As a researcher, I am convinced that it is an        inevitable  global mega trend for vulnerable languages to wither away. But this poses a  grave  challenge to the linguistic and  cultural  diversity . It is a sacred responsibility of linguists with conscience to pay great attention to language in danger of  extinction. Under no circumstances can they afford to do nothing about it.
           Anong is a branch of the Nu ethnic group. Its population of about 75,000 is found mainly in Fugong County, Lisu Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province. The turbulent Nu River flows       through the county from north to south. On the east bank of the river is the snow-capped Biluo Mountain and on the west bank is the Gaoligong Mountain. The Anong people live on the tableland on the banks. They border with the Union of Myanmar in the west and the Tibet Autonomous Region in  the north. They live together with people of the Lisu, Bai and Han ethnic groups. They call their language the Anong. The Anong is an independent language that belongs to the Jingpo language branch of the Tibeto-Burman language group of the Sino-Tibetan Family. It is similar to the Derung language, but  vastly different from the Nusu language that is used by the Nusu people and belongs to the Yi language branch of the Tibeto-Burman language group of the Sino-Tibetan Family. The Nusu people dominates  the  population of  the Nu ethnic group.
    I conducted my first investigation on the Anong language in September-October 1960. I found a person of the Nu ethnic group who spoke the Anong language fluently. He was a primary school teacher. I noted down his language  which was  mainly had a basic vocabulary of over 2,000 words  and a few sentences. The then statistics showed that over 800 people used the language.
    My second investigation on  the language was  conducted in April 1965. I just tried to have some general  idea  of the language and noted down some grammar examples.
    Twenty years later I had my third investigation  on  the Anong language in April-May 1983. In the area where the prefectural government was located, I found a person of the Nu ethnic group who spoke the Anong language fluently. I got some  additional grammar examples. On the basis of this I wrote "Notes on Anong, a New Language" and published it in the United States.  In accordance with the census in 1982, I estimated in my investigations the number of people using the Anong language at around 500.
    I did my fourth investigation on the Anong language in September 1987. This time I did the investigations among young and middle-aged people in Fugong County. I paid attention to their attitude toward the Anong language. There I made additional notes on grammar and family trees. I also recorded a small number of long stories.
    My fifth investigation on the Anong language was carried out in October-November 1995. I finally went deep into villages for a sample survey. The result of the survey was that only 410 people could properly use the Anong language. I obtained a lot of information in my investigations, especially grammar materials.
    My last investigation on the Anong language was done in January-February 1999. This time I observed in villages how the language was used. I also tried to find out and analyze how the language was used by different people and what attitude these people had toward the language. In addition, I especially observed and analyzed the changes in the structure of the language while it was withering away. It can be said that this time I learnt more about the language than ever before. The vocabulary was expanded from fewer than 3,000 to about 5,000 words , and additional notes were made on grammar. I also found some extremely important grammar rules and noted down some long stories and narrative information. I recorded the basic vocabulary, phonetics, long stories and important grammar examples.  Unfortunately, I found some senior citizens over 70 in villages had died. Mr. Han Wenjun, over 70, was one of them. I had interviewed him in my investigations in 1983 and 1987. This time I found fewer  than 400 people were using the Anong language.
    In my first investigation on  the Anong language, I realized that most Anong people had transferred to the use of the Lisu language and that a small number of them used the Chinese and the Bai languages. The transfer had taken place before the founding of the People's Republic of China. At that time, the Anong ethnic group had a population of around 4,300. Eight hundred, or 18.6%, of them used their mother tongue. In 1994 there were 7,200 Anong people, and 400, or 5.56%, of them used their mother tongue. Although the absolute number of users fell by 50% over 1960, the proportion dropped by about 70%.
    These natural villages have a population of about 1,000 who live in and around the natural village of Mugujia. With only one household of the Lisu ethnic group, Mugujia is basically a village where Anong people live in compact. The other villages mostly have Anong residents, but they have more Lisu people than Mugujia Village. Many Anong families are related with Lisu families by marriage. Their language conditions are: about 400 people use their mother tongue the Anong language, and most of these people are bilingual as they speak both the Anong and the Lisu languages. Many of them speak better Lisu than Anong. A small number of them are multilingual as they speak the Anong, the Lisu and the Chinese languages. Some are very good bilinguals or multilinguals, but others are not.
