Tolai language
| Kuanua | |
|---|---|
| Tinata Tuna | |
| Native to | Papua New Guinea |
| Region | Gazelle Peninsula, East New Britain Province |
Native speakers | ~100,000 |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | none |
| ISO 639-2 | map |
| ISO 639-3 | ksd |
Kuanua is spoken by the Tolai people of Papua New Guinea, who live on the Gazelle Peninsula in East New Britain Province. (This language is often referred to in the literature as Tolai. However, Tolai is actually the name of the cultural group. The Tolais themselves refer to their language as A Tinata Tuna, which translates as The Real Language.)
Unlike many languages in Papua New Guinea, Kuanua is a healthy language and not in danger of dying out to Tok Pisin, although even Kuanua suffers from a surfeit of loanwords from Tok Pisin, e.g. the original kubar has been completely usurped by the Tok Pisin braun for brown or the Tok Pisin vilivil for bicycle has replaced the former aingau. It is considered a prestigious language and is the primary language of communication in the two major centers of East New Britain: Kokopo and Rabaul.
Kuanua is unique in that it has lost the phoneme 's', though it is still in use in the closely related languages spoken in South New Ireland. There the word for sun is kesakese. This has been reduced to keake in Kuanua. However, with numerous loanwords from English and Tok Pisin having found a permanent home in Kuanua, 's' is gaining acceptance in the language.
Classification
Kuanua belongs to the Oceanic branch of the Austronesian language family. The most immediate subgroup is the Patpatar-Tolai group of languages which also includes Minigir (also spoken on the Gazelle Peninsula) and Patpatar (spoken on New Ireland).
Geographic distribution
Kuanua is spoken on the Gazelle Peninsula in the East New Britain Province of Papua New Guinea.
Derived languages
Kuanua is said to be one of the major substratum languages of Tok Pisin. Some common Tok Pisin vocabulary items that likely come from Kuanua (or a closely related language) include:
aibika (from ibika) - Hisbiscus manihot
buai - betelnut
diwai (from dawai) - tree, wood
guria - earthquake
kawawar (from kavavar) - ginger
kiau - egg
lapun - elderly person
liklik (from ikilik) - small
umben (from uben) - fishing net
Grammar
Independent Pronouns
Kuanua pronouns have four number distinctions (singular, dual, trial and plural) and three person distinctions (first person, second person and third person) as well as an inclusive/exclusive distinction. There are no gender distinctions.
| Singular | Dual | Trial | Plural | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st exclusive | iau (I) |
(a)mir (he/she and I) |
(a)mital (both of them, and I) |
avet (all of them, and I) |
| 1st inclusive | - | dor (thou and I) |
datal (both of you, and I) |
dat (all of you, and I) |
| 2nd | u (thou) |
(a)mur (you two) |
(a)mutal (you three) |
avat (you guys) |
| 3rd | ia (he/she) |
dir (they two) |
dital (they three) |
diat (they) |
The plural pronouns lose their final -t when used before a verb. 'Da vana!' - 'Let's go!', 'Pa ave gire.' - 'We didn't see.', 'Dia tar pot' - 'They have already arrived.'
Syntax
The usual word order of Kuanua is SVO.
There is an interesting phenomenon involving the prefix ni-, which changes a verb to a noun. This introduces an element of irregularity into the language. Ordinarily, the prefix is just added to the beginning of the verb, e. g. laun to live -> a nilaun the life; ian to eat -> a nian the food; aring to pray -> a niaring the prayer. However: varubu to fight -> a vinarubu the fight; tata to talk -> a tinata the language; mamai to chew betelnut -> a minamai (a small supply of) betelnuts for chewing. In those instances, the ni- changes to -in- and becomes an infix which is inserted after the initial phoneme of the verb. It could also be said that the ni- is added as a prefix, but then the initial phoneme of the verb changes places with the n of the prefix.
References
Mosel, Ulrike. (1984). Tolai syntax and its historical development. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.
Lynch, John, Malcolm Ross & Terry Crowley. (2002). The Oceanic languages. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press.