The Hlai languages are a primary branch of the Kra-Dai language family spoken in the mountains of central and south-central Hainan, China, by the Hlai people. They include Cun, whose speakers are ethnically distinct from other Hlai groups. About a quarter of Hlai speakers are monolingual, and none of the Hlai languages had a writing system until the 1950s, when a Latin script was adopted for the Ha variety.
Facts
RegionMountains of central and south-central Hainan, China 1 Speaker Count Proto-Language StatusReconstructed (Proto-Hlai; Matisoff 1988, Thurgood 1991, Ostapirat 2004, Norquest 2007) 1 Sources
1. Hlai languages, Wikipedia
Opening paragraph, region
spoken in the mountains of central and south-central Hainan in China by the Hlai people
Speakers section
There are some 750,000 Hlai speakers.
Proto-Hlai section
The Proto-Hlai language is the reconstructed ancestor of the Hlai languages.
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