Nengone language

Nengone is a language of the Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia.

Nengone
Native toNew Caledonia
RegionMaré Island
Native speakers
8,700 (2009 census)[1]
Austronesian
Language codes
ISO 639-3nen
Glottologneng1238[2]

Phonology

The phonological inventory of consonants is untypically large for an Oceanic language. Many sounds which are allophones in other sub-families are distinct sounds in the Nengone language:[3]

Consonant sounds
Labial Dental Alveolar Retroflex Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive voiceless p t ʈ k ʔ
voiced b d ɖ ɡ
Affricate voiceless t͡ʃ
voiced d͡ʒ
Fricative voiceless (f) θ s ʃ (x) h
voiced z ɣ
Nasal voiceless ŋ̊
voiced m n ɲ ŋ
Rhotic r
Approximant voiceless
voiced w ɭ j

Phonemes in parentheses only occur in words borrowed from other languages.[3]

Vowel sounds
Front Back
High iu
Mid eo
ɛɔ
Low a

References

  1. Nengone at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Nengone". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  3. Tryon, Darrell T. 1967. Nengone Grammar
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