Sani language

Sani (Chinese: 撒尼; pinyin: Sani) is one of the Loloish languages spoken by the Yi people of China. It is one of six Yi languages recognized by the Chinese government, under the name Southeastern Yi. Sani is spoken in Shilin, Luliang, Luxi, Shizong, Yiliang, Malong, Luquan, and Mile counties by about 120,000 speakers.^[2]

Sani
nɪ˨˩ do˨˩
Sani written in Yi script
Native to	China
Ethnicity	Yi
Native speakers	100,000 (2007)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman Lolo-Burmese Loloish Southeastern Sani–Azha Sani
Writing system	Yi script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	ysn
Glottolog	sani1269

The Sani [sa˨˩ni˨˩] call themselves [ni21]. Their language is distinct from the closely related Samei, whose speakers call themselves Sani [sa21 ni53].^[1]

Another group known as the Sa 撒 (autonym: Sani 撒尼) lives in Qiubei County (Yunnan 1960).^[3] Yunnan (1960) considers it to be similar to Sani of Shilin County. The ethnic population consisted of 1,443 as of 1960.

Innovations

Pelkey (2011:378) defines two innovations that Sani and Axi both share with each other.

1. Exclusive devoicing of tone category 1 proto-voiced initials (even if there is voiced retention in tone category 2). These words include 'fly (v.)', 'wing', 'bridge', and 'liquor'.
2. Dominant -e/-ɛ reflexes of *-ak rhymes.