Mah Meri, also known as Besisi, Cellate, Hma’ Btsisi’, Ma’ Betisek, and “Orang Sabat” (pejorative term), is an

Austroasiatic language The Austroasiatic languages , , are a large language family in Mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. These languages are scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China and are th ...

spoken in the

Malay Peninsula The Malay Peninsula (Malay: ''Semenanjung Tanah Melayu'') is a peninsula in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area ...

. Along with Semaq Beri, Semelai and Temoq, Mah Meri belongs to the Southern Aslian branch of the

Aslian The Aslian languages () are the southernmost branch of Austroasiatic languages spoken on the Malay Peninsula. They are the languages of many of the '' Orang Asli'', the aboriginal inhabitants of the peninsula. The total number of native speakers ...

languages. Mah Meri is the only remaining

language spoken in a coastal area (on the coasts of

Negeri Sembilan Negeri Sembilan (, Negeri Sembilan Malay: ''Nogoghi Sombilan'', ''Nismilan'') is a state in Malaysia which lies on the western coast of Peninsular Malaysia. It borders Selangor on the north, Pahang in the east, and Malacca and Johor to the s ...

and

Selangor Selangor (; ), also known by its Arabic language, Arabic honorific Darul Ehsan, or "Abode of Sincerity", is one of the 13 Malaysian states. It is on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia and is bordered by Perak to the north, Pahang to the east ...

) and its speaker population is 3,675 as recorded at the Orang Asli Museum in

Gombak The Gombak District is an administrative district located in the state of Selangor, Malaysia. The district was created on February 1, 1974, the same day when Kuala Lumpur was declared a Federal Territory. Until 1997, Rawang was the district capi ...

. A dictionary of the Mah Meri language has been compiled by Nicole Kruspe. Kruspe, N., & Zainal, A. (2010)
A Dictionary of Mah Meri as Spoken at Bukit Bangkong
''Oceanic Linguistics Special Publications'', (36), Iii-410. https://www.jstor.org/stable/25822793

Phonology

Vowels Kruspe, N., & Hajek, J. (2009)
Mah Meri
''Journal of the International Phonetic Association'', 39(2), 241-248
doi:10.1017/S0025100309003946
/ref>

Voice Register

There are two voice registers in Mah Meri:
Register 1: Register 1 vowels have a clear tense voice quality, shorter duration and lower pitch. Register 1 vowels also have fewer phonotactic restrictions.
Register 2: Register 2 vowels are laxer, longer and higher in pitch. Register 2 vowels also have a slight

breathy voicing Breathy voice (also called murmured voice, whispery voice, soughing and susurration) is a phonation in which the vocal folds vibrate, as they do in normal (modal) voicing, but are adjusted to let more air escape which produces a sighing-like ...

Consonants

Grammar

Syntax

In Mah Meri, modifiers and

demonstratives Demonstratives (list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) are words, such as ''this'' and ''that'', used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic; their meaning ...

occur after the head as shown in examples (1) and (2) while prepositions occur before the head as shown in example (3). For transitive clauses, Mah Meri generally follows an

Agent Agent may refer to: Espionage, investigation, and law *, spies or intelligence officers * Law of agency, laws involving a person authorized to act on behalf of another ** Agent of record, a person with a contractual agreement with an insuranc ...

Verb A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...

Object Object may refer to: General meanings * Object (philosophy), a thing, being, or concept ** Object (abstract), an object which does not exist at any particular time or place ** Physical object, an identifiable collection of matter * Goal, an ai ...

(AVO) order as shown in example (4), but a Verb-Agent-Object (VAO) order is more common during natural discourse as shown in example (5). For intransitive clauses in Mah Meri, both

Subject Subject ( la, subiectus "lying beneath") may refer to: Philosophy *''Hypokeimenon'', or ''subiectum'', in metaphysics, the "internal", non-objective being of a thing **Subject (philosophy), a being that has subjective experiences, subjective cons ...

-Verb (SV) and Verb-Subject (VS) orders are possible as shown in examples (6) and (7) respectively.

