Mongolian is natively spoken by about 5.5 million people, primarily in Mongolia, where it is the official language, and among Mongolian communities in China and Russia. It is integral to Mongolian cultural identity, known for its nomadic heritage, traditional music such as throat singing (khoomei), and the historic Mongol Empire. Written in the Cyrillic alphabet (and traditionally in the Mongolian script), Mongolian grammar features a subject-object-verb (SOV) word order, extensive use of cases for nouns, and vowel harmony.