Punjabi - Orientation



Identification. The term "Punjabi" signifies both an inhabitant of the Punjab and a speaker of the predominant Language of that region, Punjabi. The name is from the Persian panj, "five," and ab, "river." The Punjab is defined by the Indus River and the five rivers to the south that flow out of the Himalayas to join it: the Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej. These define five doabs, which differ culturally and linguistically. A doab is the land between two converging rivers. Culturally, Punjab actually extends southward still more, to the bed of the largely extinct Ghaggar, which also traces from the Himalayas to the Indus and joins it about where the Sutlej does. The Punjab culture region includes the states of Punjab in Pakistan and in India as well as portions of present-day North-West Frontier Province in Pakistan and Jammu, Rajasthan, and Himachal Pradesh in India.


Location. The region lies between 28° and 34° N and 70° and 74° E. It is mainly a nearly level plain, dropping in elevation from 300 meters in the northeast at the edge of the Siwalik range to about 100 meters at the point where the Indus becomes a single stream. Above the plain, the culture region includes the mountains of the Salt range in Pakistan and parts of the lower Himalayas in India. Its area is about 270,000 square kilometers. Of this, 205,344 square kilometers are in Pakistan Punjab and 50,362 square kilometers in Indian Punjab.

The climate is warm to temperate. The hottest season is May-June, when maximum daytime temperatures are about 40° C. The coolest months are January and February, when light nighttime frosts are common. Rainfall is monsoonal, with more than two-thirds falling in the summer rainy season. It is heaviest near the Himalayas. Along the Himalayan edge of the plains annual amounts of about 1 meter are normal. At Lahore, 100 kilometers out into the plain, rainfall is about 50 centimeters, and at Multan, about 500 kilometers from the mountains and in the center of the southeastern portion of the region, it is about 18 centimeters. There are two major agricultural seasons marked by two dry, hot harvest periods in April-May ( rabi ) and September-October ( kharif ). The Winter monsoon, although light, is vital for the wheat crop that provides the traditional staple of the region.

Demography. The combined population of Indian and Pakistan Punjab in 1981 was about 64.1 million, compared to about 36.6 million in 1961. Population densities in rural areas range from over 1,900 persons per square kilometer in the highly urbanized Lahore District in Pakistan to about 10 persons per square kilometer in the desert of the Thal Doab between the Indus and the lower portion of the Chenab (Mianwala District). Indian Punjab had about 333 persons per square kilometer.

Linguistic Affiliation. Punjabi is Indo-European with close relations to surrounding languages, particularly to Pahari to the east. It is divided into six major dialects, localized in the major doabs. The Majhi and Malwa dialects are considered the most "pure." Majhi occupies the upper half of the Bari Doab, the plain region between the Ravi and the Sutlej rivers, which includes the cities of Lahore and Amritsar. The Malwa tract is just south of this between the Sutlej and Ghaggar, centering on Bhatinda. The other dialects are Doabi, spoken around Jalandhar between the Beas and the Sutlej; Powadhi, spoken in the eastern portion of the doab between the Sutlej and Ghaggar, centering on Sirhind; Dogri in Jammu District of Jammu and Kashmir and Kangra District of Himachal Pradesh; and finally Bhattiani, extending southeast from the Malwa tract across the eastern tip of Haryana State and into Ganganagar District of Rajasthan. North and west of Majhi, Punjabi gives way to Lahnda, also called Western Punjabi, which is spoken all across the Western half of the Pakistani Punjab. While linguistically distinguishable, Lahnda speakers generally consider themselves Punjabi. Lahnda and Bhattiani have been attenuated further by large migrations to the canal colonies of Shahpur, Lyallpur, Montgomery, and Multan and to Ganganagar District in Rajasthan. These schemes comprised almost 2.5 million hectares of new agricultural land by 1930, and by far the largest numbers of settlers were Jat farmers from around Lahore, Amritsar, Ludhiana, and Jalandhar.


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uzma
I want some phonological examples of shahpuri dialect and majhi dialect

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