Wyn Owen
Payap University
Tai Khuen is a Southwestern Tai (Tai-Kadai) language spoken mainly in the Kengtung area of eastern Shan State, Myanmar (Egerod, 1959; Petsuk, 1978). During a brief visit to Kengtung in 1956, Dr. Banchob Bandhumedha noted linguistic differences between the Khuen varieties spoken in Kengtung Town and the outlying village of Wan Jai, and raised the question of whether Wan Jai would be able to maintain its linguistic distinctiveness (Bandhumedha, 1983, p. 72). This paper provides a partial answer to her question, drawing together more recent data not just from Wan Jai and Kengtung, but eight other locations in the Kengtung plain to present an overview of phonological variation in Khuen.
Owen (2012) identified contact with Shan (Tai Long) as the most likely cause of the differences between the Kengtung tone system and more conservative varieties. The present study expands on the previous work by including consonants and vowels, as well as more varieties. Contact with Shan is again found to be the most likely cause of the observed variation.
(Presented in the 2020 Chulalongkorn Asian Heritage Forum : Thai-Tai Language and Culture, 20 July 2020, The St.Regis Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies, Chulalongkorn University, Department of Thai, Department of Linguistics, Southeast Asian Linguistics Research Unit, Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University)