    In November 1995, I conducted a sample survey of the languages the Anong people used. The site of my survey was natural village of Mugujia where the Anong people lived in compact. I had 104 respondents from 27 households , that is, all the people at or above the age of 10 who could speak. The survey was about the name, sex, age, ethnicity, education and the language of the respondent. There were four levels for the language:
    A. Fluent. Able  not only to use the language for daily purposes but also to talk about all matters in production and living. Mastery of a vocabulary of over 3,000  words.
    B. Not so fluent. Able to use the language for daily purposes with a lack of fluency. Mastery of a vocabulary of about 1,000  words. The second language was better than the mother tongue.
    C. Able only to use daily greetings. Not able  to use the mother tongue to completely express ideas. Conversations often containing the vocabulary of the second language. Mastery of a very limited vocabulary. Unable to use the common words for daily living. Bad pronunciation. Fluent in the second language.
    D. Having basically forgotten the mother tongue. Able to understand a bit, but unable to speak. Some people didn't understand their mother tongue.
    The results of the survey are as follows: 62 people were under Category A, accounting for 59.6% of all the respondents; 19 under Category B, 18.2%; 14 under Category C, 13.4%; and 7 under Category D, 8.8%. This shows that the Anong people had basically kept their mother tongue. However, after we had a sample survey of the use of the Lisu language, their second language, the situation look serious. Of the 104 respondents, 96 people fell under Category A and the remaining eight fell under Category B. In addition, those under Category B were senior citizens who seldom traveled out of the village. No one was under categories C and D. This shows that in the core area where the Anong language was used, the Anong people were at a far higher level in their second language than in their mother tongue. Almost all the Anong people spoke the Lisu language, and most of them spoke the Lisu better than the Anong. As far as their use of the Chinese language is concerned, the results of the survey were as follows: Of the 104 respondents, 13 fell under Category A, accounting for 12.5% of the total; 17 under Category B, 16.3%; and all the rest 55 people under Category C, 52.9%. Although those who spoke the Chinese language were mall in number , they were mostly  intellectuals, village cadres or those who often traveled out of the village. It should be pointed out they didn't speak Putonghua but a local dialect of the Chinese language. Those who knew nothing about the Chinese language were often senior citizens or women who were seldom out of the village. A small number of households of the Bai ethnic group live in Mugujia Village, but the Anong people there do not speak the Bai language. On the contrary, most Bai people there speak the Chinese language or the Lisu language.
    The natural village of Mugujia has the most concentrated Anong population in Mugujia Township and the Anong language is often used there. When you visit the households there, you sometimes hear conversations in the Anong language, but mostly the Lisu language is used. In the natural villages I mentioned above that are around Mugujia Village, as the Anong people live together with those of the Lisu and other ethnic groups, none of them fall under Category A. Some of them, about 280, fall under Category B. Most of these people are 60, 70 or older. Few of the people aged from 50 to 60 speak their mother tongue. Most of the Anong people fall under Categories C and D. Basically, they cannot communicate in their mother tongue. This shows that in these villages, the Anong language has basically ceased functioning as the main communication tool of the Anong people and has been totally replaced by the Lisu language.
    The 400 Anong people I mentioned before who can still use their mother tongue are those who fall under Categories A and B. But as a matter of fact, most of them, especially those in the other natural villages except Mugujia, seldom use their mother tongue.
    According to my long-term observation and analysis in those villages, the main reasons for this are as follows:
    1. It is because of the general environment of the Anong language. According to the family trees and historical stories of the Anong ethnic group, the Anong people moved here from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the north and have been living here for more than 70 generations. In those long years, some of them moved north to Gongshan and still call themselves Anong now. However, they haven't had any contact with each other for a long time, so they have developed a language that is vastly different from the one used by Anong people in and around Fugong. Later on, some of the Anong people in Gongshan moved to areas on the Derung River to form the now Derung ethnic group. So the Anong people in Gongshan and the Derung people almost have the same language, and their languages can be seen as the two sides of a language. Some other Anong people moved westward to Myanmar.  At the time of the 40th-50th generations of the Anong people, the Lisu and Bai ethnic groups moved to most areas in the middle reaches of the Nu River. The Anong people who stayed there were successively assimilated by the Lisu and Bai ethnic groups. They gradually lost their characteristics, including their language. So when the People's Republic of China was founded, most of the Anong people there had lost their mother tongue. Since the People's Republic was founded 50 years ago, the natural assimilation has been continuing.
