Dura is an extinct language of Nepal. It has been classified in the West Bodish branch of Tibetan languages, though more recent work separates it out as an independent branch of Sino-Tibetan.[3] Many of the Dura have switched to speaking Nepali, and the Dura language has sometimes been thought to be extinct. Some of the people who have switched to Nepali for their daily speech still use Dura for prayer.[4]
The Himalayan Languages Project is working on recording additional knowledge of Dura.[5] Around 1,500 words and 250 sentences in Dura have been recorded. The last known speaker of the language was the 82-year-old Soma Devi Dura.[2]
Classification
Schorer (2016:293)[6] classifies Dura as part of his newly proposed Greater Magaric branch.
Distribution
The ethnic Dura people mostly live in Lamjung District, with some in neighboring Tanahu District of Gandaki Province in central Nepal.[7] They mostly live on farms in the hilly countryside.[7] Different recent census counts have reported the number of Dura people anywhere from 3,397 to 5,676.[7]
Other ethnic groups in the Dura region include the Gurung, Brahmins, Chetrīs, Kāmī, and Damāi.[6]
Tandrange
A closely related language variety called Tandrange (Nepali: Tāndrāṅe; IPA: tandraŋe) is spoken in a few Gurung villages.[6] Tandrange is spoken in the villages of Tāndrāṅ तान्द्राङ, Pokharī Thok पोखरी थोक, and Jītā जीता. However, Tandrange speakers adamantly consider themselves as not related to the stigmatized Dura people.[6]
Vocabulary
Schorer (2016:126-127) provides the following 125-word Swadesh list of Dura.
^Van Driem, George. Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region, Brill Academic Publishers 2002 (ISBN978-9004103900)
