Social:Karakalpak language

Short description: Kipchak Turkic language of Karakalpakstan, Uzbekistan

Karakalpak
Qaraqalpaq tili, Қарақалпақ тили, قاراقالپاق تىلى
Karakalpak written in Latin, Cyrillic, and Perso-Arabic scripts
Native to	Central Asia
Region	Karakalpakstan
Ethnicity	Karakalpaks
Native speakers	870,000 (2019)e26
Language family	Turkic Common Turkic Kipchak Kipchak–Nogai Karakalpak
Writing system	Karakalpak alphabet (Latin, Cyrillic, Arabic script)
Official status
Official language in	Karakalpakstan (Uzbekistan)
Language codes
ISO 639-1	kaa
ISO 639-3	kaa
Glottolog	kara1467
Map showing locations of Karakalpak (red) within Uzbekistan

Karakalpak (Qaralqalpaq tili) is a Turkic language spoken by Karakalpaks in Karakalpakstan. It is divided into two dialects, Northeastern Karakalpak and Southwestern Karakalpak. It developed alongside Nogai and neighbouring Kazakh languages, being markedly influenced by both. Typologically, Karakalpak belongs to the Kipchak branch of the Turkic languages, thus being closely related to and highly mutually intelligible with Kazakh and Nogai.

Classification

Karakalpak is a member of the Kipchak branch of Turkic languages, which includes Kazakh, Bashkir, Tatar, Kumyk, Karachay, Nogai and Kyrgyz. Due to its proximity to Turkmen and Uzbek, some of Karakalpak's vocabulary and grammar has been influenced by Uzbek and Turkmen. Like the vast majority of Turkic languages, Karakalpak has vowel harmony, is agglutinative and has no grammatical gender. Word order is usually subject–object–verb.

Geographic distribution

Karakalpak is spoken mainly in the Karakalpakstan Autonomous Republic of Uzbekistan. Approximately 2,000 people in Afghanistan and smaller diaspora in parts of Russia , Kazakhstan, Turkey and other parts of the world speak Karakalpak.

Official status

Karakalpak has official status in the Karakalpakstan Autonomous Republic.

Dialects

Ethnologue identifies two dialects of Karakalpak: Northeastern and Southwestern. Menges mentions a third possible dialect spoken in the Fergana Valley. The Southwestern dialect has /tʃ/ for the Northeastern /ʃ/.

Phonology

Karakalpak has 25 native consonant phonemes and regularly uses four non-native phonemes in loan words. Non-native sounds are shown in parentheses.

Karakalpak vowels, from Menges (1947:?)

Consonants

		Labials	Alveolar	Post-alv./ Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
Nasal		m ⟨m/м⟩	n ⟨n/н⟩		ŋ ⟨ń/ң⟩
Stop	voiceless	p ⟨p/п⟩	t ⟨t/т⟩		k ⟨k/к⟩	q ⟨q/қ⟩
	voiced	b ⟨b/б⟩	d ⟨d/д⟩		ɡ ⟨g/г⟩
Affricate			(t͡s ⟨c/ц⟩)	(t͡ʃ ⟨ch/ч⟩)
Fricative	voiceless	(f ⟨f/ф⟩)	s ⟨s/с⟩	ʃ ⟨sh/ш⟩	x ⟨x/х⟩		h ⟨h/ҳ⟩
	voiced	(v ⟨v/в⟩)	z ⟨z/з⟩	ʒ ⟨j/ж⟩	ɣ ⟨ǵ/ғ⟩
Approximant			l ⟨l/л⟩	j ⟨y/й⟩	w ⟨w/ў⟩
Rhotic			r ⟨r/р⟩

Vowels

	Front		Back
	spread	rounded	spread	rounded
Close	i ⟨i/и⟩	y ⟨ú/ү⟩	ɯ ⟨ı/ы⟩	u ⟨u/у⟩
Mid	e ⟨e/е⟩	œ ⟨ó/ө⟩		o ⟨o/о⟩
Open	æ ⟨á/ә⟩		a ⟨a/а⟩

Vowel harmony

Vowel harmony functions in Karakalpak much as it does in other Turkic languages. Words borrowed from Russian or other languages may not observe rules of vowel harmony, but the following rules usually apply:

