Foreword

Previous Studies

Before 1970, no research had been done on the Jirel language, other than that done by Prof. C. M. Bandhu who conducted a preliminary linguistic survey in 1968. The mimeographed report contains a short linguistic description of the Jirel language and a comparative wordlist.

Nirmal Man Thuladar (1992) has published a socio-linguistic report on the use of the Jirel language, for which Bir Bahadur Jirel did the field research.

Jirel has not been included in any of the earlier linguistic classifications of the languages of Nepal. Other than the work published by the main compilers of this dictionary, Esther Strahm and Anita Maibaum, the only major linguistic work of which we are aware is: Jirel, Tej Bahadur. 1999. Selected Discourse Features of Jirel Folk Narratives, M.A. Thesis, Payap University, Chiang Mai, Thailand. Pp. 233.

Dialects

Since the Jirels are one of the smaller ethnic groups, living in a comparatively limited geographic area, the dialect variations are minor. For details see section 1. Order of Entries, 1.4 Dialect variation in Jirel.

The Jirel-Nepali-English Dictionary is based on the dialects of the Jirel mother-tongue compilers who were raised in the village of Yarsa in Jiri.

Loan words from Nepali

Users of this dictionary will notice that many Nepali loan words have been included. In fact, in the entire section of words beginning with अ /À/, there is not a single entry that is entirely Jirel. In that section, the closest we come to Jirel forms are the verbalizers used to make Jirel verbs from Nepali loan predicates. Jirel has borrowed liberally from Nepali, and many Nepali words have become part of the normal vocabulary of Jirel speaker. To exclude such loans would be to give a distorted picture of natural usage in Jirel.

The tendency to use loan words from Nepali is growing, even at the expense of indigenous Jirel words. In this dictionary, however, recently introduced loan words have not been included. For details on loan words from Nepali and their spelling in Devanagari and their Roman transcription see section 1. Order of Entries, 1.3, Spelling of loan words from Nepali.

For more details on the Jirel language see the GUIDE FOR THE ENGLISH USER OF THE DICTIONARY and the BIBLIOGRAPHY.

Aim and scope of the dictionary: Intended audience

The Jirel-Nepali-English Dictionary has been compiled with two audiences in mind.

First and foremost we wish to provide the Jirel people with documentation of their own language, a resource both for the present and the future, a publication that preserves their cultural heritage as found in the vocabulary of the language. It can also serve them as a guide for writing the language. As a tri-lingual dictionary it can enable them to expand their understanding of Nepali, and expose them to a bit of English.

Secondly we wish that the dictionary will benefit the scholars, anthropologists, linguists and others who have an interest in Jirel. Many of the features incorporated in the main body of the dictionary will be useful primarily to this secondary audience. We hope that this work will significantly facilitate access to the lexical treasures of Jirel for those who are interested in comparative studies of the linguistic heritage of Nepal.

In 1994, the two main compilers started to build a database for a Jirel-Nepali-English Dictionary with wordlists and other material previously collected over a number of years. Working under the auspices of the Centre for Nepal and Asian Studies (CNAS) of the Tribhuvan University of Nepal, the proposal was to eventually publish two dictionaries from the one database; that is, one for the Jirel-speaking community and one for an audience of scholars and others interested. In the light of the on-going shift away from the mother tongue to the national language it became apparent that a single volume for the two audiences would be a more valuable contribution to both of our audiences than would two separate dictionaries. Factors such as greater opportunities for education, which is in Nepali, the national language; more mobility through better accessibility to the area; exposure to a more and more Nepali-speaking environment have had their impact on the use of the Jirel language. The compilers (both Jirel and non-Jirel) have observed the tendency toward increased borrowing from Nepali, as well as young people becoming more bilingual in Nepali, with a preference for speaking Nepali over their mother tongue. This shift from the mother tongue to the national language has been so extensive that the Jirel language might even become classified as an endangered language -– unless there is a move towards a revitalization of the language. So the compilers decided to publish only one dictionary for both audiences, Jirel and non-Jirel, as they felt that educated Jirels, in particular those in danger of losing their mother tongue, would profit from the material included for non-Jirel speakers, such as cultural notes, illustrative sentences in Jirel with their English translations, etc.

After we decided to publish only one dictionary, there needed to be a change made in the arrangement of some of the entries for easier reference. In the dictionary for the non-Jirel-speaking audience we had chosen to group entries with semantic relationships together in sub-entries under the main entries of a headword. However, it made the entries more complex for looking up. Since the Jirels were our our primary audience, we then converted most of the sub-entries into main entries for easier reference; the main aim being a more user-friendly dictionary which would not require looking for information in more than one place.

Strengths and weaknesses of the dictionary

Every dictionary has its strengths and weaknesses. The Jirel-Nepali-English Dictionary is no exception.

Some of the well-developed areas of this dictionary are: 1) An overall representation of the language by compiling a fairly large corpus of the language and by including loan words, mainly from Nepali, which are part of the language (some 7600 entries). 2) The use of the Roman representation of the Jirel (in Devanagari) with very few phonetic symbols, so that educated Jirels and non-linguists can easily follow it. 3) The inclusion of semantic domains (e.g., botanical and zoological terms, terms for body parts and utensils). These domains, as far as possible, are quite exhaustive, with specific definitions wherever possible. 4) The inclusion of vocabulary (marked archaic) which is used and understood less and less by younger generations. 5) The inclusion of intensifiers, ideophones and onomatopoeic expressions. 6) The inclusion of the morphological diagnostic forms of nouns, pronouns and verbs. 7) The inclusion of a fair number of cross-references, e.g., synonyms, antonyms or semantically related entries. 8) The illustrative sentences which are generally taken from daily use. 9) The various notes and comments included in the dictionary besides the English definitions. This gives the educated Jirel user a broad picture of his or her own culture and to the non-Jirel user an insight into the Jirel culture.

Some of the weaknesses or less developed areas of this dictionary are: 1) Other than the part-of-speech designation and the morphological diagnostic forms, relatively few grammatical notes are included in the main part of the dictionary. 2) No Nepali-Jirel Index is included, although such an index could be provided upon request to the compilers. 3) No Roman transcription of the illustrative sentences in Jirel is given. 4) No Nepali translation of the illustrative sentences is included.