Sunwar language

Sunuwar
सुनुवार, कोइँच, किराँती-कोइँच, मुखिया
'Kõica' in Jenticha script; 'Sunuwar' in Tikamuli and Devanagari script
RegionNepal;
India (Sikkim and West Bengal)
EthnicitySunuwar
Native speakers
37,898 (2011)[1]
Sino-Tibetan
Dialects
  • Surel
Devanagari
Sunuwar (Sikkim, India)
Tikamuli (2005)
Official status
Official language in
 India
Language codes
ISO 639-3suz
Glottologsunw1242
ELPSunwar
Sunwar greeting

Sunwar, Sunuwar, or Koinch (कोइँच; kõich; other spellings are Koinch and Koincha), is a Kiranti language of the Sino-Tibetan language family spoken in Nepal and India by the Sunuwar people. It was first comprehensively attested by the Himalayan Languages Project. It is also known as Kõits Lo (कोइँच लो ; kõica lo), Kiranti-Kõits (किराँती-कोइँच ; kirā̃tī-kõich), Mukhiya (मुखिया ; mukhiyā).[2][3]

The Sunwar language is one of the smaller members of the Tibeto-Burman language family. About 40,000 speakers are residing in eastern Nepal.

  1. ^ 2011 Nepal Census, Social Characteristics Tables
  2. ^ Ager, Simon. "Sunuwar alphabet". Omniglot. Retrieved 8 December 2021.
  3. ^ Borchers, Dörte (2008). A grammar of Sunwar: descriptive grammar, paradigms, texts and glossary ([Online-Ausg.]. ed.). Leiden: Brill. pp. 1–2. ISBN 978-90-04-16709-4.