ABSTRACT
The very numerous Tibeto-Burman, Austroasiatic and other non-Indic and non-Dravidian languages of South Asia are mainly spoken in peripheral regions in the north, northeast and east. While most of these groups are recognised as indigenous, many of their languages are endangered, and few have official status. There are also locally developed colonial contact languages which with Portuguese and Malay lexicon.
Contact with Indic and Dravidian languages has influenced all these languages, some very profoundly, with substantial structural convergence which makes many of them quite different from related languages spoken elsewhere. Conversely, Tibetan language and cultural influence has spread into parts of northern South Asia and Austroasiatic Munda languages have impacted some Indic and Dravidian languages spoken in eastern regions of South Asia.
