Cham generally uses SVO word order, without any case marking to distinguish subject from object: Dummy pronominal subjects are sometimes used, echoing the subject: Composite verbs will behave as one inseparable verb, having the object come after it: Sometimes, however, the verb is placed in front of the subject: Auxiliary verbs are placed after any objects: If a sentence contains more than one main verb, one of the two will have an adverbial meaning: Adjectives come after the nouns they modify: If the order is reversed, the whole will behave like a compound: Composite sentences can be formed with the particle krung: It is also possible to leave out this particle, without change in meaning: Questions are formed with the sentence-final particlerẽi: Other question words are in situ:
Nominals
Like many languages in Eastern Asia, Cham uses numeral classifiers to express amounts. The classifier will always come after the numeral, with the noun coming invariably before or after the classifier-numeral pair. The above examples show the classifier boḥ, which literally means "egg" and is the most frequently used — particularly for round and voluminous objects. Other classifiers are ôrang for people and deities, ḅêk for long objects, blaḥ for flat objects, and many others. The days of the month are counted with a similar system, with two classifiers: one used to count days before the full moon, and the other one for days after the full moon. Personal pronouns behave like ordinary nouns and do not show any case distinctions. There are different forms depending on the level of politeness. The first person singular, for example, is kău in formal or distant context, while it is dahlak or hulun in an ordinarily polite context. As is the case with many other languages of the region, kinship terms are often used as personal pronouns. Comparative and superlative are expressed with the locative preposition di/dii:
Verbs
There are some particles that can be used to indicate tense/aspect. The future is indicated with shi or thi in Vietnam, with hi or si in Cambodia. The perfect is expressed with jœû. The first one comes in front of the verb: The second one is sentence-final: Certain verbs can function as auxiliaries to express other tenses or aspects. The verb dok is used for the continuous, vœk for the repetitive aspect, and kiœngfor the futuretense. The negation is formed with ôh/ô at either or both sides of the verb, or with di/dii in front. The imperative is formed with the sentence-final particle bêk, and the negative imperative with the preverbal jvai/jvẽi.
Sociolinguistics
Diglossia
Brunelle observed two phenomena of language use among speakers of Eastern Cham: They are both diglossic and bilingual. Diglossia is the situation where two varieties of a language are used in a single language community, and oftentimes one is used on formal occasions and the other is more colloquial.
Dialectal differences
Cham is divided into two primary dialects. Western Cham is spoken by the Cham in Cambodia as well as in the adjacent Vietnamese provinces of An Giang and Tây Ninh. Eastern Cham is spoken by the coastal Cham populations in the Vietnamese provinces of Bình Thuận, Ninh Thuận, and Đồng Nai. The two regions where Cham is spoken are separated both geographically and culturally. The more numerous Western Cham are predominantly Muslims, while the Eastern Cham practice both Islam and Hinduism. Ethnologue states that the Eastern and Western dialects are no longer mutually intelligible. The table below gives some examples of words where the two dialects differed as of the 19th century. Lê et al. lists a few Cham subgroups.
Chăm Poông: in Thạnh Hiếu village, Phan Hiệp commune, Bắc Bình District, Bình Thuận Province. The Chăm Poông practice burial instead of cremation as the surrounding Cham do.
is a Brahmic script. The script has two varieties: Akhar Thrah and Akhar Srak. The Western Cham language is written with the Arabic script or the aforementioned Akhar Srak.
Dictionaries
The Ming dynasty Chinese Bureau of Translators produced a Chinese-Cham dictionary. John Crawfurd's 1822 work "Malay of Champa" contains a dictionary of the Cham language.