Morphology

Morphology in Mah Meri is exclusively through prefixation and

infixation An infix is an affix inserted inside a word stem (an existing word or the core of a family of words). It contrasts with ''adfix,'' a rare term for an affix attached to the outside of a stem, such as a prefix or suffix. When marking text for int ...

Semi-productive derivations

1. ''Detransitivizing N- 'DTR
::The prefix ''n-'' is attached to monosyllabic verbs and the vowel from the final syllable is reduplicated into the vowel position.
::Example: ''bɛ'' 'to do' → ''nɛ-bɛ'' 'doing, doer'
::For disyllabic verbs, the initial consonant is replaced by a

homorganic In phonetics, a homorganic consonant (from ''homo-'' "same" and ''organ'' "(speech) organ") is a consonant sound that is articulated in the same place of articulation as another. For example, , and are homorganic consonants of one another since ...

nasal. ::Example: ''plɘt'' 'to extinguish' → ''m:ɘlɘt'' 'extinguishing'
2. ''Transitive focus ka- 'TR
::The prefix ''ka-'' only applies to indigenous monosyllabic verbs.
::Example: ''jɛt'' 'to follow' → ''ka-jɛt'' 'to follow someone or something', ''cɔʔ'' 'to go' → ''ka-cɔʔ'' 'to go to someone or a place'
3. ''Distributive < l > 'DISTR
::The infix ''< l >'' applies to disyllabic intransitive verbs of position or state and also some verbs of motion.
::The infix is inserted into the initial syllable and a schwa replaces to well to correct syllable structure.
::Example: ''kancɛw'' 'to be naked' → ''kɘlancɛw'' 'many naked (people)'.
::If the penultimate syllable CV is a palatal stop plus schwa, the ''< la >'' infix is applied instead.
::Example: ''jɘkɘʔ'' 'to sit motionless' → ''jɘ-la-kɘʔ'' 'many sitting motionless'

Regular productive derivations

=Iterative sɘ-RDP-root 'ITER'

= The prefix is attached to the initial constituent of reduplicated bases to express iteration. Example: (ITER-RDP-that) 'that one over and over again'

=Happenstance 'happ'

= The prefix expresses: *an inadvertent event *ability or inability when used in a negated clause. Example: 'happen to eat'

= Middle voice bɘ- 'MID'

= The prefix is applied to either verbal or nominal roots to express an

attributive In grammar, an attributive expression is a word or phrase within a noun phrase that modifies the head noun. It may be an: * attributive adjective * attributive noun * attributive verb or other part of speech, such as an attributive numeral. ...

possessive A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...

function. Example: 'having a house'

Language Endangerment and Vitality

According to

Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensiv ...

, the language status of Mah Meri is '6b: Threatened', referring to the situation whereby the language is used for face-to-face communications within all generations, but is losing users. This status is based on Lewis and Smino's (2010)

Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale (EGIDS) The Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale (EGIDS), developed by Lewis and Simons (2010), measures a language's status in terms of endangerment Endangerment is a type of crime involving conduct that is wrongful and reckless or wan ...

. A study by Coluzzi, Riget & Wang (2017) on language use and attitudes across 4 different Mah Meri villages on

Carey Island Carey Island ( ms, Pulau Carey) is an island in Selangor, Malaysia. It is administered by the Zone 17 of the Kuala Langat Municipal Council. Carey Island is located to the south of Port Klang and north of Banting town. It is a huge island separat ...

suggests that while Mah Meri still holds a strong and positive status in the community, there is a possibility of a complete language shift towards

Malay Malay may refer to: Languages * Malay language or Bahasa Melayu, a major Austronesian language spoken in Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore ** History of the Malay language, the Malay language from the 4th to the 14th century ** Indonesi ...

in the future due to lesser usage of Mah Meri amongst the younger generation.

References

External links

* http://projekt.ht.lu.se/rwaai RWAAI (Repository and Workspace for Austroasiatic Intangible Heritage) * http://hdl.handle.net/10050/00-0000-0000-0003-66E2-7@view Mah Meri in RWAAI Digital Archive * ELAR archive o
Mah Meri (and Ceq Wong) language documentation materials
Languages of Malaysia Aslian languages {{AustroAsiatic-lang-stub