Sgaw Karen vs Pwo Karen: What Is the Difference?

No, Sgaw Karen and Pwo Karen are not the same language. They are the two largest branches of the Karen language family, spoken by the two largest Karen peoples, and a speaker of one does not automatically understand the other. Knyaw teaches Sgaw Karen only.

Two branches of one family

The Karen, or Karenic, languages are a group of tonal languages spoken by some 4.5 million Karen people in Myanmar and Thailand. Their three main branches are Sgaw, Pwo and Pa'O. Unusually for languages in the Sino-Tibetan family, Karen languages put the verb before the object, the way English does.

The Karen peoples are made up of roughly twenty subgroups. The two largest are the S'gaw and the Pwo, which is why these two languages come up first whenever someone asks about "the Karen language".

Who speaks Sgaw Karen

Sgaw Karen (ISO 639-3: ksw) has about 2.2 million speakers. Most live in Myanmar, in the Tanintharyi, Ayeyarwady, Yangon and Bago regions, and about 200,000 live in northern and western Thailand along the border with Kayin State. Karen communities abroad speak it too.

Who speaks Pwo Karen

Pwo Karen is not one language in the ISO registry but a group of four: Eastern Pwo, Western Pwo, Northern Pwo, Phrae Pwo. Even these four are at best marginally mutually intelligible with one another, so "Pwo Karen" covers more variation than the single name suggests.

How to tell them apart in writing

Both languages are written in the Myanmar script, so a page of Karen text can look Burmese at first glance. The Unicode block for Myanmar sets aside separate characters for each language: the characters whose names contain SGAW KAREN sit at U+1061 to U+1064, and the Pwo Karen characters at U+1065 to U+1070. If you see Pwo characters, the text is not Sgaw Karen. Our guide on Sgaw Karen vs Burmese walks through this character by character.

Which one does Knyaw teach

Sgaw Karen only. Every word in the dictionary is Sgaw Karen, and each entry says whether a Karen speaker has confirmed it. Knyaw has no Pwo Karen material and does not guess at Pwo readings of Sgaw words.

Sources

The language facts on this page come from these references. Karen words and their meanings come from Knyaw's own dictionary, where every entry shows whether a Karen speaker has confirmed it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Pwo Karen the same as Sgaw Karen?

No. They are two different languages within the Karen family, spoken by the two largest Karen peoples, and each has its own characters in Unicode.

Can a Sgaw Karen speaker understand Pwo Karen?

Not automatically. They are separate languages, and even the four Pwo varieties are at best marginally mutually intelligible with each other.

How many people speak Sgaw Karen?

About 2.2 million, mostly in Myanmar, with about 200,000 in Thailand.

Does Knyaw teach Pwo Karen?

No. Knyaw teaches reading Sgaw Karen only, and every dictionary entry shows whether a Karen speaker has confirmed it.