This is a Hani-English, English-Hani dictionary containing nearly 30,000 words. There are some 1.3 million Hani people living in the Yunnan Province in the extreme Southwest of China. Their language is a member of the Loloish (Yi) branch of the Lolo-Burmese subgroup of Tibeto-Burman family of languages. The introduction to the dictionary provides a basic description of the culture and the language of the Hani people. A bibliography of English, Chinese and Hani books and articles on Hani is included. The alphabetization of the dictionary follows the English alphabet, which makes it easy to use. Illustrations of some words are given when the full force of the words cannot be adequately translated into English. In many cases, page numbers where the word can be found in various Hani books are given, so that the reader can see the word used in context.
The dictionary contains 12 appendices which include a comparison of the Hani and Akha orthographies; a story of the dragon and the son-in-law (in Hani and English); Hani genealogies; Hani names of 56 ethnic groups in China; Hani names of provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions; words for sounds as the Hani hear them; Hani terms of endearment; set negative phrases; a sample of Hani proverbs and riddles; the Hani concept of time; and four syllable elaborate expressions.