Ontong Java (or ''Luangiua'', ''Lord Howe'', ''Luaniua'') is a

Polynesian language The Polynesian languages form a genealogical group of languages, itself part of the Oceanic branch of the Austronesian family. There are 38 Polynesian languages, representing 7 percent of the 522 Oceanic languages, and 3 percent of the Austro ...

located on the

Ontong Java Atoll Ontong Java Atoll or Luangiua, (formerly ''Lord Howe Atoll'', not to be confused with Lord Howe Island) is one of the largest atolls on earth. Geographically it belongs to a scattered group of three atolls which includes nearby Nukumanu Atol ...

, also known as the Luangiua Atoll or Lord Howe island, in the Solomon Islands. Two

dialects The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...

, Luangiua and Pelau, are also spoken on the island. Ontong Java is commonly used by all speakers, young and old. There is approximately 2,370 residents of Ontong Java Atoll and has approximately 2,400 (estimated) speakers living on the atoll.

Classification

Ontong Java is closely related to the

Ellicean languages The Polynesian languages form a genealogical group of languages, itself part of the Oceanic branch of the Austronesian family. There are 38 Polynesian languages, representing 7 percent of the 522 Oceanic languages, and 3 percent of the Austron ...

of Polynesia and to

Sikaiana Sikaiana (formerly called the Stewart Islands) is a small atoll NE of Malaita in Solomon Islands in the south Pacific Ocean. It is almost in length and its lagoon, known as Te Moana, is totally enclosed by the coral reef. Its total land s ...

, Takuu, and Nukumanu in Papua New Guinea.

Phonology

The phoneme inventory of this language is poorly studied, and many sources have conflicting phoneme inventories. An older source lists two additional vowels, and .

Grammar

Ontong Java

word order In linguistics, word order (also known as linear order) is the order of the syntactic constituents of a language. Word order typology studies it from a cross-linguistic perspective, and examines how different languages employ different orders. C ...

is normally VSO and SVO.

Notes

References

External links

* Materials on Ontong Java are included in the open access

Arthur Capell Arthur Capell (28 March 1902 – 10 August 1986) was an Australian linguist, who made major contributions to the study of Australian languages, Austronesian languages and Papuan languages. Early life Capell was born in Newtown, New South Wales ...

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