    2. The Anong people are an open group. They live in harmony with other ethnic groups and are connected with them by marriage. Mostly they marry Lisu people. The Anong language has a complex phonetics and grammar. We have noticed that in several villages with a concentration of Anong people, some households of other ethnic groups live with them. Even if they are in the minority, few of them can learn and use the Anong language. In Anong families that have married people of other ethnic groups, these members seldom use the Anong language. Conversely, the Lisu language is their common language. Take the man who helped many times in my research on the phonetics of the Anong language for example. He falls under Category A in terms of his mother tongue. His wife is from the Lisu ethnic group. They have been married for more than 30 years, but now she can only understand a little bit Anong language and never speaks  the language. Their family uses the Lisu language. They have three daughters and one son who understand only some Anong language. Sometimes the father speaks the Anong language at home, but other members of his family respond often in the Lisu language. In this region the Lisu is the dominant language, and family members often learn the Lisu language first.
    3. About the attitude toward the Anong language. In our on-the-spot investigations, we contacted many Anong intellectuals, cadres and some ordinary people. We have realized that they take the following three attitudes toward the current conditions of their mother tongue:
    First, some main officials and intellectuals are worried about the current conditions of their mother tongue. They regard the language as an important characteristic of their ethnic group. They believe that the withering away of the language will lead to the loss of many cultural phenomena and historical legends of their ethnic group and to the loss of the main characteristic of their ethnic group. In the mid-1980s, a Nu official of the Lisu, Nu and Derung Autonomous Prefecture proposed that measures be taken to preserve the language information. Under her direction, some money was put into the recording, classifying and publishing of  the Nu language information. Her attitude clearly represents the attitude of the far-sighted Anong people for their language. Some of these people hope that there will be pinyin or characters for recording their language so as to preserve the language more effectively.
    Second, a few intellectuals and ordinary people stand by the extinction of their language. According to them, the Chinese language is most useful and if you speak it, you can travel all over the country without difficulty. You easily understand the Chinese language if you turn on the radio and TV. You cannot afford not to understand the Lisu language because you have Lisu people all around you. It simply won't do if you don't know the Lisu language because you have to use it when you leave your home. When asked what they think of their own language disappearing rapidly, they say that it doesn't  matter  if it is gone and that it would be better if it were gone because it would be more convenient and they don't have to use interpreters any more. Some of them even think that their language is backward so that it cannot be used to describe many things. So these people are not in the least supporting the move to create pinyin or characters for their language. They believe all that is unnecessary.
    Third, most cadres, ordinary people and intellectuals are indifferent to the withering way of their mother tongue. They think it is better to let the language take its own course as it is useless to worry about it.
    A language that is withering way undergoes rapid changes. By comparing the information we obtained in different periods, we have found changes in the structure of the Anong language. Examples are as follows:
    1. Changes in vocabulary.
    First, the number of foreign words had increased drastically. In 1960 I noted down a basic vocabulary of 2,600 words , about 5% of which were borrowed from the Chinese language and around 8% of which were borrowed from the Lisu language. In 1999 I checked the words I noted down in 1960 and at the same time I noted down new words. Altogether I had about 4,900 words. This time the percentage of the words borrowed from other languages changed a lot. The percentage of the words borrowed from the Chinese language increased to 8%, and the percentage of the words from the Lisu language increased to 17%. An interesting phenomenon is that Anong people often replace some very common native words with Lisu words. Therefore, the coexistence of borrowed and native words is very common in the Anong language.
