# Tavoyan dialects

Tavoyan or Dawei (ထားဝယ်စကား) is a divergent dialect of Burmese is spoken in Dawei (Tavoy), in the coastal Tanintharyi Region of southern Myanmar (Burma). Tavoyan speakers tend to self-identify as Bamar, and are classified by the Burmese government as a subgroup of the Bamar.
Tavoyan retains an /-l-/ medial that has since merged into the /-j-/ medial in standard Burmese, and can form the following consonant clusters: /ɡl-/, /kl-/, /kʰl-/, /bl-/, /pl-/, /pʰl-/, /ml-/, /m̥l-/. Examples include မ္လေ (/mlè/ → Standard Burmese /mjè/) for "ground" and က္လောင်း (/kláʊɴ/ → Standard Burmese /tʃáʊɴ/) for "school". Also, voicing can only occur with unaspirated consonants in Tavoyan, whereas in standard Burmese, voicing can occur with both aspirated and unaspirated consonants.
Also, Tavoyan has many loan words from Malay and Thai not found in Standard Burmese. In the Tavoyan dialect, terms of endearment, as well as family terms, are considerably different from Standard Burmese.

## History

According to Michael Aung-Thwin, the Burmese dialect of Dawei/Tavoy preserved the "spelling (and presumably pronunciation)" of the Old Burmese from the Bagan era. As a result, he suggests that it diverged from other Burmese varieties sometime after the Burmese settlement of Lower Burma under the Bagan era, between the 11th and 13th centuries. He attributes this divergence to a migration of Mon speakers into the area north of Dawei in the late 13th century, which would have cut off Dawei from the main Burmese area.$^{:112–3}$ To this day, the Bamar are called gantha (ဂံသား, lit. 'children of Pagan') in Tavoyan.

## Rhymes

The following is a list of rhyme correspondences unique to the Tavoyan dialect
| Written Burmese | Standard Burmese | Tavoyan dialect | Notes |
| -င် -န် -မ် | /-ɪɴ -aɴ -aɴ/ | /-aɴ/ | |
| -ဉ် -ျင် | /-ɪɴ -jɪɴ/ | /-ɪɴ -jɪɴ/ | |
| ောင် | /-aʊɴ/ | /-ɔɴ/ | |
| ုန် | /-oʊɴ/ | /-uːɴ/ | |
| ုမ် | /-oʊɴ/ | /-aoɴ/ | |
| ိမ် | /-eɪɴ/ | /-iːɴ/ | |
| ုတ် | /-oʊʔ/ | /-ṵ/ | |
| ုပ် | /-oʊʔ/ | /-aoʔ/ | |
| -က် -တ် -ပ် | /-ɛʔ -aʔ -aʔ/ | /-aʔ/ | |
| -ိတ် -ိပ် | /-eɪʔ/ | /-ḭ/ | |
| -ည် | /-ɛ, -e, -i// | /-ɛ/ | |
| -စ် -ျက် | /-ɪʔ -jɛʔ/ | /-ɪʔ -jɪʔ/ | |
| ေွ | /-we/ | /-i/ | ေ is pronounced as in standard Burmese |
Rhymes :
| Open syllables | weak = ə full = i, e, ɛ, a, ɔ, o, u |
| Closed syllables | nasal = iːɴ, ɪɴ, aɪɴ, an, ɔɴ, ʊɴ, uːɴ, aoɴ stop = ɪʔ, aɪʔ, aʔ, ɔʔ, ʊʔ, aoʔ |

## Vocabulary

Due to language contact with Malay and Thai, Tavoyan vocabulary has adopted many loanwords that are not otherwise present in standard Burmese. Certain lexical terms, such as kinship terms, differ from standard Burmese.
| Gloss | Tavoyan | Standard Burmese | Source |
| 'goat' | ဘဲ့ bê | ဆိတ် hseit | Mon /həbeˀ/ (ဗၜေံ) or Thai /pʰɛ́ʔ/ (แพะ) |
| 'axe' | ကတ်ပ katpa | ပုဆိန် pasein | Malay kapak |
| 'grandfather' | ဖအို (/pʰa̰ʔò/) | အဖိုး apho | Tavoyan prefers the Burmese augmentative အို |
| 'grandfather' | မိအို (/mḭʔò/) | အဖွား aphwa | Tavoyan prefers the Burmese augmentative အို |
| 'son' | ဖစု (/pʰa̰sṵ/) | သား tha | Tavoyan prefers the Burmese diminutive စု |
| 'daughter' | မိစု (/mḭsṵ/) | သမီး thami | Tavoyan prefers the Burmese diminutive စု |
| honorific for younger males | နောင် naung | မောင် maung | နောင် refers to the elder brother (of a male) in standard Burmese |