The Lhokpu of southwestern Bhutan: the people and their language

The Lhokpu people are a language community indigenous to the hills of southwestern Bhutan. Historically, the Lhokpu homeland extended further into the mountains of western Bhutan as well as out into the jungles on the plains of the Western Duars, where their ancestors used to hunt wild hnar ‘elephants’ and hnaisa ‘bear’. The Lhokpu language represents a distinct linguistic subgroup unto itself within the Trans-Himalayan language family, world’s second most populous language family in terms of numbers of speakers. Some grammatical features of the language have given rise to two hypotheses about the phylogenetic propinquity of the language within the language family. Salient cultural traits of the language community include the matrilocal and matriarchal structure of Lhokpu society as well as Lhokpu rites, rituals and burial practices.