    Second, people with different fluency in their mother tongue have vastly different vocabularies. Those under Category A have a vocabulary of over 3,000 words , and those under Category B have a vocabulary of about 1,000. We had a test in this regard. Take for example "crossbow," a hunting tool Anong people are most familiar with. In addition to the general term, there are more than ten names for the different parts such as the back, bowstring, bowstring lock, stem, bowhead, bow-tail, quiver, gun-sight, trigger, trigger groove, trigger spring, and back-stem joint. Some of these parts are proper words, and others are compound words. When asked to name crossbow parts, Anong people of Category A told all or most of the names, while people of Category B told only the general term and sometimes the names of the bowstring, the back and the trigger. But that was all people of Category B knew. This shows that an important symbol for the loss of the vitality of a language is the drastic fall in the number of its native words and sometimes the failure to borrow from other languages promptly.
           2. Phonetics.
    First, the Anong language has eight consonant clusters with retroflex semivowels as postpositive consonants. Basically none of those under 50 knows how to use these consonant clusters.
    Second, the Anong language has ten consonant clusters with a frontal glottal stop. Only a few senior citizens know how to use them. Some elderly people use them as tight glottal of vowels. Most Anong people do not use them at all.
    Third, the Anong language has a set of retroflex sounds, including retroflex glottal, nasal and lateral sounds. Anong people under Category B mostly combine these sounds with glottal, nasal and bilateral sounds that are not retroflex.
    Fourth, the Anong language has tongue and dorsal friction sounds. Currently there are free changes in the pronunciations of some words. This means a trend toward changes in phonetics.
    Fifth, some vowels have become tight glottal. Sixth, irregular changes often take place in pronunciations when the language is in use.
    3. Grammar.
    First, some important grammar rules are still observed among senior citizens, but younger people do not use them in their oral language. These include the grammar rules about the use of verbs and about the person and number of verbs.
    Second, the Anong language has structural auxiliary words indicating grammatical relations. These are subordinate, action, reception, tool, location, direction, comparison and designated auxiliary words. The auxiliary words play an important role in indicating grammatical relations. Generally speaking, the rules for their use are strict. However, Anong people who do not speak good Anong language do not use these auxiliary words correctly.
    Third, the Anong language has the rules indicating the person subordination of nouns by adding a prefix before a noun to match the person pronoun. A few elderly Anong people who are good at their mother tongue often use these rules in their oral language. Person prefixes are added to many addresses of relatives, but the grammar rule is no longer used in the oral language of most Anong people. Person pronouns are used to indicate subordination instead.
    Fourth, the Anong language has its numeral system. The system has the common characteristics of the Tibeto-Burman language group. In addition to the unit's place, the ten's place, and the hundred's place, the cardinal numerals are up to the thousand's place. Things vary a lot among the Anong people under Category B who do not speak very good Anong language. Some of them go up to the hundred's place, some up to the ten's place, but others only use the unit's place. Instead they use the Lisu language for numerals above the ten's place. Some Anong people simply use the Lisu language even for the unit's place.
    Fifth, Anong people have rich oral literature. However, it is still remembered by a very small number of elderly people. In recording these long language materials, we found that a very small number of senior citizens could tell stories endlessly. The stories were complicated and moving and logic. They contained vivid forms of expression such as four-sound words, idioms and antitheses. However, not all Anong people who are good at their mother tongue can tell stories. Some of them can tell some stories, but only in plain language. The stories they tell are simple and illogic. Most Anong people do not know how to tell long stories in their mother tongue.
       About the author:
Sun Hongkai
    Research fellow and supervisor for doctorate candidates, deputy director,  of the China Center for Ethnic Minority Languages of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He has been engaged in research on the languages of ethnic minorities since 1954. He has publications on descriptive linguistics, comparative linguistics, ancient ethnic languages and literature and language planning. He stayed long in ethnic minority regions to investigate and record over 20 languages of the Sino-Tibetan Family and discovered more than ten ethnic minority languages. He has published 16 titles of academic books and over 150 articles. Currently Sun is in charge of the Thoroughgoing Investigations and Study of Newly Discovered Ethnic Minority Languages in China, a major project funded by the State Foundation for Social Sciences for the Ninth Five-Year Plan.