The Senagi languages are a small

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

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 ...

in the classification of Malcolm Ross, that had been part of

Stephen Wurm Stephen Adolphe Wurm ( hu, Wurm István Adolf, ; 19 August 1922 – 24 October 2001) was a Hungarian-born Australian linguist. Early life Wurm was born in Budapest, the second child to the German-speaking Adolphe Wurm and the Hungarian- ...

's Trans–New Guinea proposal. They consist of the two languages Angor and

Dera Dera, Dero, Daro, Dhoro, Dahar or Dehra is a word in several languages of South Asia, whose meaning is ' camp', 'mound' or 'settlement'. It appears in the names of a number of places. Geography India * Dera, Himachal Pradesh * Dera Bassi, Mo ...

. The Angor language is unusual in that it distinguishes gender in the second- and third-person dual and plural ''(you'' and ''they),'' but not in the singular. It is not clear if Dera does the same. In Papua New Guinea, they are spoken in Amanab Rural LLG of

Sandaun Province Sandaun Province (formerly West Sepik Province) is the northwesternmost mainland Provinces of Papua New Guinea, province of Papua New Guinea. It covers an area of 35,920 km2 (13868 m2) and has a population of 248,411 (2011 census). The capita ...

. They are also spoken across the border in

Keerom Regency Keerom Regency is one of the regencies (''kabupaten'') in the Papua Province of Indonesia. It was formed from the eastern districts then within Jayapura Regency with effect from 12 November 2002. It covers an area of 9,365 km2, and had a popu ...

, Indonesia.

Classification

The Senagi family consists of only two languages: * Senagi family: Angor,

The most promising external links are with the

Sepik The Sepik () is the longest river on the island of New Guinea, and the second largest in Oceania by discharge volume after the Fly River. The majority of the river flows through the Papua New Guinea (PNG) provinces of Sandaun (formerly West Se ...

and Torricelli languages. The pronoun for "I" is reconstructed as ''*wan'' for both proto-Senagi and proto-Sepik, while the Angor masculine dual and plural pronominal suffixes ''-fa-'' and ''-mu-'' appear to reflect the proto-Sepik and proto-Torricelli dual and plural pronominal suffixes ''*-p'' and ''*-m.''

Pronouns

Pronouns are: :

Grammar

Verbal morphology in Senagi languages is highly complex and irregular.

References

External links

Senagi languages database at TransNewGuinea.org
{{language families Language families Papuan languages