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Sepik Languages
The Sepik or Sepik River languages are a family of some 50 Papuan languages spoken in the Sepik river basin of northern Papua New Guinea, proposed by Donald Laycock in 1965 in a somewhat more limited form than presented here. They tend to have simple phonologies, with few consonants or vowels and usually no tones. The best known Sepik language is Iatmül. The most populous are Iatmül's fellow Ndu languages Abelam and Boiken, with about 35,000 speakers each. The Sepik languages, like their Ramu neighbors, appear to have three-vowel systems, , that distinguish only vowel height in a vertical vowel system. Phonetic are a result of palatal and labial assimilation to adjacent consonants. It is suspected that the Ndu languages may reduce this to a two-vowel system, with epenthetic (Foley 1986). Classification The Sepik languages consist of two branches of Kandru's Laycock's Sepik–Ramu proposal, the Sepik subphylum and Leonhard Schultze stock. According to Malcolm Ross, th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sepik River
The Sepik () is the longest river on the island of New Guinea, and the second largest in Oceania by discharge volume after the Fly River. The majority of the river flows through the Papua New Guinea (PNG) provinces of Sandaun (formerly West Sepik) and East Sepik, with a small section flowing through the Indonesian province of Papua. The Sepik has a large catchment area, and landforms that include swamplands, tropical rainforests and mountains. Biologically, the river system is often said to be possibly the largest uncontaminated freshwater wetland system in the Asia-Pacific region. But, in fact, numerous fish and plant species have been introduced into the Sepik since the mid-20th century. Name In 1884, Germany asserted control over the northeast quadrant of the island of New Guinea, which became part of the German colonial empire. The colony was initially managed by the Deutsche Neuguinea-Kompagnie or German New Guinea Company, a commercial enterprise that christened the ter ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Assimilation (linguistics)
Assimilation is a sound change in which some phonemes (typically consonants or vowels) change to become more similar to other nearby sounds. A common type of phonological process across languages, assimilation can occur either within a word or between words. It occurs in normal speech but becomes more common in more connected speech, rapid speech. In some cases, assimilation causes the sound spoken to differ from the normal pronunciation in isolation, such as the prefix ''in-'' of English ''input'' pronounced with phonetic [m] rather than [n]. In other cases, the change is accepted as canonical for that word or phrase, especially if it is recognized in standard spelling: ''implant'' pronounced with [m], composed historically of ''in'' + ''plant''. English "handbag" (canonically ) is often pronounced in rapid speech because the and sounds are both bilabial consonants, and their places of articulation are similar. However, the sequence - has different places but similar man ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amal Language
Amal is a language spoken along the border of Sandaun Province and East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea, along the Wagana River near the confluence with Wanibe Creek. Foley (2018) classifies Amal as a primary branch of the Sepik languages, though it is quite close to Kalou. Pronouns Pronouns are: : Cognates Amal cognates with Sepik languages are: *''tal'' ‘woman’ *''yan'' ‘child’ *''lal'' ‘tongue’ < proto-Sepik *ta(w)r *''mi'' ‘breast’ < proto-Sepik *muk *''waplo'' ‘liver’ *''nip'' ‘blood’ *''yen'' ‘egg’ *''ak'' ‘house’ Foley (2018) notes that there appears to be somewhat more lexical similarities between Amal and the Tama languages
The Tama languages are a small family of three clusters of closely related languages of northern Papua New Guinea, spoken just to the south of Nuku town in eastern ...
