Mandeali

Dialects: Preliminary survey suggests speakers have functional intelligibility of Kangri ,. People in southeast Mandi district may have more difficulty understanding Kangri. Standard Mandeali is spoken throughout the broad valley running north and south from Jogindernagar to Sundarnagar. Mandeali Pahari is spoken north around Barot, east of Uhl River. Intelligible with difficulty to standard Mandeali. May be intermediate variety between Mandeali and Kullui ,. Southeast district contains transition to Mahasui ,. In the west, Sarkaghat is also a bit different from standard Mandeali, perhaps forming a transition towards Hamirpur and Bilaspur areas. Lexical similarity: 89% with Palampuri dialect of Kangri ,, 83% with Chambeali ,.

Demographics: 900,000 (1991 census).

Language Use: All ages. Also use Eastern Panjabi [pan], Hindi [hin], Urdu [urd].

Language Development: Newspapers. Radio programs. Grammar. Bible portions: 1970.

Typology: SOV.

Writing System: Devanagari

Nation of Origin: India

Other Comments: Hindu.