Tause, also known as Doa or Darha, is a poorly-known
Papuan language
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 ...
of
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
spoken by approximately 500 people, mainly in Derapos village.
The Tause only made contact with the outside world in 1982.
The Tause language has been widely reported to be related to the neighboring
Lakes Plain languages
The Lakes Plain languages are a family of Papuan languages, spoken in the Lakes Plain of Indonesian New Guinea. They are notable for being heavily tonal and for their lack of nasal consonants.
Classification
The Lakes Plain languages were tenta ...
; however, this conclusion is based on little evidence.
Ross Ross or ROSS may refer to:
People
* Clan Ross, a Highland Scottish clan
* Ross (name), including a list of people with the surname or given name Ross, as well as the meaning
* Earl of Ross, a peerage of Scotland
Places
* RoSS, the Republic of Sou ...
(2005) placed Tause in his
East Bird's Head – Sentani family, along with another
language isolate
Language isolates are languages that cannot be classified into larger language families. Korean and Basque are two of the most common examples. Other language isolates include Ainu in Asia, Sandawe in Africa, and Haida in North America. The num ...
and two small families, but this was motivated more by an attempt to spark further research than an actual claim of relationship. Usher (2018) classifies it as the most divergent of the West Lakes Plain languages.
References
*
Languages of western New Guinea
West Lakes Plain languages
Unclassified languages of New Guinea
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