Native to Nepal Language family Sino-Tibetan
Dura Glottolog dura1244 | Ethnicity 2,160 (2011 census) ISO 639-3 drq | |
Extinct between 2008 and 2012
with the death of Soma Devi Dura | ||
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Dura is a recently extinct language of Nepal. It has been classified in the West Bodish branch of Tibetan languages, though more recent work separates it out as an independent branch of Sino-Tibetan. Many of the Dura have switched to speaking Nepali, and the Dura language has sometimes been thought to be extinct. Some of the people who have switched to Nepali for their daily speech still use Dura only for saying prayers.
The ethnic Dura people mostly live in the Lamjung District, with some in the neighboring Tanahu District, of the Gandaki Zone of central Nepal. They mostly live on farms in hilly country. Different recent census counts have reported the number of Dura people anywhere from 3,397 to 5,676.
The Himalayan Languages Project is working on recording additional knowledge of Dura. Around 1,500 words and 250 sentences in Dura have been recorded. The last known speaker of the language is the 82-year-old Soma Devi Dura.