Nenets languages

{{Short description|Samoyedic languages spoken in Russia}}

{{distinguish|Enets language}}

{{Infobox language family

| name = Nenets

| region = Russia (Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Krasnoyarsk Krai, Komi Republic, Murmansk Oblast){{Citation needed|date=January 2010}}

| ethnicity = 49,787 Nenets (2020 census){{Cite web |title=Росстат — Всероссийская перепись населения 2020 |url=https://rosstat.gov.ru/vpn_popul |access-date=2023-01-03 |website=rosstat.gov.ru}}

| speakers = 38,405

| date = 2020 census

| ref = {{Cite web |title=Итоги Всероссийской переписи населения 2020 года. Таблица 6. Население по родному языку.|trans-title=Results of the All-Russian population census 2020. Table 6. population according to native language. |url=https://rosstat.gov.ru/vpn_popul |access-date=2023-01-03 |website=rosstat.gov.ru}}

| familycolor = Uralic

| fam2 = Samoyedic

| fam3 = (core)

| fam4 = Enets–Nenets

| iso3 = yrk

| glotto = nene1251

| glottorefname = Nenets

| map = Nenets_current.png

| mapcaption = Distribution of Nenets languages in the 21st century.{{Cite journal |last1=Rantanen |first1=Timo |last2=Tolvanen |first2=Harri |last3=Roose |first3=Meeli |last4=Ylikoski |first4=Jussi |last5=Vesakoski |first5=Outi |date=2022-06-08 |title=Best practices for spatial language data harmonization, sharing and map creation—A case study of Uralic |journal=PLOS ONE |language=en |volume=17 |issue=6 |pages=e0269648 |doi=10.1371/journal.pone.0269648|doi-access=free |pmid=35675367 |pmc=9176854 |bibcode=2022PLoSO..1769648R }}Rantanen, Timo, Vesakoski, Outi, Ylikoski, Jussi, & Tolvanen, Harri. (2021). Geographical database of the Uralic languages (v1.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4784188

| child1 = Forest Nenets

| child2 = Tundra Nenets

| altname = Yurak

}}

Nenets (in former work also Yurak) is a pair of closely related languages spoken in northern Russia by the Nenets people. They are often treated as being two dialects of the same language, but they are very different and mutual intelligibility is low. The languages are Tundra Nenets, which has a higher number of speakers, spoken by some 30,000 to 40,000 people{{cite web|url=http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=yrk|title=Nenets|website=ethnologue.com|access-date=20 April 2018}}{{cite book | author = Salminen, Tapani, Ackerman, Farrell | editor = Brown, Keith | year = 2006 | pages = 577–579 | chapter = Nenets | title = Encyclopedia of Languages & Linguistics | edition = 2 | volume = 8 | publisher = Elsevier | location = Oxford, England}} in an area stretching from the Kanin Peninsula to the Yenisei River,{{cite book | author = Staroverov, Peter | location = Moscow, Russia | year = 2006 | title = Vowel deletion and stress in Tundra Nenets | page = 1| author-link = Peter Staroverov }} and Forest Nenets, spoken by 1,000 to 1,500 people in the area around the Agan, Pur, Lyamin and Nadym rivers.

The Nenets languages are classified in the Uralic language family, making them distantly related to some national languages spoken in Europe – namely Finnish, Estonian, and Hungarian – in addition to other minority languages spoken in Russia. Both of the Nenets languages have been greatly influenced by Russian. Tundra Nenets has, to a lesser degree, been influenced by Komi and Northern Khanty. Forest Nenets has also been influenced by Eastern Khanty. Tundra Nenets is well documented, considering its status as an indigenous and minority language. It has a literary tradition going back to the 1930s, while Forest Nenets was first written during the 1990s and has been little documented.

Apart from the word 'Nenets', only one other Nenets word has entered the English language: 'parka', their traditional long, hooded jacket, made from skins and sometimes fur.[http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/parka#word-history "parka"], Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary