Khanty language

Khanty (also spelled Khanti or Hanti), previously known as Ostyak (ˈɒstiæk), is a Uralic language spoken in the Khanty-Mansi and Yamalo-Nenets Okrugs. There were thought to be around 7,500 speakers of Northern Khanty and 2,000 speakers of Eastern Khanty in 2010, with Southern Khanty being extinct since the early 20th century, however the total amount of speakers in the most recent census was around 13,900. The Khanty language has many dialects. The western group includes the Obdorian, Ob, and Irtysh dialects. The eastern group includes the Surgut and Vakh-Vasyugan dialects, which, in turn, are subdivided into thirteen other dialects. All these dialects differ significantly from each other by phonetic, morphological, and lexical features to the extent that the three main "dialects" (northern, southern and eastern) are mutually unintelligible. Thus, based on their significant multifactorial differences, Eastern, Northern and Southern Khanty could be considered separate but closely related languages. Cyrillic Palatalised consonants are designated by either ь or a yotated character. The Khanty written language was first created after the October Revolution on the basis of the Latin script in 1930 and then with the Cyrillic alphabet (with the additional letter for /ŋ/) from 1937. Khanty literary works are usually written in three Northern dialects, Kazym, Shuryshkar, and Middle Ob. Newspaper reporting and broadcasting are usually done in the Kazymian dialect. Khanty is divided in three main dialect groups, which are to a large degree mutually unintelligible, and therefore best considered three languages: Northern, Southern and Eastern. Individual dialects are named after the rivers they are or were spoken on. Southern Khanty is probably extinct by now. Eastern Khanty Far Eastern (Vakh, Vasjugan, Verkhne-Kalimsk, Vartovskoe) Surgut (Jugan, Malij Jugan, Pim, Likrisovskoe, Tremjugan, Tromagan) transitional: Salym Western Khanty Northern Khanty Obdorsk Berjozov (Synja, Muzhi, Shuryshkar), Kazym, Sherkal transitional: Atlym, Nizyam Southern Khanty: Upper Demjanka, Lower Demjanka, Konda, Cingali, Krasnojarsk The Salym dialect can be classified as transitional between Eastern and Southern (Honti:1998 suggests closer affinity with Eastern, Abondolo:1998 in the same work with Southern).