A regional reference point

Glottolog’s bibliographic record for Tej K. Bhatia’s Punjabi grammar states that it is primarily based on Majhi as spoken in Lahore, Amritsar and the pre-Partition Gurdaspur district. This describes the scope of a particular reference grammar. It also shows why the modern international border is not an adequate boundary for the speech variety being described.[1]

A grammar based on one regional variety can be a valuable reference without documenting every Punjabi speaker. The catalogue’s scope statement should therefore travel with any grammatical example taken from the book. This introduction has inspected the bibliographic record, not the whole grammar, and does not attribute unexamined rules or verb forms to Bhatia.[1]

How linguistic resources label it

The ASJP database maintains an entry titled Punjabi Majhi, compiled by Ann-Katrin Wett. Its metadata links the entry to ISO code pan and a Punjabi Glottocode. Those identifiers help distinguish a documented dataset from a loose search term. The undated speaker total displayed there is not adopted here as a current population estimate.[2]

Punjab Agricultural University’s Basic Punjabi syllabus includes Majhi alongside other named regional varieties, as part of a wider practical course covering script, vocabulary and grammar. This is evidence of how one institution organises teaching. It does not establish that all regional speakers use the same vocabulary or that a syllabus’s classification settles every question of language identity.[3]

A similar name in Nepal

There is also a separately documented language named Majhi in Nepal. The publisher’s announcement for Dubi Nanda Dhakal’s 2014 grammar identifies the Tamakoshi-area variety and the language code mjz. That is a different research subject from the Punjabi variety discussed here. A search result about its verb agreement cannot safely be imported into an account of Punjabi just because both titles contain Majhi.[4]

When selecting a grammar, recording or wordlist, check the language code, region and author’s stated variety before using an example. In this case, the contrast between the Punjabi dataset and the Nepal grammar makes that check concrete. Names of varieties are useful entry points, but the underlying record establishes which speech community and research material a source actually concerns.[2][4]

Sources & notes

Source records include access dates and, where known, limits on what was examined. Checks used AI assistance; independent human or specialist review has not been completed.

  1. Glottolog. Reference record: Bhatia, Punjabi: A Cognitive-Descriptive Grammar (1993) ↗linguistic bibliography · Source date: 1993 book; catalogue record undated · Locator: Bibliographic entry and lgcode scope statement. Accessed 2026-10-31.The catalogue record was read; the entire grammar was not inspected.Return to A regional reference point, paragraph 1 ↑Return to A regional reference point, paragraph 2 ↑
  2. ASJP Database / Ann-Katrin Wett. Wordlist Punjabi Majhi ↗linguistic dataset metadata · Source date: publication date not established · Locator: Title, compiler, language identifiers and metadata. Accessed 2026-10-31.Only the displayed metadata are used; no unseen wordlist rows or current speaker counts are claimed.Return to How linguistic resources label it, paragraph 1 ↑Return to A similar name in Nepal, paragraph 2 ↑
  3. Punjab Agricultural University. Agricultural Journalism, Languages and Culture: course contents ↗institutional curriculum · Source date: publication date not established · Locator: Pbi. 101 Basic Punjabi, practical course description. Accessed 2026-10-31.Institutional syllabus used for teaching context, not as a universal taxonomy.Return to How linguistic resources label it, paragraph 2 ↑
  4. Lincom publisher announcement via LINGUIST List. A Grammar of Majhi: Dhakal ↗publisher announcement · Source date: 2014 · Locator: Announcement dated 6 May 2014, abstract and language code mjz. Accessed 2026-10-31.Used to disambiguate the Nepal language from Majhi Punjabi; no full-book inspection claimed.Return to A similar name in Nepal, paragraph 1 ↑Return to A similar name in Nepal, paragraph 2 ↑
Help improve this entry. Suggest a correction with a source.
Record PH-LAN-0006 · English edition · human review not performed