Talk:Tai languages

message: I think Tai shouldn't really redirect here.  Tai refers to the Tai peoples (speakers of Tai languages) which we should have something on.  I'll write it some day. Markalexander100 05:51, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: Thai language should be the most suitable because it also refers to a variety of languages that are used in Thailand. iampad
:No.  Thai languages refers to languages spoken in Thailand (we should have an article on that, but it should be at Languages of Thailand.  Tai languages refers to a linguistic group. HenryFlower 06:07, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I totally agreed with Henry. I was confused at the time. --Iampad (talk) 00:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Thai languages

message: The San Chay people of Vietnam seem to be missing from this article, for some reason. Badagnani 19:47, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Vietnam

message: Why are Northern Zhuang, Bouyei, and Tai Mene in listed in Central Tai? Li Fang-kuei, the originator of the N/C/SW classification, put the first two there (see e.g. his Handbook of Comparative Tai), and Chamberlain classifies Tai Mene as Northern (sorry, can't put my finger on the exact reference). --Abhideja (talk) 23:39, 28 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: No response to my previous query, so I moved them. Also moved E since Ethnologue (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=eee) locates it in northern Guangxi and states "Chinese scholars consider E a mixture of Northern Zhuang languages, Mulam [mlm], Dong [doc] and Chinese." Abhideja (talk) 17:25, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Saw this after I reverted. This classification contradicts the map in the main article (Kradai languages), which AFAIK is based on more recent refs. Maybe the languages do need to be moved, but I'd like to see some recent refs. And that would mean updating the map as well - maybe we could just relabel the orange "N & C"?  kwami (talk) 00:35, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The following citations from the Kradai article either make it clear that Northern Zhuang and Bouyei are Northern Tai or make no mention of any contrary view: Edmondson and Solnit 1997; Blench 2004 (has Tai Mene under Northern); Tai-kadai Languages (2007); Diller, A. (2005) The Tai-Kadai languages. (BTW, I think that the last two are really the same. Don't know what's going on there.) Yes, the map in the Kradai entry (shouldn't that be Kra-Dai?) definitely should be updated. Labeling the orange area "N & C" could be a temporary solution, but Central and Northern really should be separated. If anything SW and C could be together. Some (e.g. Gedney "Speculations on Early Tai Tones" 1978) have suggested a single SW/C node which then splits into SW and C, but nobody to my knowledge has proposed grouping C and N in opposition to SW. I also put Turung in Southwestern. It's an interesting case of language shift, but it surely has nothing to do with Central Tai; see Morey's article in the Tai-kadai Languages book cited above. Abhideja (talk) 18:18, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I updated the map to match. kwami (talk) 20:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Subgrouping 

message: What is Yay language? I am a native Thai person but I have never heard about that name. We have also pronunciation problem for the word 'Yay' either.--Octra Bond (talk) 14:34, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe this refers to the language of Tai Yai people, which is Shan. Thai readers can look at th:ภาษาไทใหญ่. Since Shan language is already on the list here, I have removed the entry for "Yay". Tim Shuba (talk) 18:03, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: No, this is a different group also called Giay or Nhang/Nyang.  It's not Shan, it's a Northern Tai language.  William Gedney (1965, "Yay, A Northern Tai Language of North Vietnam", Lingua 14:180-193) places it in Vietnam near the Chinese border.  --Taivo (talk) 18:15, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

text: Ethnologue actually counts both "Giay" and "Nhang/Nyang" as dialects of Bouyei, so Yay is still a dialect, but not of Shan.  --Taivo (talk) 18:27, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: What of iso3=Yoy? It's the only N. Tai lang E. lists for Thailand. — kwami (talk) 01:36, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Yoy isn't Yay despite the similarity of name.  I suspect that Ethnologue has confused it for something else.  Gedney is the authority on Tai (and did fieldwork on Yay) and he's very clear in his description of where Yay is spoken and what the alternate names are.  If you look at the Ethnologue entry for Bouyei, you see both Giay and Nhang/Nyang listed as dialects.  This also fits within the geographical range where Gedney places Yay (Vietnam on the Chinese border), while Ethnologue's Yoy is outside that range (Thailand/Laos).  Linguasphere lists a Yo as part of Lao-Isan and a Tay-yo as part of Phu-Tai, both with ranges in Laos and Vietnam.  It's possible that Ethnologue's entry may be a confusion of Yay with Yo, but I'm not certain.  As you know there is much confusion among the mass of dialect names floating around the Tai languages.  One can't always be certain about either the exact meaning or origin of any of these more obscure names.  In the case of Yay, however, we have a very precise description from Gedney.  --Taivo (talk) 02:16, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Yay language 

message: Academic experts recommended consulting the works of Joe Pittayaporn
https://www.lib.washington.edu/SouthEastAsia/vsg/elist_2011/Understanding%20Trung%20Sisters.htm
Rajmaan (talk) 21:47, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  history of Tai language migration 

message: Substituted at 07:33, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Assessment comment

message: A French version (2014) of Michel Ferlus' Formation of Ethnonyms in Southeast Asia (2009) which contains more information about ethonyms. .
Read further Kra-Dai and the Proto-History of South China and Vietnam (2016) by James R. Chamberlain .
I am thinking of adding Chamberlain's paper to this article, but haven't yet got time. Maybe somebody else would do this. Dirtolin1234 (talk) 13:05, 28 November 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  some more sources 

message: Edmondson (2013) has been added, which shows Central Tai to be a branch. Central Tai corresponds to Pittayaporn's (2009) Node A, of which SW Tai is simply a subgroup of. — Stevey7788 (talk) 06:01, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edmondson (2013)