Shixing language


Shixing, also rendered Shuhi, is a poorly-attested Qiangic language of Sichuan and the Tibet Autonomous Region. Two thirds of its speakers are monolingual.
Shixing is also known by its Chinese name Xumi ; it is spoken by about 1800 people living by the Shuiluo River 水洛 in Shuiluo Township 水洛乡, Mili Tibetan Autonomous County.
Katia Chirkova reports two varieties.

Consonants

Xumi features a very unusual phonemic contrast between voiceless and voiced alveolo-palatal lateral approximants.
In the table above, gold phonemes only appear in the Upper Xumi dialect while blue phonemes only appear in the Lower Xumi dialect. All others appear in both Upper and Lower Xumi.

Vowels

Oral