SALAR (China)

Family
Eastern-(Chagatay)-Turkic languages

Country
China

Language code
SLR

Continent
Asia

Alternate language names
SALA

Genetic affiliation
Altaic, Turkic, Eastern

Geographical region
Xunhua Salar Autonomous County and Hualong Hui Autonomous County in Qinghai Province, Jishishan Autono- mous County in Gansu Province. Also Yining in Xinjiang

Population
55,000 speakers (1982) out of 87,697 in the official nationality (1990 census)

Bilingual in
Uyghur, Chinese

Remarks
The people use Chinese as literary language. Reinhard F. Hahn says Salar is spoken by descendants of an Oghuz-Turkic-speaking sub-tribe that, in the 15th century area of Samarkand, split off a main tribe and 'returned eastward,' eventually settling in Western China. Their language has an Oghuz Turkic base, has taken on a medieval Chaghatay Turkic stratum through Central Asian contacts and finally acquired a stratum of features from local languages. An official nationality

Subsistence type
Agriculturalists, animal hus-bandry, commerce

Grammar typology
SOV

Religion
Sunni Muslim

Total speakers
55,000