Phonetic Changes in Yellow Uighur Language

Abstract

Yellow Uighurs are one of the 9 Turkic nations in 55 minorities living in the People's Republic of China. These 9 Turkic nations are scattered across four different provinces of China, and the Turkic languages they speak are:Uighur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Salır, Tatar, Tuva, Yellow Uighur, Uzbek and Fuyu Kyrgyz language. While some of these languages are spoken both in China and abroad (such as Uighur, Kazakh, Tatar, Tuva); Some are only spoken in China (such as Salır, Yellow Uighur and Fuyu Kyrgyz); Some are spoken more often in abroad (such as Uzbek). The great majority of the Yellow Uighurs, who are considered to be one of the greatest of the old Uighurs, are living in Gansu province of China. According to the population census of 2010, the total population of them is 14378 people. The Yellow Uighurs speak three languages: Eastern Yellow Uighur (Mongolian), Western Yellow Uighur and Chinese. Because the Yellow Uighur is not a writing language so it is exposed to the danger of extinction. And the number of people who speak Yellow Uighur is decreasing steadily because they use Chinese as their official language. In this article, firstly, some brief information about Yellow Uighurs and their language will be given. After mentioning about the vocabulary of this language, I will peruse the vowel changes and consonant changes with relevant examples. Finally, some short text samples will be shown.