Universal Declaration of Human Rights - Shan

TOTAL SPEAKERS

USAGE BY COUNTRY (OFFICIAL LANGUAGE)

Home Speakers: Myanmar

BACKGROUND

It has five tones and is a part of the Kam-Tai or Kadai language family, which are found from Northern Burma and India on the west through Southern China on the north, and Laos on the east. It is related to the Thai language and is called Tai-Yai, or Tai Long in the Tai languages. The term "Shan" is believed to be a Burmese variation on "Siam", which surely indicates that the ethnic Burmese believed that the "Shan" were a Thai (Tai) people. Studies of the Shan are complicated by the civil war within Burma and the difficulty of escaping to Thailand.