Tibetan Language Guide

Official language in
China
Script
Tibetan

Where it's spoken

Tibetan belongs to the Tibetic languages, a family derived from Old Tibetan and spoken on the Tibetan plateau, in the Himalayas and in the Karakoram. The Tibetic-speaking area today lies in six countries: China, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar (Burma). Central Tibetan, one of the main Tibetic languages, is listed for the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, where the Ü and Tsang dialects are spoken.

A white paper from China's State Council Information Office states that the regulations of the Tibet Autonomous Region give equal attention to Tibetan and Chinese, with Tibetan as the major one. The same white paper states that road and traffic signs and street names there are written in both Tibetan and Chinese.

In Central Tibet, Amdo and Kham, the various Tibetic languages are often mixed within the same sentence with Mandarin Chinese or local Chinese dialects; the non-Tibetic words used in such mixing are in particular numerals, nouns and some adverbs.

Sources

Script & pronunciation

Tibetan is written in the Tibetan script, which is also used in Bhutan to write Dzongkha. Each word has a base consonant, which can be written alone or with other consonants added above or below it to form a vertically stacked letter. The primary delimiter in Tibetan text is the tsek (tsheg), and the shay (shad) marks the end of an expression. For example, the card ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཆེ། (Tuk je che, "Thank you") has the tsek between syllables and ends with the shay.

Sources

Grammar essentials

The default word order of a Lhasa Tibetan sentence is subject–object–verb, although the order of the words before the verb is essentially free. No part of the sentence may follow the verb apart from the grammatical material within the verb complex, so Lhasa Tibetan is described as a "rigidly verb-final" language. Question words generally stay in their ordinary position in the sentence, though they can optionally be moved to the front, as in ཁྱེད་རང་གང་ནས་ཡིན་ནམ། (Khe-rang gang-ne yin-nam?, "Where are you from?"), where གང་ ("where") comes in the middle.

Dryer classifies Lhasa Tibetan as placing the negative before the verb, and adjectives, numerals and demonstratives after the noun.

This app's card notes say ཡིན (yin) is used for first-person statements, as in ང་བདེ་པོ་ཡིན། (Nga de-po yin, "I am well."), and རེད (red) for third-person or objective facts, as in འདི་ག་རེ་རེད། (Di ga re red?, "What is this?").

Sources

Politeness & etiquette

Tibetan has a respectful register called zhesa (ཞེ་ས), a formal and polite way of speaking. Zhesa is not only used to indicate a relationship to someone of higher social status: it may be used between friends and, at least in Central Tibet, is often used inside the family and by married couples. Nowadays "broken honorific forms", which mix honorific and non-honorific words, are often heard, particularly in Common Tibetan.

Honorific forms are found for verbs, nouns, personal pronouns, adjectives, auxiliaries, terms of address and politeness formulas. Honorific forms are used in reference to others and may not be used by speakers to refer to themselves; when speaking in the respectful register, humble forms are required for oneself.

The honorific vocabulary is built from a small number of specific roots, and the main roots for honorific nouns include body parts. ཐུགས ("heart, mind", honorific) appears in ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཆེ། (Tuk je che, "Thank you (formal/honorific)"), and སྐུ ("body", honorific) with གཟིམས ("to lie down, to sleep", honorific) appears in སྐུ་གཟིམས་བདེ་ལེགས། (Ku-zim de-lek, "Good night"). The honorific verb ཕེབས ("to go, come") appears in ཀ་ལེ་ཕེབས། (Ka-le pheb, "Go safely / Take care (said to someone leaving)").

For "you", Tournadre and Suzuki's chart of respectful and ordinary words gives ཁྱེད as honorific and རང or ཁྱོད as ordinary. This app's cards use ཁྱེད་རང (Khe-rang), which the card's note calls polite, as in ཁྱེད་རང་བདེ་པོ་ཡིན་ནམ། (Khe-rang de-po yin-nam?, "Are you well?"). The app's card for "Yes", ལགས་རེད། (La red), includes ལགས, which the card's note says adds politeness.

Sources

Browse all TravelPhrases languages