The Piore River or Lagoon languages form a branch of Skou languages. Historically most have been lumped together as a single Warapu language, with Nouri variously classified. They are spoken in the

Sissano Lagoon Sissano Lagoon is a lagoon located in West Aitape Rural LLG, Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea. The Piore River languages (also called the ''Lagoon languages''), as well as the Sissano language, are spoken on the shores of the lagoon. History ...

area of West Aitape Rural LLG,

Sandaun Province Sandaun Province (formerly West Sepik Province) is the northwesternmost mainland Provinces of Papua New Guinea, province of Papua New Guinea (also known as home of the sunset). It covers an area of 35,920 km2 (13868 m2) and has a population ...

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

. The Piore River runs to the west of all the languages, and so speakers do not find it an acceptable name. However, it is not clear which name would be better, as the name of the lagoon, 'Sissano', is used for different neighboring languages.

Languages

The ''Piore River'' branch was ambiguously named ''Lagoon'' by Miller (2017).Miller, Steve A. 2017. Skou Languages Near Sissano Lagoon, Papua New Guinea. Language and Linguistics in Melanesia 35: 1-24. The older names of the Piore River languages were from village names; Miller submitted that the languages name were actually ''Bauni, Uni, Bouni'', and ''Bobe''. Bobe is coordinate with the rest, which might be considered (divergent) dialects of a single language. Lagoon (Piore River) * Bobe (Nouri village) *Warapu ** Bauni (Poo and Barapu/Warapu villages) ** Uni (Ramo village) ** Bouni (Sumo village)

Convergence area

The Piore River languages have influenced various other languages (other Skou, Kwomtari,

Torricelli Torricelli may refer to: People with the surname * Evangelista Torricelli (1608–1647), Italian physicist and mathematician * Robert Torricelli (born 1951), United States politician * Moreno Torricelli (born 1970), Italian football player * Gi ...

, and Oceanic languages) that have arrived relatively recently in the Sissano Lagoon area within the last century or so.

Sound change In historical linguistics, a sound change is a change in the pronunciation of a language. A sound change can involve the replacement of one speech sound (or, more generally, one phonetic feature value) by a different one (called phonetic chan ...

s shared by genealogically unrelated languages in the

linguistic convergence area include *s > zero; *t/d, *l > r; and loss of

tone Tone may refer to: Visual arts and color-related * Tone (color theory), a mix of tint and shade, in painting and color theory * Tone (color), the lightness or brightness (as well as darkness) of a color * Toning (coin), color change in coins * ...

, which is a phonological feature typical of Skou languages. The Sissano Lagoon convergence zone is at the northeastern end of what Donohue and Crowther refer to as the "North-Central New Guinea" (NCNG) area, which is a highly linguistically and culturally heterogeneous area marked by the lack of widespread trade and cultural diffusion due to geographical isolation among groups; the "NCNG" area ranges from just east of the Lakes Plain region to the western edge of the

Sepik The Sepik () is the longest river on the island of New Guinea, and the third largest in Oceania by discharge volume after the Fly River, Fly and Mamberamo River, Mamberamo. The majority of the river flows through the Papua New Guinea (PNG) provi ...

basin.

References

* {{Skou languages Eastern Skou languages