Tombonuwo (Tambonuo) is a Paitanic language spoken in the Pitas and Labuk-Sugut Districts of northwest

Sabah Sabah () is a state of Malaysia located in northern Borneo, in the region of East Malaysia. Sabah borders the Malaysian state of Sarawak to the southwest and the North Kalimantan province of Indonesia to the south. The Federal Territory ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Mal ...

Phonology

Consonants

The phonemes are voiceless. All other expressions are voiced.

Vowels

is often pronounced as unrounded . is neutralized to in a pre-stressed syllable.

Morphology

Focus

Sabahan languages are characterized by "focus" morphology, which marks a syntactic relationship between the predicate of a clause and the "focused" noun phrase of the clause (see Austronesian alignment). Tombonuwo has four focus categories, conventionally labelled "actor", "patient", "referent" and "theme". Focus is marked by affixation on the verb. * Actor: ''-um-'' / ''m(u)-'' * Patient: ''-on'' (Present tense) / -∅ (Past tense) * Referent: ''-an'' * Theme: ''i-''

Tense and aspect

The only marked tense in Tombonuwo is past tense. * Past tense: ''n-'' (''-in-'') * Stative: ''o-'' * Perfective: ''ko-'' * Non-volitional past tense: ''n-o-'' * Accomplishment: ''n-o-ko-''

Demonstratives

* Near the speaker: * Far from the speaker: * Medium distance from the speaker:

References

Paitanic languages Languages of Malaysia Endangered Austronesian languages {{Austronesian-lang-stub