What is Khmer?
Khmer is a language spoken throughout southeast Asia, particularly in the nation of Cambodia. It is spoken by more than 20 million people, with the majority speaking it as a native language. Khmer is part of the Austro-Asiatic family of languages, and is related to languages such as Vietnamese and Mon. Khmer is an official language of Cambodia. The region that is present-day Cambodia was once the center of the Khmer empire, from which the Khmer language originates. There are another estimated 5 million people who speak Khmer living in Vietnam and Thailand. Overseas, both France and the United States have large Cambodian immigrant populations who also speak Khmer, adding approximately 250,000 more speakers. As the state religion of the Khmer Empire switched between Hinduism and Buddhism, the language also changed accordingly. During the Hindi periods, the Khmer language experienced a great deal of shift and vocabulary expansion from the Pali language used in the national religion, and d
