similar to Yamphu. Northern Lohorung [lbr] refers to the language spoken to the north of Khandbari and has been renamed simply
“Lohorung,” because there is no reason to differentiate between a Southern and Northern Lohorung. There is very little variation within the Lohorung-speaking area, so the new ISO
code is now simply called Lohorung [lbr]. Henceforth, these new language names will be used. In order to test comprehension between varieties we used two Recorded Text Tests see Appendix D-
1 for a description of this tool: one Yamphu see Appendix D-5 and one Lohorung see Appendix D-4. Chapter 6 is divided into sections that address the status of each language by examining the
relationships between varieties. The relationships are investigated using lexical similarity, the degree of comprehension between the varieties, as well as attitudes expressed on questions before and after the
recorded text test.
6.1 Yamphe [yma]
“Yamphe” is not used as a term by anyone inside the Yamphu community. The speakers we interviewed do not like or use the term
“Yamphe.” This term was taken from Hanβon 1988; 1991. In his 1988 work he states, “Yamphe is spoken in the north of Sankhuwasabha district, around the upper Arun valley…”
1988:9. Hanβon is considered by some scholars, like van Driem, to have made dubious choices for terms of reference in this region van Driem 2001:623. We did not find references to
“Yamphe” in any other scholarly works. In our interviews with community leaders and members, we did not find that
anyone uses the term “Yamphe” in self-reference, nor to denote anything separate from “Yamphu.”
Additionally, on the Knowledgeable Insider Questionnaire, we asked leaders the following two questions: “What names are given by non-native speakers for your language?” and “What other names
are used for your language?” In response to these questions, only in Khoktak did the leaders say that some other Rai groups call the Yamphu
“Yamphe.” No respondents mentioned the term “Yamphe.” After hearing the responses, we asked the leaders if they had heard of the term
“Yamphe.” Of those who had heard the term, none of them expressed an affiliation with or liking of the term. The leaders in Devitar
said, “‘Yamphe’ is impure Yamphu language. It is a wrong pronunciation of ‘Yamphu.’” For these reasons, the
“Yamphe” [yma] ISO code will be retired and the people previously considered to be “Yamphe” will be subsumed under the ISO code of Yamphu [ybi].
6.2 Yamphu [ybi]
In this section we will give supporting evidence for the ISO 639-3 classification of Yamphu [ybi] as a distinct language from Lohorung [lbr] and Southern Yamphu [lrr].
6.2.1 Lexical similarity results
Figure 20 displays the lexical similarity percentages between wordlists collected in the villages listed. Hedangna
Yamphu 79
Devitar Southern Yamphu
76 89
Rajarani Southern Yamphu
65 65
66 Pangma
Lohorung Figure 20. Lexical similarity percentages.
The lexical similarity between the Yamphu spoken in Hedangna and the Lohorung spoken in Pangma is 65. This is a rather low percentage of lexical similarity, showing that the two varieties may
be separate languages. This assumption is based on Blair’s statement regarding lexical similarity
percentages and intelligibility, “If wordlists are less than sixty percent similar, then the speech varieties are referred to as ‘different languages.’ As a rule of thumb, no dialect intelligibility testing need be done
between different languages” 1990. This rule of thumb was also affirmed
10
among sociolinguistic practitioners and scholars who attended the International Language Assessment Conference ILAC and
can be found in “Language Assessment Criteria” SIL 1989. The lexical similarity percentage 65 falls beneath the 70 upper confidence limit stated at ILAC. Because this lexical similarity percentage is
inconclusive with regard to intelligibility, we conducted Recorded Text Testing RTT between Lohorung and Yamphu to further clarify the relationship between the two varieties.
The lexical similarity between wordlists elicited in Hedangna and Rajarani 76 as well as Hedangna and Devitar 79 are inconclusive, providing evidence that the Yamphu in Hedangna may be
similar to or distinct from the language varieties to the south. The recorded text test RTT results below will help evaluate the intelligibility of Yamphu Hedangna in the Southern Yamphu areas of Devitar and
Rajarani. The highest lexical similarity in
Figure 20 is between Rajarani and Devitar 89. This high lexical similarity provides evidence that the language in Rajarani and Devitar is very similar.
6.2.2 Recorded Text Test results
In order to interpret RTT results properly, three pieces of information are necessary. The first is average score, which is the mean or average of all subjects’ individual scores on a particular story at a particular
test site. Another important piece of information is a measure of how much individual scores vary from the average, which is known as standard deviation. The third important component of the data is the
size of the sample of people tested on each story.
Blair 1990:25 has written about the relationship between test scores and their standard deviation, as seen in
Figure 21. Standard Deviation
High Low
Average Score
High Situation 1
Many people understand the story well, but some have difficulty.
Situation 2 Most people understand the
story. Low
Situation 3 Many people cannot understand the story, but a few
are able to answer correctly. Situation 4
Few people are able to understand the story.