Vowel	May be followed by:
a	a, ɯ
æ	e, i
e	e, i
i	e, i
o	a, o, u, ɯ
œ	e, i, œ, y
u	a, o, u
y	e, œ, y
ɯ	a, ɯ

Vocabulary

Personal pronouns

	Singular	Plural
1st person	мен/men 'I'	бизлер/bizler 'we'
2nd person	сен/sen 'you'	сизлер/sizler 'you (pl.)'
3rd person	ол/ol 'he/she/it'	олар/olar 'they'

Numbers

1. бир – bir – 1
2. еки – eki – 2
3. үш – úsh – 3
4. төрт – tórt – 4
5. бес – bes – 5
6. алты – altı – 6
7. жети – jeti – 7
8. сегиз – segiz – 8
9. тоғыз – toǵız – 9
10. он – on – 10

• жүз – júz – 100
• мың – mıń – 1000
• миллион – million – 1000000

Writing system

March 2006. A photo laboratory in Nukus – with the signboard written in Karakalpak language using the Latin alphabet.

Karakalpak was written in the Arabic and Persian script until 1932, in the Latin script from 1928 to 1940, after which Cyrillic was introduced. Following Uzbekistan's independence in 1991, the decision was made to drop Cyrillic and revert to the Latin alphabet. Whilst the use of Latin script is now widespread in Tashkent, its introduction into Karakalpakstan remains gradual.

The Cyrillic, Latin, and Arabic alphabets are shown below with their equivalent representations in the IPA. Cyrillic letters with no representation in the Latin alphabet are marked with asterisks. The last changes to the new Karakalpak alphabet were made in 2016: instead of letters with apostrophes, letters with acutes were introduced.

Cyrillic	Latin	Arabic	IPA
А а	A a	ا / ‍ـا	/a/
Ә ә	Á á	ە / ـە	/æ/
Б б	B b	ب	/b/
В в	V v	ۋ	/v/
Г г	G g	گ	‌ /ɡ/
Ғ ғ	Ǵ ǵ	ع	/ɣ/
Д д	D d	د	/d/
Е е	E e	ە / ـە	/e/
Ё ё*	yo	یو	/jo/
Ж ж	J j	ج	/ʒ/
З з	Z z	ز	/z/
И и	I i	ى / ىـ	/i/
Й й	Y y	ي / يـ	/j/
К к	K k	ك	/k/
Қ қ	Q q	ق	/q/
Л л	L l	ل	/l/
М м	M m	م	/m/
Н н	N n	ن	/n/
Ң ң	Ń ń	ڴ	/ŋ/
О о	O o	و	/o/
Ө ө	Ó ó	و	‌/œ/
П п	P p	پ	‌/p/
Р р	R r	ر	‌/r/
С с	S s	س	/s/
Т т	T t	ت	/t/
У у	U u	وُ	/u/
Ү ү	Ú ú	وُ‌‌‌	‌ /y/
Ў ў	W w	ۋ	/w/
Ф ф	F f	ف	‌/f/
Х х	X x	ح	‌/x/
Ҳ ҳ	H h	ه / هـ	‌ /h/
Ц ц	C c	تس	/ts/
Ч ч	Ch ch	چ	/tʃ/
Ш ш	Sh sh	ش	/ʃ/
Щ щ*	sch	شش	/ʃtʃ/
Ъ ъ*
Ы ы	Í ı	ى / ىـ	/ɯ/
Ь ь*
Э э	E e	ە / ـە	/e/
Ю ю*	yu	يوُ	/ju/
Я я	ya	يا	‌/ja/

Before 2009, C was written as TS; I and Í were written as dotted and dotless I.

Sample text

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Karakalpak text	English translation
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Poets

• Ájiniyaz
• Berdaq Ǵarǵabay Ulí
• Kúnxoja
• Ibrayim Yusupov

Bibliography

• The Turkic Languages, London: Routledge, 1998, ISBN 9780415082006, OCLC 40980286, https://books.google.com/books?id=U1009DRu_vMC 
• Menges, Karl H. (1947), Qaraqałpaq Grammar, Translated from German by Leora P. Cunningham, New York: King's Crown Press, OCLC 3615928