Kedah Malay


Kedah Malay or Kedahan also referred in Thailand as "Syburi Malay" is a variety of the Malayan languages mainly spoken in the northwestern northern Malaysian states of Perlis, Kedah, Penang, and northern Perak and in the southern Thai provinces of Trang, Satun and parts of Yala, the usage of Kedahan Malay was historically prevalent in southwestern Thailand before being superseded by the Thai language. Enclaves of Kedahan Malay language can be found in Kawthaung District in Myanmar, Jaring Halus, Langkat in Indonesia and Bangkok, Thailand, mostly by the descendants of historical settlers from Kedah.
Kedah Malay can be divided into several dialects, namely Kedah Persisiran, Kedah Utara, Perlis-Langkawi, Penang and some others outside Malaysia. See Malayan languages for a comparison of Kedah Persisiran, and Penang dialects.
The main characteristic of Kedah Malay is the -a final vocal is pronounced as such as /a/ in "dark", which is varied from standard Malay -a that pronounced as. Other characteristics of the dialect are final consonant -r is pronounced as -q and final consonant -s is pronounced as -ih, Lepas = Lepaih while initial and middle r are guttural. Speakers in Trang are most heavily influenced by the Thai language.