The Trans-Fly – Bulaka River South-Central Papuan languages form a hypothetical
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 ...
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 geogr ...
. They include many of the languages west of the
Fly River
The Fly River is the third longest river in the island of New Guinea, after the Sepik River and Mamberamo River, with a total length of and the largest by volume of discharge in Oceania, the largest in the world without a single dam in its cat ...
in southern Papua New Guinea into southern Indonesian
West Papua, plus a pair of languages on the
Bulaka River a hundred km further west.
The family was posited by
Stephen Wurm as a branch of his 1975
Trans–New Guinea proposal. Wurm thought it likely that many of these languages would prove to not actually belong to Trans–New Guinea, but rather to have been heavily influenced by Trans–New Guinea languages.
Malcolm Ross (2005) concurred, and removed most of them.
Classification
None of the families are closely related; indeed, it is difficult to demonstrate a link between any of them. Wurm's 1975 TNG branch included the following eight demonstrated families:
*
Kiwaian, on the banks and east of the Fly River
*''
Waia
WAIA (1600 AM) was a radio station formerly licensed to Beaver Dam, Kentucky, United States. The station was owned by Starlight Broadcasting Co., Inc.
History
The station originally signed on on June 21, 1969. Before October 1, 1996, it was W ...
'', north of the Fly delta
*
Tirio, on the western bank of the Fly River
*
Eastern Trans-Fly languages
The Eastern Trans-Fly (or Oriomo Plateau) languages are a small independent family of Papuan languages spoken in the Oriomo Plateau
The Oriomo Plateau is a plateau in Western Province, Papua New Guinea.Oriomo Plateau
The Oriomo Plateau i ...
, south of the Fly delta
*
Pahoturi, west of the Eastern languages
*
Yam, up to and just across the Indonesian border
*''
Moraori'', between Upper Maro and the
Marind language
Marind is a Papuan language spoken in Malind District, Merauke Regency, Indonesia by over ten thousand people. Dialects are Southeast Marind, Gawir, Holifoersch, and Tugeri. Bian Marind (Northwest Marind), also known as Boven-Mbian, is divergent ...
*
Bulaka River, west of Marind
Ross (2005) accepted the TNG identity of Tirio, Moraori, and, tentatively, Kiwaian. He split off the four Eastern Trans-Fly languages as an independent family. The remainder of the family, which he calls ''South-Central Papuan'', is only tentatively retained: their pronouns are suggestive of a relationship, but this has not been demonstrated.
A more conservative approach would break up Wurm's Trans-Fly – Bulaka River entirely, with two or three of the families remaining within Trans–New Guinea, and five or six being independent. Evans (2012), for example, argues that the inclusion of the Yam language at least is not justified on present evidence. Timothy Usher treats the Bulaka River and Yam languages as separate families, and links the Pahoturi– clade to the
Eastern Trans-Fly languages
The Eastern Trans-Fly (or Oriomo Plateau) languages are a small independent family of Papuan languages spoken in the Oriomo Plateau
The Oriomo Plateau is a plateau in Western Province, Papua New Guinea.Oriomo Plateau
The Oriomo Plateau i ...
.
Southern New Guinea linguistic area
A ''Southern New Guinea''
linguistic area, which spans both Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, consisting of the following families is mentioned in Evans (2018).
*
Yelmek-Maklew - 500 speakers
*
Yam (Morehead-Upper Maro) - 3,000 speakers
*
Pahoturi River
The Pahoturi, or Paho River, is a river in southwestern Papua New Guinea. Pahoturi Riverin Geonames.org (cc-by) post updated 2011-07-09; database downloaded 2015-06-22
See also
*List of rivers of Papua New Guinea
*Pahoturi languages
The Pahotu ...
- just over 4,000 speakers
*
Oriomo (Eastern Trans-Fly) - 6,500 speakers
*
Trans-New Guinea (TNG)
**
Kolopom - just over 7,000 speakers
**''
Marori'' - fewer than 20 elderly speakers
**
Gogodala-Suki - 30,000 speakers
**
Kiwaian - 37,000 speakers
**
Anim
Anim or ANIM may refer to:
Places
*A city in the mountains of Judah, now el-Ghuwein, near Eshtemoh, about 10 miles south-west of Hebron
*An alternative spelling for the biblical city of Anem, now Jenin
* Anim synagogue, a synagogue in Israel
...
***
Marindic - 10,000 speakers
***
Tirio (Lower Fly)
***''
Ipiko'' (Inland Gulf)
Languages within the Southern New Guinea linguistic area generally share these typological features.
*lack of
tone (except Kuni-Boazi, possibly Marind, and some Kiwai dialects)
*complex verb morphology
*limited or no
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures ...
(except for the four-way gender system in
Anim languages
The Anim or Fly River languages are a language family in south-central New Guinea established by Usher & Suter (2015).Timothy Usher and Edgar Suter (2015) "The Anim Languages of Southern New Guinea". ''Oceanic Linguistics'' 54:110–142 The name ...
, and the masculine vs. feminine contrast on undergoer-prefixes in the
Tonda languages
The Tonda languages form a branch of the Yam language family of southern New Guinea. There are over 10 languages.
Tonda languages share some areal features are shared with the Kolopom languages.
Languages
The Tonda languages are:
;Tonda / West ...
and some
Oriomo languages)
*lack of verb chaining or
switch-reference
*single-word verbs form an
open class
Pronouns
The pronouns Ross reconstructs for the three families he keeps together are suggestively similar, but it has not been possible to reconstruct common forms:
;Proto-Yam (Proto–Morehead – Upper Maro)
:
;Proto-Pahoturi
:
;Proto–Bulaka River
:
Lexical comparison
The lexical data below is from the Trans-New Guinea database
and Usher (2020) (for Proto-Kiwai),
unless noted otherwise. Neighboring languages not traditionally classified within Trans-Fly–Bulaka River are also included for comparison.
See also
*
Trans-Fly languages
The Trans-Fly languages are a small family of Papuan languages proposed by Timothy Usher, that are spoken in the region of the Fly River.The family is called 'East Trans-Fly' in Usher, an unfortunate synonym with what others call the Eastern Tran ...
References
*
External links
South-Central Papuan languages database at TransNewGuinea.orgBulaka River on newguineaworld
{{DEFAULTSORT:Trans-Fly-Bulaka River languages
Proposed language families
Papuan languages