This talk presents an analysis of the speech sounds of Nyagrong Minyag employing palatographic, acoustic, and video techniques to complement traditional auditory analysis. Nyagrong Minyag is an understudied language of Xinlong (Nyagrong) County, Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province; it is not to be confused with Muya (ISO 639-3: mvm), spoken near Kangding. It is likely a Rgyalrongic language, whose closest living relative is probably Horpa (ISO 639-3: ero). Nyagrong Minyag, however, differs significantly from published descriptions of Horpa and other Rgyalrongic languages, especially in terms of the phonetics.

After presenting the phoneme inventory and syllable structure of Nyagrong Minyag, this talk will elaborate on the researcher's use of instrumental techniques to identify some of the more challenging phonemic distinctions and resolve cases where the details of articulation are unclear. Palatographic evidence is used to show the contrasting coronal places of articulation, and video evidence is presented for distinguishing the labial sounds. Acoustic data is used for characterizing pre-initials and vowel distinctions.

The data presented in this talk provide the first phonetic description of Nyagrong Minyag and add to our understanding of the phonetics of Rgyalrongic languages more generally.