Locale Ii Cn
Use when working with the Yi (China) locale (`ii-CN`) — its endonym ꆈꌠꉙ (ꍏꉸ), Yi script, left-to-right (LTR) direction, or spoken-population data. Reference data and translation guidance (register, grammar, idiom, typography) for this specific locale; see [[locale]] for general i18n/l10n concepts (BCP 47, plural rules, RTL) that apply across all locales.
Reference data for the Yi (China) locale — endonym ꆈꌠꉙ (ꍏꉸ), written in the Yi script, left-to-right (LTR).
Identifiers
- BCP 47 tag:
ii-CN - ISO 639-1:
ii - ISO 639-3:
iii - Script: Yiii (Yi)
- Region: CN (China)
- Text direction: ltr — left-to-right (LTR)
Speakers (approximate)
- L1 (native): 2,000,000
- L2 (additional): 200,000
- L1+L2 (total): 2,200,000
Pluralization
CLDR plural categories for this locale: other (1 form).
- other — everything else (e.g. 0~15, 100, 1000, 10000, …)
See Unicode Messageformat for writing plural messages using these categories.
Translating into this locale
Nuosu Yi (Sichuan Yi, ꆈꌠ) is a Loloish language of the Tibeto-Burman family, written in the standardized Yi syllabary of Liangshan (about 800 characters, standardized in 1980). Other Yi varieties use different scripts or Chinese-based writing, so confirm the variety. This guidance is lower-confidence; have a native reviewer check it.
Translate ideas, not words.
- Translate from the meaning into Nuosu Yi rather than via Chinese. Chinese loanwords are common, but new coinages follow Yi word formation.
- Re-express idioms by meaning.
Grammar.
- Word order is subject-object-verb. Yi is tonal; the syllabary writes each syllable, including its tone, with one character.
- There is no grammatical gender and no inflection by case or number; particles and word order carry grammatical relations.
Orthography and typography.
- Use Unicode Yi Syllables (U+A000 to U+A48C) and Yi Radicals (U+A490 to U+A4CF); never use look-alike characters from other blocks.
- Text is left to right. Punctuation follows Chinese conventions in China (full-width 。，), and numerals are Arabic.
Common pitfalls
- Using Chinese grammar or punctuation without adaptation.
- Using the wrong script variety.
- Using fonts or encodings that substitute look-alike characters.
Learn more
- Locale for BCP 47 identifiers, locale-sensitive formatting, pluralization, and text-direction concepts that apply across all locales.
- Unicode Messageformat for writing plural/selection messages correctly for this locale's grammar.
- Unicode Standard, Yi Syllables block (https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/UA000.pdf)
- Standardized Yi script of Liangshan (1980 standardization by the Chinese government)