Trans-Fly–Bulaka River languages

"South-Central Papuan languages" redirects here. For the proposed branch of the Trans–New Guinea family, see Central and South New Guinea languages.

Trans-Fly – Bulaka River
South-Central Papuan (tentative)
Geographic distribution:	New Guinea
Linguistic classification:	a primary family of Papuan languages
Subdivisions:	Bulaka River Waia–Pahoturi Morehead & Upper Maro Rivers

The Trans-Fly – Bulaka River aka South-Central Papuan languages form a hypothetical family of Papuan languages. They include many of the languages west of the Fly River in southern Papua New Guinea into southern Indonesian West Papua, plus a pair of languages on the Bulaka River a hundred km further west.

The family was posited by Stephen Wurm as a branch of his 1975 Trans–New Guinea proposal. Wurm thought it likely that many of these languages would prove to not actually belong to Trans–New Guinea, but rather to have been heavily influenced by Trans–New Guinea languages. Malcolm Ross (2005) concurred, and removed most of them.

Classification

None of the families are closely related; indeed, it is difficult to demonstrate a link between any of them. Wurm's 1975 TNG branch included the following eight demonstrated families:

• Kiwaian, on the banks and east of the Fly River
• Waia, north of the Fly delta
• Tirio, on the western bank of the Fly River
• Eastern Trans-Fly languages, south of the Fly delta
• Pahoturi, west of the Eastern languages
• Morehead – Upper Maro Rivers, up to and just across the Indonesian border
• Moraori, between Upper Maro and the Marind language
• Bulaka River, west of Marind

Ross (2005) accepted the TNG identity of Tirio, Moraori, and, tentatively, Kiwaian. He split off the four Eastern Trans-Fly languages as an independent family. The remainder of the family, which he calls South-Central Papuan, is only tentatively retained: their pronouns are suggestive of a relationship, but this has not been demonstrated. A more conservative approach would break up Trans-Fly – Bulaka River entirely, with two or three of the families remaining within Trans–New Guinea, and five or six being independent.

Trans-Fly – Bulaka River  (South-Central Papuan)	Bulaka River family Pahoturi family Waia isolate Morehead – Upper Maro family

Pronouns

The pronouns Ross reconstructs for the three families he keeps together are suggestively similar, but it has not been possible to reconstruct common forms:

Proto–Morehead – Upper Maro

I/we	*ni
you	*bu
s/he/they	*be

Proto-Pahoturi

I	*ŋa-na	we	?
thou	*ba or *be	you	*-bi
s/he	*bo	they	?

Proto–Bulaka River

I	*ŋöl	we	*ŋag
thou	*ob	you	*el
s/he	*ib	they	*im

References

• Ross, Malcolm (2005). "Pronouns as a preliminary diagnostic for grouping Papuan languages". In Andrew Pawley, Robert Attenborough, Robin Hide, Jack Golson, eds. Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan-speaking peoples. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 15–66. ISBN 0858835622. OCLC 67292782.