Guhu-Samane, also known as ''Bia, Mid-Waria, Muri, Paiawa, Tahari'', is a divergent Trans–New Guinea language that is related to the Binanderean family in the classification of Malcolm Ross (2005). The divergence of Guhu-Samane from other

Binanderean languages The Greater Binanderean or Guhu-Oro languages are a language family spoken along the northeast coast of the Papuan Peninsula – the "Bird's Tail" of New Guinea – and appear to be a recent expansion from the north. They were classified as a bra ...

may be due to extensive historical contact with

Oceanic languages The approximately 450 Oceanic languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages. The area occupied by speakers of these languages includes Polynesia, as well as much of Melanesia and Micronesia. Though covering a vast area, Oceanic languages ...

such as Numbami.Bradshaw, Joel (2017). Evidence of contact between Binanderean and Oceanic languages. ''Oceanic Linguistics'' 56:395–414.

Dialects

Smallhorn (2011:131) gives the following dialects. *Kipu (most widely spoken) *Bapi *Garaina *Sekare *Sinaba The dialect differences are principally lexical, but two voiced

obstruent An obstruent () is a speech sound such as , , or that is formed by ''obstructing'' airflow. Obstruents contrast with sonorants, which have no such obstruction and so resonate. All obstruents are consonants, but sonorants include vowels as well as ...

s also show regular variants. The coronal obstruent is realized as /dz/ upriver in Bapi and Garaina, /d/ downriver to Asama, and /j/ farther downriver in Papua. The voiced bilabial is realized as /b/ inland but as /w/ at the coast (Sinaba and Paiawa) (Handman 2015:102).

References

* Handman, Courtney. 2015. ''Critical Christianity: Translation and denominational conflict in Papua New Guinea''. Oakland: University of California Press. * Smallhorn, Jacinta Mary. 2011. ''The Binanderean languages of Papua New Guinea: reconstruction and subgrouping''. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.

Dialects

References

Further reading