The South Bird's Head or South Doberai languages are three
families of
Papuan languages. They form part of the
Trans–New Guinea languages in the classifications of
Malcolm Ross (2005) and Timothy Usher (2020), though Pawley and Hammarström (2018) do not consider them to be part of Trans–New Guinea.
However, according to
Dryer
Dryer (or drier) may refer to:
Drying equipment
* Hair dryer
* Hand dryer
* Clothes dryer, also known as a tumble-dryer
* Belt dryer
* Desiccant, a substance that absorbs or adsorbs water
* Grain dryer, for storage grain bins
* Oil drying agent, a ...
(2022), based on a preliminary quantitative analysis of data from the
ASJP database, South Bird's Head languages are likely to be a subgroup of Trans–New Guinea.
Languages
The languages are as follows,
* Konda-Yahadian (Yabin): Konda Konda may refer to:
*Kondia or Konda, 18th century Mansi principality, Russia
*Konda (river) in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, Russia
* Konda (Vitim), river in Buryatia, Russia
* Konda, Indonesia, a town in West Papua
* Konda, Angola, municipal ...
, Yahadian
* Inanwatan
Inanwatan is a small coastal town in Southwest Papua, Indonesia. The town is located on the southern coast of the Bird's Head Peninsula
The Bird's Head Peninsula ( Indonesian: ''Kepala Burung'', nl, Vogelkop) or Doberai Peninsula (''Semenanju ...
(West South Bird's Head): Duriankere, Inanwatan
Inanwatan is a small coastal town in Southwest Papua, Indonesia. The town is located on the southern coast of the Bird's Head Peninsula
The Bird's Head Peninsula ( Indonesian: ''Kepala Burung'', nl, Vogelkop) or Doberai Peninsula (''Semenanju ...
(Suabo)
* South Bird's Head proper (East South Bird's Head):
** Kais (Kampong Baru)
** Iwaro–Kaburi
*** Kaburi
*** Puragi (Iwaro)
** Kokoda–Arandai
*** Kokoda (Tarof, Kasuweri)
*** Arandai
**** Kemberano (Weriagar, Barau)
**** Dombano (Tomu)
Noting low cognacy rates, Holton and Klamer (2018) tentatively consider the following three language groups to each be independent language families, pending further evidence.
* Konda–Yahadian
* Inanwatan–Duriankere
* Nuclear South Bird's Head
Usher classifies the South Bird's Head languages as part of a wider ''Berau Gulf
The Berau Gulf ( id, Teluk Berau), formerly the MacCleur Gulf, separates the Vogelkop (Doberai) and Bomberai Peninsulas of Western New Guinea. It opens on the Ceram Sea to the west and ends in Bintuni Bay to the east.
Geography
Berau Bay is for ...
'' branch of Trans–New Guinea.[Usher, Timothy]
New Guinea World, North Berau Gulf
/ref>
Pronouns
The pronouns are:
:
3sg *ni is reconstructable for SBH proper. There appears to be both a plural vowel change from *a to *i, as in proto-TNG, and a plural suffix *-ri.
Cognates
Below are cognates in Nuclear South Bird's Head languages ( Arandai, Kokoda, Kemberano, Kaburi, Kais, Puragi) demonstrating their relatedness, as listed by Holton & Klamer (2018):
:
South Bird's Head basic vocabulary quoted by Holton & Klamer (2018) from de Vries (2004), showing diverse non-cognate vocabulary across different language groups:[de Vries, Lourens. 2004. ''A Short Grammar of Inanwatan: An endangered language of the Bird’s Head of Papua, Indonesia''. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.]
:
Morphology
Except for the outlier languages Konda Konda may refer to:
*Kondia or Konda, 18th century Mansi principality, Russia
*Konda (river) in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, Russia
* Konda (Vitim), river in Buryatia, Russia
* Konda, Indonesia, a town in West Papua
* Konda, Angola, municipal ...
and Yahadian, all South Bird's Head languages have nouns classified according to masculine and feminine genders, which are determined with final vowel quality. West Bird's Head languages
West Bird's Head languages are a small family of poorly documented Papuan languages spoken on the Bird's Head Peninsula of New Guinea.
The West Bird's Head (WBH) family is a well-defined family of six languages spoken at the western end of the B ...
also mark nouns for gender.
Syntax
Unlike many other languages of the Bird's Head Peninsula which display SVO word order (such as Abun, Mpur, Maibrat, West Bird's Head, and others), the South Bird's Head languages have SOV word order.
Further reading
*
*Cowan, H. K. J. 1953. ''Voorlopige Resultaten van een Ambtelijk Taalonderzoek in Nieuw-Guinea entative Results of a Governmental Linguistic Study in New Guinea'. ’S-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff.
*Galis, Klaas Wilhelm. 1955. Talen en dialecten van Nederlands Nieuw-Guinea anguages and dialects of Netherlands New Guinea ''Tijdschrift Nieuw-Guinea'' 16: 109–118, 134–145, 161–178.
*Smits, Leo and Clemens L. Voorhoeve. 1998. ''The J.C. Anceaux Collection of Wordlists of Irian Jaya Languages B: Non-Austronesian (Papuan) languages (Part II)''. Leiden-Jakarta: Department of Cultures and Languages of Southeast Asia and Oceania.
References
*
External links
East South Bird's Head
New Guinea World.
{{Papuan languages
Languages of Papua New Guinea
Berau Gulf languages