The Central–Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (CEMP) languages form a proposed branch of the
Malayo-Polynesian languages
The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages, with approximately 385.5 million speakers. The Malayo-Polynesian languages are spoken by the Austronesian peoples outside of Taiwan, in the island nations of Southeas ...
consisting of over 700
language
Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed language, signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing syste ...
s (Blust 1993).
Distribution
The Central Malayo-Polynesian languages are spoken in the
Lesser Sunda and
Maluku Islands
The Maluku Islands ( ; , ) or the Moluccas ( ; ) are an archipelago in the eastern part of Indonesia. Tectonics, Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located in West ...
of the
Banda Sea
The Banda Sea (, , ) is one of four seas that surround the Maluku Islands of Indonesia, connected to the Pacific Ocean, but surrounded by hundreds of islands, including Timor, as well as the Halmahera Sea, Halmahera and Ceram Seas. It is about ...
, in an area corresponding closely to the
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...
n provinces of
East Nusa Tenggara and
Maluku and the nation of
East Timor (excepting the
Papuan languages
The Papuan languages are the non- Austronesian languages spoken on the western Pacific island of New Guinea, as well as neighbouring islands in Indonesia, Solomon Islands, and East Timor. It is a strictly geographical grouping, and does not imply ...
of
Timor and nearby islands), but with the
Bima language extending to the eastern half of
Sumbawa Island in the province of
West Nusa Tenggara and the
Sula languages of the
Sula Islands in the southwest corner of the province of
North Maluku. The principal islands in this region are
Sumbawa,
Sumba,
Flores,
Timor,
Buru, and
Seram. The numerically most important languages are Nggahi Mbojo (
Bimanese),
Manggarai of western Flores,
Uab Meto of
West Timor, and
Tetum, the national language of
East Timor.
Subgrouping
In the original proposal, CEMP is divided into ''Central Malayo-Polynesian'' (CMP) and ''Eastern Malayo-Polynesian'' (EMP). However, CMP is generally understood to be a cover term for the non-EMP languages within CEMP, which form a linkage at best rather than a valid clade.
The Central Malayo-Polynesian languages may form a
linkage. They are for the most part poorly attested, but they do not appear to constitute a coherent group. Many of the proposed defining features of CMP are not found in the geographic extremes of the area. Therefore some linguists consider it a
linkage; a conservative classification might consider CMP to be a convenient term for those Central–Eastern languages which are not Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (Grimes 1991).
The Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages extend from the coasts of Halmahera across the Pacific. This subgroup is still controversial as it is solely based on lexical evidence, with no shared phonological innovations. In contrast, the two individual branches,
South Halmahera–West New Guinea and
Oceanic, each are well-defined by phonological and
lexical innovations, and universally accepted as valid subgroups.
Criticism
CEMP is rejected as a valid clade by Donohue & Grimes (2008), who do not consider CEMP to even be a
linkage. Donohue & Grimes (2008) argue that many features claimed to define CMP or CEMP are also found in some of the more conservative Western Malayo-Polynesian languages and even Formosan languages. Edwards & Grimes (2021) also does not consider CEMP to be a coherent branch.
[Edwards, Owen; Charles E. Grimes. 2021. ]
Revising the classification of the Austronesian languages of eastern Indonesia and Timor-Leste
'
15th International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics (15-ICAL)
June 28 to July 2, 2021, Palacký University Olomouc.
See also
*
Languages of Indonesia
Notes
References
*Fay Wouk and Malcolm Ross (ed.), ''The history and typology of western Austronesian voice systems.'' Australian National University, 2002.
*K. Alexander Adelaar and Nikolaus Himmelmann, ''The Austronesian languages of Asia and Madagascar.'' Routledge, 2005.
External links
LexiRumah(part of th
Lesser Sunda linguistic databasesReconstructing the past through languages of the present: the Lesser Sunda Islands
{{DEFAULTSORT:Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages
Languages of Indonesia