Kamano language

Kamano
Native to Papua New Guinea
Region Eastern Highlands Province
Native speakers
 63,000 (2000 census)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 kbq
Glottolog kama1370[2]

Kamano (Kamano-Kafe) is a Papuan language spoken in Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea.

Nomenclature

The terms 'Kamano' and 'Kamano-Kafe' are both used to refer to the language primarily spoken in Henganofi District, although within the linguistics literature Kamano refers to some varieties within the Kamano-Yagaria group, a dialect chain of Eastern Highlands Province[3]

Clause Chaining

Kamano Kafe exhibits a unique form of the clause chaining system often described in Papuan languages. Clause chaining in Papuan languages typically involves one or more medial verbs with limited morphological possibilities being under the scope of a more fully inflected final verb. The medial verbs in these clause chains typically use a switch reference system and various degrees of agreement with final verbs. The Kamano system, unlike other clause chaining systems in New Guinea, has requisite person and number agreement with the subjects of higher clauses [4]. A typical example is given below.

Nägra

I

tr-o-ge-nka,

leave-1P.SG-SR-B.2P.SG

kägra

you

tr-an-ke-no',

leave-2P.SG-SR-B.3P.SG

ägra

he

tre-'n-i-e

leave-PERF-3P.SG-IND

Nägra tr-o-ge-nka, kägra tr-an-ke-no', ägra tre-'n-i-e

I leave-1P.SG-SR-B.2P.SG you leave-2P.SG-SR-B.3P.SG he leave-PERF-3P.SG-IND

"I left, then you left, then he left."

References

  1. ↑ Kamano at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Kamano". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  3. ↑ Ford, Kevin (1993). "A Preliminary Comparison of Kamano-Yagaria". Language and Linguistics in Melanesia 24. 191-202.
  4. ↑ Elliott, John (2017). "Understanding preview-subject clause chains in Kamano Kafe". University of Hawai'i at Manoa Working Papers
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