Semelai 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 t ...
spoken in the Malay Peninsula. It belongs to the
Southern branch of the
Aslian language
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 o ...
subgrouping. The Semelai reside predominantly around the Bera, Serting and associated river systems in the states of
Pahang
Pahang (;Jawi alphabet, Jawi: , Pahang Hulu Malay: ''Paha'', Pahang Hilir Malay: ''Pahaeng'', Ulu Tembeling Malay: ''Pahaq)'' officially Pahang Darul Makmur with the Arabic honorific ''Darul Makmur'' (Jawi: , "The Abode of Tranquility") is a ...
,
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
Johor
Johor (; ), also spelled as Johore, is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia in the south of the Malay Peninsula. Johor has land borders with the Malaysian states of Pahang to the north and Malacca and Negeri Sembilan ...
.
Phonology
Semelai has 32 consonants and 20 vowels.
* Stops /p t c k/ are heard as
̚ t̚ c̚ k̚word-final position.
* Palatal sounds /c ɟ/ are slightly affricated as
ᶝ ɟᶽ
Unicode has subscripted and superscripted versions of a number of characters including a full set of Arabic numerals. These characters allow any polynomial, chemical and certain other equations to be represented in plain text without using an ...
when in word-initial position.
* /s/ may occur as
or
within free variation.
* Nasals /m n ɲ ŋ/ can occur as prestopped
m ᵈn ᶡɲ ᶢŋwhen in word-final position.
* /r/ can be heard as
when in word-final position. When preceded by a nasal /n/ it is heard as
r
* /w j/ are heard as off-glides
ʷ, ʲwhen in word-final position. After nasal vowels, they are then heard as nasalized
ʷ̃, ʲ̃
Vowels are also distinguished with nasal counterparts:
* /ɒ/ is phonetically noted as
̙
* /i/ can be heard as in closed syllables
* /ə/ can be heard as in stressed word-final syllables
Notes
References
*
*
*
External links
* http://projekt.ht.lu.se/rwaai RWAAI (Repository and Workspace for Austroasiatic Intangible Heritage)
*
http://hdl.handle.net/10050/00-0000-0000-0003-66E3-8@view Semelai in RWAAI Digital Archive
{{Austroasiatic languages
Languages of Malaysia
Aslian languages