Mongolia Languages

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Mongolia

Languages

Description

Mongolian is the official language of Mongolia and is spoken by 95% of the population.
A variety of dialects of Oirat and Buryat are also spoken across the country.
There are also some speakers of Mongolic Khamnigan.
In the west of the country, the Turkic languages of Kazakh and Tuvan are also spoken.
Mongolian Sign Language is the dominate language of the deaf community.
Russian is the most frequently spoken foreign language in Mongolia, followed by English, although English has been slowly replacing Russian as the second language.
Korean has gained popularity as tens of thousands of Mongolians work in South Korea.
See Alphabets and Scripts for more information on the historical use in Mongolia.

Word List(s)

• Russian Genealogical Word List
• Chinese Genealogical Word List

Mongolian or Khalkha Mongolian

• Useful Mongolian phrases (Omniglot)
• Mongolian phrasebook (Wikitravel)

Oirat

Buryat

• Buryat Word List (UCLA.edu)
• The Talking Buryat Phrasebook (Folkways.today)

Mongolic Khamnigan or Khamnigan Mongol

Kazakh

• Useful Kazakh phrases (Omniglot)
• Taranov, Andrey. Kazakh vocabulary for English speakers : 3000 words. n.p.: T & P Books Pub., 2013. Available at: WorldCat.

Tuvan

• Tuvan phrasebook (Wikivoyage)

Alphabet and Pronunciation

Mongolian or Khalkha Mongolian

• Khalkha Mongolian Phonology (Wikipedia)
• Khalkha Mongolian Grammar (Wikipedia)
• Mongolian Alphabet and Pronunciation (Omniglot)
• Mongolian grammar and basics (Learn101)]
• Ch, Battulga, Mika Laiho, Bat-Irėėdu̇ĭ Zh, and Mongol Ulsyn Ikh Surguulʹ. A student guide to Khalkha Mongolian pronunciation. Ulaanbaatar: T & U Print, 1999. Available at: WorldCat.

Oirat

Buryat

• Buryat Phonology (Wikipedia)
• Buryat Grammar (Wikipedia)
• Buryat Alphabet and Pronunciation (Omniglot)

Mongolic Khamnigan or Khamnigan Mongol

• Khamnigan Mongol Alphabet and Pronunciation (Omniglot)

Kazakh

• Kazakh Phonology (Wikipedia)
• Kazakh Morphology and syntax (Wikipedia)
• Kazakh Alphabet and Pronunciation (Omniglot)

Tuvan

• Tuvan Phonology (Wikipedia)
• Tuvan Grammar (Wikipedia)
• Tuvan Alphabet and Pronunciation (Omniglot)

Language Aids and Dictionaries

Mongolian or Khalkha Mongolian

• English to Mongolian Dictionary (Glosbe)
• Mongolian dictionary (Lexilogos)
• Mongolian (MustGo)
• Classical Mongolian Romanization

Oirat

• English to Written Oirat Dictionary (Glosbe)
• Oirat people : cultural uniformity and diversification. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology, 2014. Available at: WorldCat.

Buryat

Mongolic Khamnigan or Khamnigan Mongol

• Janhunen, Juha. Khamnigan Mongol. Munchen: Lincom Europa, 2005. Available at: WorldCat.

Kazakh

• English to Kazakh Dictionary (Glosbe)
• Kazakh dictionary (Lexilogos)

Tuvan

• Krueger, John Richard. Tuvan manual : area handbook, grammar, reader, glossary, bibliography. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University, 1977. Available at: WorldCat.

Additional Resources

• Mongolia (Britannica)
• Mongolia (Wikitravel)
• Rupen, Robert A. and Arpad Von Lazar. Mongolian area handbook. Washington, D.C.: American Council of Learned Societies, 1963. Available at: WorldCat.

History of the alphabet and script used in Mongolia:
As a result of pressure from the Soviet Union, Mongolia adopted the Latin alphabet in 1931 and the Cyrillic alphabet in 1937.
In 1941, the Mongolian government passed a law to abolish the Classical Mongol script, but since 1994 they have been trying to bring it back.
It is now taught to some extent in schools, though is mainly used for decorative purposes by artists, designers, calligraphers and poets.
The average person in Mongolia knows little or nothing about the Classical Mongol script, though there is high literacy in Cyrillic.
In the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region of China, the Classical Mongol script is still used.
The older, traditional alphabet was developed in the 1200s from the Turkic Uighur script.
Unlike most vertical scripts, it begins at the left.
In Mongolia, most older genealogical sources were written either in the classical Mongol script or in Chinese.
Records from the 1900s are written in Russian, in Cyrillic Mongolian, or in the Kazakh language.