Figure 21. Relationship between test averages and standard deviation. The higher the standard deviation, the more spread out the range of scores was on the test. RTT
average scores lower than 60 percent are interpreted to indicate inadequate comprehension. There are limits to what RTT data can tell us. Our sample size for testing the RTTs used during this fieldwork were
quite limited 10–12. Additionally, the samples were not randomly chosen. Additionally, in most situations in Nepal it is difficult to find people for whom contact with speakers of other languages is not
frequent. Despite all of these limitations, we believe the following RTT data, when corroborated with the other data collected, helps create a clearer picture of language relationships and intelligibility.
Table 4 displays the average RTT scores and standard deviations for people we tested on the Yamphu Hedangna RTT. Also listed are the hometown pilot test results for the Hedangna story.
According to Blair, for a hometown test HTT to be usable, it should have an average score of 90 or better among participants 1990:81. The average score on the Hedangna HTT was 91. This is on the
10
More precisely, the conference statement is that they are different languages when lexical similarity is less than 70 at the upper confidence limit.
lower side for an average score on the HTT. Due to logistical constraints, we were not able to develop a new HTT, but went ahead and used the HTT story knowing that the results would be less than ideal.
Despite this limitation, we believe the data we gathered still provides valuable insight into the intelligibility issue.
Table 4. RTT results for the Yamphu RTT Test Location
Hedangna Yamphu
Pangma Lohorung
Devitar Southern
Yamphu Rajarani
Southern Yamphu
Yamphu Hedangna
Story Average
Score 91
44 58
44 Standard
Deviation 9.6
17.8 20.8
14.0 Sample Size
10 10
12 10
The average score on the Yamphu Hedangna RTT for people who took the test in Pangma was 44. The standard deviation among the scores was 17.8. The combination of these two statistics tells us
that most people do not understand the Hedangna Yamphu story, though some score higher than others. The combination of the average score 58 and the standard deviation 20.8 in Devitar on the
Yamphu RTT means that many people who took the test cannot understand the story, but a few people who took the test were able to answer correctly. With a high standard deviation like 20.8 it is probable
that language contact plays a part in the wide range of scores. See Figure 22 for a plot of the scores in
Devitar on the Yamphu RTT.
Figure 22. Plot of Devitar subject scores on the Yamphu RTT. When administering the RTT we asked if those taking the test had been to Hedangna. While most of
them had, their travel there did not correlate with their test scores. Measuring language contact is more complex than asking if a person has been somewhere or not, so it is still likely that varying levels of
contact plays a role in the results we found. With that in mind, the people who scored lowest 30 are probably more representative of the intelligibility of Yamphu in Devitar, as they had not had any contact
with Hedangna.
The results of the Southern Yamphu speakers in Rajarani on the Yamphu RTT are quite clear. The combination of an average score of 44 and a lower standard deviation of 14.0 means that few people
who took the test were able to understand the story adequately. Unfortunately, we did not do RTT testing of Southern Yamphu in Hedangna.
Figure 23 displays a plot of the scores of those who took the Yamphu RTT in Rajarani.
Figure 23. Plot of Rajarani subject scores on the Yamphu RTT. In Table 5 the scores for Hedangna on the Lohorung test are displayed.
Table 5. RTT results for Hedangna on the Lohorung RTT Test Location
Hedangna Yamphu
Pangma Lohorung
Lohorung Pangma
Story Average
Score 61
89 Standard
Deviation 24.6
10.9 Sample Size
11 10
The average score among people in Hedangna who took the Lohorung Pangma RTT was higher 61 than the average score of people in Pangma who took the Yamphu Hedangna RTT 44. The
standard deviation of the scores in Hedangna was also higher 24.6 suggesting that the average was probably greatly increased by some who had encountered the Pangma way of speaking previously and
learned it at least to some degree.
In cases of high standard deviation, patterns of contact usually correlate with higher scores. However, in this case our limited data presented no obvious correlation between contact and score.
Based on the scores from our small sample at both sites, we can see that, among those tested, the comprehension between Yamphu Hedangna and Lohorung Pangma is directional. The participants in
Hedangna understood Lohorung more easily than the participants in Pangma understood Yamphu Hedangna. The reason for this could be related to travel. People from Hedangna may be more exposed
to Lohorung when they travel south; whereas people from Pangma may rarely have contact with Yamphu speakers because they are geographically more remote.
According to Blair, for a hometown test HTT to be usable, it should have an average score of 90 or better among participants 1990:81. The Lohorung HTT had an average score of 89. This is less
than ideal. The relatively low standard deviation 10.9, however, adds some validity to the test. Due to
logistical constraints, we were not able to develop a new HTT, but went ahead and used the HTT story knowing that the results would be less than ideal. Despite this limitation, we believe the data we
gathered still provides valuable insight into the intelligibility issue.
6.2.3 Pre- and post-RTT question results
