Nivkh language
Nivkh or
Gilyak (ethnonym: Nivxi) is a language spoken in
Outer Manchuria, in the basin of the
Amgun, a tributary of the
Amur, along the lower reaches of the
Amur and on the northern half of
Sakhalin. 'Gilyak' is the Manchu appellation. Its speakers are known as the
Nivkhs.
Gilyak is a
language isolate, i.e., it does not appear to be related to any other language. For classification convenience, it is included in the group of
Paleosiberian languages. Recently it was included in the controversial
Eurasiatic languages hypothesis by
Joseph Greenberg.
The population of ethnic Nivkhs been reasonably stable over the past century, with 4,549 speakers counted in 1897, and 4,673 in 1989. However, the number of native speakers of the Nivkh language among these has dropped from 100% to 23.3% in the same period, so that there are now just over 1,000 first-language speakers left.
*
The Nivkhs from
The Red Book*
Sound Materials of the Nivkh Language The World's Largest Sound Archive of the Nivkh Language on the Web
