The East Pauwasi languages are a
family
Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...
of
Papuan languages
The Papuan languages are the non- Austronesian and non-Australian languages spoken on the western Pacific island of New Guinea in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, as well as neighbouring islands, by around 4 million people. It is a strictly geogra ...
spoken in north-central
New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu
Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea).
It is a simplified version of ...
, on both sides of the Indonesia-Papua New Guinea border. They may either form part of a larger
Pauwasi language family along with the
Western Pauwasi languages
The West Pauwasi languages are a likely family of Papuan languages spoken on the Indonesian side of New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . ...
, or they could form an independent language family.
Languages
According to Timothy Usher, the East Pauwasi languages, which seem to form a
dialect chain
A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated varie ...
, are:
[NewGuineaWorld]
/ref>
;East Pauwasi River
* Zorop (Yafi)
*Emem–Karkar
**Emem
Minimal Essential Medium (MEM) is a synthetic cell culture medium developed by Harry Eagle first published in 1959 in ''Science'' that can be used to maintain cells in tissue culture. It is based on 6 salts and glucose described in Earle's salts ...
(Emumu)
***North Emem
***South Emem
**Karkar Karkar may refer to:
*Karkar, Selseleh, a village in Iran
*Karkar Island, an island in Papua New Guinea
*Karkar language, a language spoken in Papua New Guinea
*Karkar Rural LLG, a local-level government in Papua New Guinea
*Karkar Morghi Deli Baja ...
(Yuri)
Usher also identified the Karkar (Yuri) language as Pauwasi.
Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from Voorhoeve (1971, 1975), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:
Proto-language
Some lexical reconstructions of Proto-East Pauwasi by Usher (2020) are:[
:
]
References
External links
Pauwasi languages database at TransNewGuinea.org
{{language families
Pauwasi languages