A Hmong-Mien language spoken in southern China, Vietnam, Laos, and the diaspora — about 4 million speakers, with major communities in the United States after Indochina wars.
Where it’s spoken
Hmong is spoken by Hmong people across southern China (especially Guizhou, Yunnan, Sichuan, Hunan, Guangxi), Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and Myanmar. Major US Hmong communities in Minnesota, California, and Wisconsin (about 300,000 people) descend from refugees of the Vietnam War’s Laotian phase. Hmong includes several major dialect groups, principally White Hmong (Hmong Daw) and Green Hmong (Hmong Njua), partially mutually intelligible.
What it sounds like
Hmong is tonal with seven or eight tones depending on dialect, distinguished by pitch and phonation type (creaky, breathy, modal). It has aspirated and unaspirated stop contrasts, prenasalized consonants, and a complex onset system. The vowel system varies by dialect.
How it’s written
The Romanized Popular Alphabet (RPA), developed in 1953 by missionaries, is the most common writing system. Tones are marked by consonants at the end of syllables (b for high, j for high-falling, etc.) — a unique strategy. The Pahawh Hmong script, invented in 1959 by Shong Lue Yang, is an indigenous syllabary used by some communities.
History
Hmong oral history places ancestral origins in northern China. Migrations southward over millennia and refugee waves after the 20th century have spread the language globally.
Find more languages by letter
Hmong starts with H and ends with G. Browse other languages along the same letter.
Languages that contain a letter from "Hmong":