Bazigar language

Initially nomadic and with a traditional occupation involving acrobatics and performance arts, they are now largely settled and mostly engaged in agricultural and other forms of labour.{{harvnb|Deb|1987}}; {{harvnb|Schreffler|2011}}. Several of the major Bazigar groups currently found in Indian Punjab migrated at the time of Partition in 1947 from Western Punjab (now in Pakistan), where they had started settling earlier in the century.{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|p=223}}

The ethnic Bazigar are estimated at half a million in Punjab,{{sfn|Deb|1987|p=10}} but the language is not spoken by all. The younger generation are shifting to the regional languages,{{sfn|Singh|2016|p=116}} for example Schreffler reports that people younger than 30 prefer to use the regional language with one another, and speak Bazigar only with older people.{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|p=225}}

The language is also known as Guar boli,{{sfn|Singh|2010|p=31}} or goāroṅ ri bolī "Guars' speech", after the name that the community uses for itself.{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|pp=218, 225}} Bazigar has no written literature.{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|p=225}}

Additionally, the Bazigar have an artificial secret language which they use when they do not want to be understood by outsiders. They call it Parsi or Pashto (not to be confused with the Farsi and Pashto languages).{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|p=226}}

Bazigar has an almost identical phonology to Punjabi except for the presence of the voiceless palatal fricative {{IPA|/ç/}} and the absence of the voiceless glottal fricative {{IPA|/h/}}. Words with initial {{IPA|/h/}} in Punjabi correspond to words with a tone in Bazigar. There are differences from Punjabi in the vocabulary and the morphology, notably in the absence of a vowel feminine ending (e.g. {{IPA|/buɖʱ/}} 'old woman'), and there are similarities to Hindi and Western Rajasthani, for example the

genitive marker {{IPA|/ro/}} and the dative marker {{IPA|/ne/}}.{{sfn|Schreffler|2011|p=225}}

{{Cite web |last=Schreffler |first=Gibb |title=The Bazigar (Goaar) People and Their Performing Arts |url=https://punjab.global.ucsb.edu/sites/secure.lsit.ucsb.edu.gisp.d7_sp/files/sitefiles/journals/volume18/8_Bazigar_article.pdf |website=punjab.global.ucsb.edu}}

• Lambadi language, spoken by the Banjara

{{Reflist}}

• {{Cite book| last = Deb| first = P. C.| date = 1987| title = Bazigars of Punjab: A Socio-economic Study| publisher = Mittal Publications| location = Delhi}}
• {{cite journal| last = Schreffler| first = Gibb | date = 2011 | title = The Bazigar (Goaar) People and Their Performing Arts | journal = Journal of Punjab Studies| volume = 18| number = 1&2| url = https://punjab.global.ucsb.edu/sites/secure.lsit.ucsb.edu.gisp.d7_sp/files/sitefiles/journals/volume18/8_Bazigar_article.pdf}}
• {{cite book| editor-last = Singh| editor-first = Birinder Pal| year = 2010| title = "Criminal" Tribes of Punjab: A Social-anthropological Inquiry| publisher = Routledge| isbn = 9780415551472}}
• {{cite book| last = Singh | first = Gurpeet| year = 2016| chapter = Bazigari| pages = 116–20| title = The Languages of Punjab | editor-last1= Devy| editor-first1 = Ganesh| editor-last2= Koul| editor-first2 = Omkar N.| editor-last3= Bhat| editor-first3 = Roop Krishen| series = People's Linguistic Survey of India| volume = 24| number = 2 | place = Hyderabad| publisher = Orient Blackswan| isbn = 978-8125062400}}

• {{cite thesis|title=Linguistic Analysis of the Language of Bazigar Community| language = Punjabi| last = Kaur| first = Navneet| type = Mphil| year = 2004–2005| institution = Punjabi University, Patiala}}
• Christian evangelistic audio materials in Bazigar: [http://globalrecordings.net/en/program/C62008 Good News] and [http://globalrecordings.net/en/program/C62006 Words of Life]

{{Indo-Aryan languages}}

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Category:Unclassified Indo-Aryan languages

Category:Languages of India