Kembra language

Kembra is a South Pauwasi language spoken in Western New Guinea by some twenty persons in Kiambra village, Kaisenar District, Keerom Regency. It is used by between 20% and 60% of the ethnic population and is no longer passed down to children.

Kembra
Native toWestern New Guinea
RegionKiambra village, Kaisenar District, Keerom Regency
Ethnicity20–60% (2000?)[1]
Native speakers
20 (2000)[2]
Pauwasi
Language codes
ISO 639-3xkw
Glottologkemb1250
ELPKembra[3]

Classification

Initial documentation was carried out by Barnabas Konel and Roger Doriot. Kembra data remains unpublished in Konel's and Doriot's field notes.[4][5]

Foley (2018) notes that Kembra has some lexical forms resembling Lepki, but not Murkim, hinting at lexical borrowing between Kembra and Lepki, but not Murkim. He allows the possibility of Kembra being related to Lepki–Murkim, pending further evidence.[6] With more data, Usher (2020) was able to verify the connection.

Phonology

Kembra is a tonal language, as shown by the following minimal pair.[6]:464

  • ‘pig’
  • ‘fire, tree’

Basic vocabulary

Basic vocabulary of Kembra listed in Foley (2018):[7]

Kembra basic vocabulary
glossKembra
‘bird’tra
‘blood’nili
‘bone’ka
‘eat’ɲəm
‘egg’traləl
‘eye’yi
‘fire’ya
‘give’lokwes
‘ground’to
‘hair’iyet
‘I’mu
‘leg’kla
‘louse’nim
‘man’ratera
‘name’kia
‘one’kutina
‘see’iyam
‘stone’isi
‘sun’ota
‘tooth’pa
‘tree’ya
‘two’kais
‘water’er
‘we’utuas
‘you (sg)’amagrei
‘you (pl)’robkei

Sentences

Kembra has SOV word order, and also appears to have bipartite negation as in Abun and French. Only several sentences have been elicited by Konel (n.d.), which are quoted below from Foley (2018).[6]

(1)

peiporɲəm
dogpigblackeat
‘The dog ate the black pig.’

(2)

muipeiɲəm
1SGbetelnuteat
‘I’m chewing betelnut.’

(3)

mupeite-iya-mo
1SGdog?-see-TNS
‘I see the dog.’

(4)

muipeiabi-ɲikoto
1SGbetelnutNEG-eatNEG
‘I didn’t eat betelnut.’

(5)

mupeiabi-(i)yakoto
1SGdogNEG-seeNEG
‘I didn’t see the dog’.

References

  1. Kembra language at Ethnologue (15th ed., 2005)
  2. Kembra at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  3. Endangered Languages Project data for Kembra.
  4. Konel, Barnabas. n.d. Wordlist of Kembra. Photocopy of handwritten ms.
  5. Doriot, Roger E. 1991. 6-2-3-4 Trek, April-May, 1991. Ms.
  6. Foley, William A. (2018). "The languages of Northwest New Guinea". In Palmer, Bill (ed.). The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area: A Comprehensive Guide. The World of Linguistics. 4. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 433–568. ISBN 978-3-11-028642-7.
  7. Foley, William A. (2018). "The Languages of the Sepik-Ramu Basin and Environs". In Palmer, Bill (ed.). The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area: A Comprehensive Guide. The World of Linguistics. 4. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 197–432. ISBN 978-3-11-028642-7.
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