South Vanuatu
Geographic
distribution
Southern Vanuatu
Linguistic classificationAustronesian
Proto-languageProto-South Vanuatu
Glottologsout2868

The nine South Vanuatu languages form a family of the Southern Oceanic languages,[1] spoken in Tafea Province (Tanna, Aneityum, Futuna, Erromango, and Aniwa) of Vanuatu.

Languages

François (2015)

François (2015:18–21) lists the following names and locations for the 9 South Vanuatu languages.

No.LanguageOther namesSpeakersISO 639-3Region
128SieSe, Sie, Erromanga1900ergErromango
129Ura6uurErromango
130Utaha0iffErromango
131North Tanna5000tnnTanna
132LenakelNetvaar11500tnlTanna
133Southwest TannaNawal5000nwiTanna
134WhitesandsNarak7500tnpTanna
135KwameraNafe, Nɨfe3500tnkTanna
137Anejom̃Aneityum900atyAneityum

Proto-South Vanuatu

Proto-South Vanuatu
PSV
Reconstruction ofSouth Vanuatu languages
Reconstructed
ancestors

Proto-South Vanuatu was reconstructed by John Lynch in 2001.

The language, compared to Proto-Oceanic, went through a series of vowel reductions, leading to the creation of a new vowel written as *ə, such as in *na-waiR "fresh water" resulting in Proto-South Vanuatu *nə-wai of the same meaning.

However, it also preserves some, but not all final consonants. For example, *tanum "to plant, bury" is reflected in Proto-South Vanuatu as *(a)-tenum "to bury", but *taŋis "to cry" is instead reflected as *(a)-taŋi.

Vowels

The vowels of Proto-South Vanuatu, according to Lynch, are:

Vowels
Front Central Back
Close *i *u
Close-mid *e *o
Open *a

Consonants

The consonants of Proto-South Vanuatu, according to Lynch, are:

Consonants
Labiovelar Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Uvular
Stop voiced *bʷ *b *d *g
voiceless *pʷ *p *t *k *q
Nasal *mʷ *m *n *ŋ
Fricative *v *s *c, *ɟ
*ɣ
Approximant *w *l, *r *j

References

  1. Lynch, John; Ross, Malcolm; Crowley, Terry (2002). The Oceanic languages. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon. ISBN 978-0-7007-1128-4. OCLC 48929366.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.