Zou people(Part 1)
1 year ago

The Zou people (also spelled Yo or Yaw or Jo or Jou ) are an indigenous community living along the frontier of India and Burma, they are a sub-group of the Kuki people. In India, they live with and are similar in language and habits to the Thadou people and Paite and the Simte peoples. In Burma, the Zou are counted among the Chin people.They are a hill people , "Zou" may plainly means "Hills" denoting the Zous are "people of the hills" or "of the hills", and "Zou" has also a different meaning in Zou language that is "complete" or another word for it is "finish". But, the Zou people believed that they incepted the name 'Zou' from their forefather 'Zou' or 'Zo', believed to be the progenitor of the broad Chin-Kuki-Mizo people. In India, the Zou are officially recognized as one of the thirty-three indigenous peoples within the state of Manipur,and are one of the Scheduled tribes. According to the 2001 Census, the Zou/Jou population in Manipur is around 20,000, less than 3% of the population. The community is concentrated in Churachandpur and Chandel districts of Manipur in North-East India. Historical background Zou cultural troupe in full traditional attire The early history of the Zou people is lost in myths and legends; they claim an origin somewhere in the north,[1] and some claim that they are originally the same as the Paite and were only separated at the end of the British Raj.[1] Linguistic and racial evidence suggest the Indo-Chinese origin of the people.[citation needed] Linguists classified the Zou language as Tibeto-Burman, with only small differences between Zote and Paite.[1] The American Baptist missionary, J.H. Cope, made an attempt to trace the pre-colonial history of the Chin Hills in a church journal, Tedim Thu Kizakna Lai. The journal (edited by Cope) provides a glimpse of the Zomis in Chin Hills before the arrival of British imperialism. Under the Manlun chiefs, Zou language Main article: Zou language Zou/Jou is similar to Paite. It is classified as a northern Tibeto-Burman tribe. According to Ethnologue, there are 20,600 speakers in India (based on the 2001 Indian census) and around 31,000 speakers in Burma (no source given).The Zou/Zo language is one of the prescribed major Indian languages in the high schools.

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