Yi (also Moso, Lolo, Noso, etc.) is a family of closely related Tibeto-Burman languages spoken by the Yi people. Although linguists still use the term Lolo or Loloish, the Yi people themselves regard it as pejorative.

Writing system

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Classic Yi is a syllabic logographic system of 8000-10,000 glyphs. Although similar to Chinese in function, the glyphs are independent in form, with little to suggest that they're directly related.

The Modern Yi script (ꆈꌠꁱꂷ nuosu bburma 'Nosu script') is a standardized syllabary derived from the classic script in 1974 by the local Chinese government. It was made the official script of the Yi languages in 1980. There are 756 basic glyphs based on the Liangshan (Cool Mountain) dialect, plus 63 for syllables only found in Chinese borrowings.

In 1958 the Chinese government introduced a Roman-based alphabet for use in Yi.http://www.worldlanguage.com/Languages/Yi.htm

Dialects

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According to Chinese linguists the Yi language is divided into six major dialects:http://www.babelstone.co.uk/Yi/language.html

1. Northern dialect
2. Western dialect
3. Central dialect
4. Southern dialect
5. South-Eastern dialect
6. Eastern dialect

Some of these dialects are mutually unintelligible. The Northern dialect is the largest one with some 1.6 million speakers.

References

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Tibeto-Burman languages | Languages of China

Yieg | Idioma yi | 彝語 | 彝语 | Yi-språken