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Yellow River Languages
The Yellow River languages are a small family of clearly related languages, : Namia (Namie), Ak, and Awun. They are classified among the Sepik languages of northern Papua New Guinea. Namia is the most divergent Yellow River language. Distribution They are spoken along the Yellow River (a tributary of the Sepik) in a mountainous area of central Sandaun Province, located to the north of the Upper Sepik basin. They are located directly to the southwest of the Ram languages The Ram languages are a small group of 3 languages spoken in Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea. They are spoken directly to the northeast of the Yellow River languages and directly to the south of the Wapei languages, both of which are also Sepik ..., another Sepik group. Pronouns The pronouns Ross reconstructs for proto–Yellow River are:Ross (2005) : References * {{Sepik languages Yellow–Wanibe languages Languages of Sandaun Province ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ram Languages
The Ram languages are a small group of 3 languages spoken in Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea. They are spoken directly to the northeast of the Yellow River languages and directly to the south of the Wapei languages, both of which are also Sepik groups. ''Ram'' is the word for 'man' in the languages that make up this group. The languages are, * Awtuw *Karawa–Pouye ** Karawa ** Pouye (Bouye) They are classified among the Sepik languages of northern Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i .... Awtuw is the best documented Ram language. Pronouns The pronouns Ross reconstructs for proto-Ram are: : Vocabulary comparison The following basic vocabulary words are from Laycock (1968) and Foley (2005), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database: : Reference ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iwam Languages
The Iwam languages are a small family of two clearly related languages, : May River Iwam and Sepik Iwam. They are generally classified among the Sepik languages of northern Papua New Guinea; Malcolm Ross places them in an Upper Sepik branch of that family. The Iwam languages are spoken at the extreme western end of East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea along the bank of the Upper Sepik River, and are situated just to the west of the Left May languages The Left May or Arai languages are a small language family of half a dozen closely related but not mutually intelligible languages in the centre of New Guinea, in the watershed of the Left May River. There are only about 2,000 speakers in all. F .... Footnotes References * {{Sepik languages Upper Sepik languages ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abau Language
Abau is a Papuan language spoken in southern Sandaun Province of Papua New Guinea, primarily along the border with Indonesia. In 2002, there were estimated to be between 4,500 and 5,000 speakers, and this number does not appear to have declined since the first accurate count in the 1970s. Abau is reported to have whistled speech. Phonology Abau has the simplest phonemic inventory in the Sepik language family. Pronouns Pronouns are: : The dual and plural numbers only distinguish between first person and non-first person. Also, the third-person gender distinction exists only for the singular, but not the dual or plural forms. Noun classes Abau noun classes are: : Nouns can take on different class affixes depending on the physical characteristics being emphasized. Examples: ;''su'' ‘coconut’ *''su pi-ron'' /coconut class.5-one/ ‘a coconut palm’ *''su ka-mon'' /coconut class.2-one/ ‘a coconut’ ;''pey'' ‘sugarcane’ *''pey pi-ron'' /sugarcane class.5-one/ â ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Suarmin Language
Suarmin, or Asaba, is a Sepik language spoken in Sandaun Province, Papua-New Guinea. Alternative names are ''Asabano, Akiapmin, Duranmin''. ''Glottolog'' leaves it unclassified. Pronouns Pronouns are: : Noun classes In Asaba, noun class In linguistics, a noun class is a particular category of nouns. A noun may belong to a given class because of the characteristic features of its referent, such as gender, animacy, shape, but such designations are often clearly conventional. Some ... affixes are suffixed to nouns. There are five noun classes. Examples: : Class 1 is the default noun class. Modifying adjectives agree with head nouns in class: References {{Languages of Papua New Guinea Definitely endangered languages Papi–Asaba languages Languages of Sandaun Province Language isolates of New Guinea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Papi Language
Papi (Paupe; also known Baiyamo) is an alleged Sepik language spoken in East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. ''Glottolog'' leaves it unclassified. It is spoken in the single village of Paupe () in Tunap/Hunstein Rural LLG of East Sepik Province East Sepik is a province in Papua New Guinea. Its capital is Wewak. East Sepik has an estimated population of 433,481 people (2010 census) and is 43,426 km square in size. History Cherubim Dambui was appointed as East Sepik's first premier .... References Papi–Asaba languages Languages of East Sepik Province Language isolates of New Guinea {{papuan-lang-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walio Languages
The Walio languages are a small family of clearly related languages, : Walio, Pei, Yawiyo, and Tuwari. However, they are not close: Walio and Yawiyo have only a 12% lexical similarity. They are frequently classified among the Sepik languages of northern Papua New Guinea, though ''Glottolog'' leaves them out. ''Glottolog ''Glottolog'' is a bibliographic database of the world's lesser-known languages, developed and maintained first at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany (between 2015 and 2020 at the Max Planck Institute for ...'' 3.4 classifies the Walio languages as an independent language family. References * {{Sepik languages Leonhard Schultze languages ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Torricelli Languages
The Torricelli languages are a family of about fifty languages of the northern Papua New Guinea coast, spoken by about 80,000 people. They are named after the Torricelli Mountains. The most populous and best known Torricelli language is Arapesh, with about 30,000 speakers. The most promising external relationship for the Torricelli family is the Sepik languages. In reconstructions of both families, the pronouns have a plural suffix ''*-m'' and a dual suffix ''*-p''. History The Torricelli languages occupy three geographically separated areas, evidently separated by later migrations of Sepik-language speakers several centuries ago. Foley considers the Torricelli languages to be autochthonous to the Torricelli Mountains and nearby surrounding areas, having been resident in the region for at least several millennia. The current distribution of Lower Sepik-Ramu and Sepik (especially Ndu) reflects later migrations from the south and the east. Foley notes that the Lower Sepik and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
