Indosphere

Indosphere is a term used for areas of Indian linguistic influence in the neighboring Southern Asian, Southeast Asian, and East Asian regions. The Indosphere comprises India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Timor-Leste and the Maldives. Historically, it also included the Champa (Southern Vietnam). It is commonly used in areal linguistics in contrast with the Sinophone languages of the Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area of the Sinosphere. Notably, unlike terms such as Anglosphere, Hispanosphere or Francosphere that refer to the multinational spread and influence of a single language with multiple dialects (English, Spanish and French respectively from the example), Indosphere refers to the influence of all the native languages of the Indian subcontinent, which includes Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages.

Influence

The Tibeto-Burman family of languages, which extends over a huge geographic range, is characterized by great typological diversity, comprising languages that range from the highly tonal, monosyllabic, analytic type with practically no affixational morphology, like the Loloish languages, to marginally tonal or atonal languages with complex systems of verbal agreement morphology, like the Kiranti group of Nepal. This diversity is partly to be explained in terms of areal influences from Chinese on the one hand and Indo-Aryan languages on the other. Matisoff proposed two large and overlapping areas combining cultural and linguistic features – the "Sinosphere" and the "Indosphere", influenced by China and India respectively. A buffer zone between them as a third group was proposed by Kristine A. Hildebrandt, followed by B. Bickel and J. Nichols. The Indosphere is dominated by Indic languages.

Some languages firmly belong to one or the other. For example, the Munda and Khasi branches of Austroasiatic languages, the Tibeto-Burman languages of Eastern Nepal, and much of the "Kamarupan" group of Tibeto-Burman, which most notably includes the Meitei (Manipuri), are Indospheric; while the Hmong–Mien family, the Kam–Sui branch of Kadai, the Loloish branch of Tibeto-Burman, and Vietnamese (Viet–Muong) are Sinospheric. Some other languages, like Thai and Tibetan, have been influenced by both Chinese and Indian languages at different historical periods. Still, other linguistic communities are so remote geographically that they have escaped significant influence from either. For example, the Aslian branch of Mon–Khmer in Malaya, or the Nicobarese branch of Mon–Khmer in the Nicobar Islands of the Indian Ocean shows little influence by Sinosphere or Indosphere. The Bodish languages and Kham languages are characterized by hybrid prosodic properties akin to related Indospheric languages towards the west and also Sinospheric languages towards the east. Some languages of the Kiranti group in the Indosphere rank among the morphologically most complex languages of Asia. Indian cultural, intellectual, and political influence – especially that of the Pallava writing system – began to penetrate both insular and peninsular Southeast Asia about 2000 years ago. Indic writing systems were adopted first by Austronesians, like Javanese and Cham, and Austroasiatics, like Khmer and Mon, then by Tai (Siamese and Lao) and Tibeto-Burmans (Pyu, Burmese, and Karen). Indospheric languages are also found in Mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA), defined as the region encompassing Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand, as well as parts of Burma, Peninsular Malaysia and Vietnam. Related scripts are also found in Southeast Asian islands ranging from Sumatra, Java, Bali, south Sulawesi and most of the Philippines. The learned components of the vocabularies of Khmer, Mon, Burmese and Thai/Lao consist of words of Pali or Sanskrit origin. Indian influence also spread north to the Himalayan region. Tibetan has used Ranjana writing since 600 AD, but has preferred to calque new religious and technical vocabulary from native morphemes rather than borrowing Indian ones. The Cham states, known collectively as Champa, which were founded around the end of 2nd century AD, as well as Funan, belonged directly to the influence of Greater India, rather than to the Sinosphere which shaped so much of Vietnamese culture and by which Chams were influenced later and indirectly.

Structure

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