergroup situations’ (308). They outlined three objective ‘structural variables’ which together may ‘permit an ethnolinguistic community to survive as a viable group’ (308): demographics, institutional support, and status. Bourhis et al. (1981) introduced the concept of subjective vitality, the idea that a group’s own perception of its ethnolinguistic vitality and position relative to other ethnolinguistic groups also influences its viability. To better describe how vitality is used in language maintenance studies, Ehala (2015: 1) proposes a new definition, which posits that ‘ethnolinguistic vitality is a group’s ability to maintain and protect its existence in time as a collective entity with a distinctive identity and language.’ Roche characterizes this idea of vitality as the ‘relationship between a language, its speakers, and its wider linguistic, social, and political context’ (2017: 193). Ehala’s conceptualization comprises four key indicators: ‘continuing intergenerational transmission of a group’s language and cultural practices, sustainable demography and active © Maya Daurio, CC BY 4.0 https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0169.04 110 The Politics of Language Contact in the Himalaya social institutions, social cohesion, and emotional attachment to its collective identity’ (Ehala 2015: 1). Following Ehala’s framework, I examine the ethnolinguistic vitality of an endangered language community in Nepal over a four-decade period: the Kaike speakers from Tichurong Valley in Dolpa. I engage with both existing scholarship around vitality, identity, and language maintenance, as well as with ethnographies of the Kaike-speaking diaspora, to assess the variability and uniformity of ethnolinguistic vitality across the diaspora. I suggest that ethnolinguistic vitality among Kaike speakers can be differentiated both geographically and generationally, and is affected by fluctuations in the status and power of the language and its speakers. Building upon existing scholarship on negative demographic shifts and power disparities among language communities, I also argue that another indicator of ethnolinguistic vitality is the ability of the group to maintain and protect its existence — not only in time, but also in place (Landweer (2000), and Hildebrandt and Hu (2017) explicitly address spatial factors in the context of vitality). Memory of, and language about, place is a form of cultural knowledge which is site-specific, processual (Pearce and Louis 2008: 110), and shapes a group’s understanding of itself and its collective history. Kaike Speakers Kaike is a Tibeto-Burman language spoken by a group of people originating in the Tichurong Valley in Dolpa, Nepal (see Fig. 4.1). Dolpa is one of Nepal’s largest, least populated, and most remote districts. It is bounded by the Tibet Autonomous Region and Nepal’s districts of Mugu, Jumla, Jajarkot, Rukum, Myagdi, and Mustang, located in Karnali Zone. As of the 2011 Census, Dolpa had a total population of 36,700 people (Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), 2014: 278) and actually saw a population increase of 2.17% between 2001 and 2011 (CBS 2014: 24). Dolpa has among the fewest number of outmigrants, with less than 10% of the population in that category (CBS 2014: 256). It is also not a high inmigration district. Kaike speakers are often called Tarali, which in fact refers to any inhabitant of the Tichurong Valley, or Tichurongba in Tibetan. Throughout this chapter, I use the term ‘Tarali’ interchangeably with ‘Kaike-speaking Tarali’. Kaike speakers predominantly occupy three 4. The Significance of Place in Ethnolinguistic Vitality 111 villages in the Tichurong Valley, referred to here as Tarang,1 Tupatara and Tarakot. Members of the Kaike-speaking Tarali community also reside elsewhere, with the largest populations outside the Tichurong Valley in Kathmandu and in Dunai, the headquarters of Dolpa district. I conducted research during the course of two separate stays over a span of nine years in Tarang, Dunai, and Kathmandu, as well as virtually. This research is based on informal interviews conducted in Nepali and correspondence over social media and via email in English. Fig. 4.1. Tichurong Valley. Map provided by the author, CC BY. 1 Tarang is the Kaike name for the village referred to as Sahartara in Nepali.