• Endangered

  80 percent certain, based on the evidence available

• 100-999

  Native speakers worldwide
• Ethnic population

  550

• MORE ON SPEAKER NUMBERS

  ~400 in Laos (as of 2014), and 149 in China (as of 2013)

SPEAKER NUMBER TRENDS

TRANSMISSION

MORE ON VITALITY

66 fluent speakers in China. No vitality info are available on those living in Laos.

The percentage of people who CANNOT speak Cosao:
age 0-5: 100%
age 6-15: 26.3%
age 16-25: 4.7％
age 26-50: 5%
age 51 and above: 0%

OTHER LANGUAGES USED BY THE COMMUNITY

• Southwestern Mandarin; Dai; Yao/Mien; Akha

LANGUAGE CONTEXT COMMENTS

They only speak Cosao among themselves. Exogamy is very common due to the low population number of the Cosao.

Scripts (Writing system)

pictographic glyphs

PLACES

China; Laos

LOCATION DESCRIPTION

Southwestern part of Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province, China, and the neighboring Phôngsali (ຜົ້ງສາລີ) Province in Laos

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS

There is only one Cosao speaking village in China, located in 中國雲南省西雙版納傣族自治州勐臘縣勐伴鎮勐伴村委會曼岡村