Mpur language
Mpur (also known as Amberbaken, Kebar, Ekware, and Dekwambre), is a language isolate spoken in and around Mpur and Amberbaken Districts in Tambrauw Regency of the Bird's Head Peninsula, New Guinea. It is not closely related to any other language, and though Ross (2005) tentatively assigned it to the West Papuan languages, based on similarities in pronouns, Palmer (2018), Ethnologue, and Glottolog list it as a language isolate.[3][4]
| Mpur | |
|---|---|
| Amberbaken | |
| Native to | Indonesia |
| Region | Mpur and Amberbaken Districts, Tambrauw Regency on the north coast of the Bird's Head Peninsula |
Native speakers | 5,000 (2002)[1] |
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | akc |
| Glottolog | mpur1239 |
| ELP | Mpur[2] |
  Mpur  Mpur | |
| Coordinates: 0.75°S 133.17°E | |
Locations
In Tambrauw Regency, ethnic Mpur people reside in Kebar District, Kebar Timur District, Manekar District, Amberbaken District, Mubrani District, and Senopi District. Villages include Akmuri, Nekori, Ibuanari, Atai, Anjai, Jandurau, Ajami, Inam, Senopi, Asiti, Wausin, and Afrawi.[5]
Phonology
Consonants
Consonants in Mpur are:
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Postalveolar | Palatal | Velar | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stop | voiceless | p | t | k | ||
| voiced | b | d | ||||
| Affricate | t͡ʃ | |||||
| Fricative | ɸ | s | ||||
| Nasal | m | n | ||||
| Approximant | j | w | ||||
Vowels
Mpur has five vowels: /a, e, i, o, u/.[1]
Tones
Mpur has a complex tonal system with 4 lexical tones and an additional contour tone, a compound of two of the lexical tones. Its tonal system is somewhat similar to the nearby Austronesian languages of Mor and Ma'ya.[6][7] The neighboring language isolate Abun is also tonal.[8]
Mpur has four lexical tones. There is also a fifth complex contour tone formed as a phonetic compound of two lexical tones. An example minimal set is given below.[8]
- bé ‘but’ (high tone)
- be ‘in’ (mid tone)
- bè ‘fruit’ (low tone)
Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from Miedema & Welling (1985),[9] as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:[10]
gloss Mpur (Arfu dialect) Mpur (Kebar dialect) head èbuam èbuam hair byambur buambor eye éyam yam tooth èbir bir leg pirik èipèt louse iːm èyim dog p(y)èr pir pig duao duaw bird iw (ip) if egg bua bua blood éfar far bone éip ip skin (è)fièk fièk tree perahu perau man dèmonip mamir sun put put water war war fire yit yèt stone biːt bit name muk emuk eat èryèt barièt one tu tu two dokir dukir
References
- "WALS Online -". wals.info. Retrieved 2018-08-18.
- Endangered Languages Project data for Mpur.
- Amberbaken at Ethnologue (21st ed., 2018)
- Hammarström, Harald; Forke, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2020). "Mpur". Glottolog 4.3.
- Ronsumbre, Adolof (2020). Ensiklopedia Suku Bangsa di Provinsi Papua Barat. Yogyakarta: Penerbit Kepel Press. ISBN 978-602-356-318-0.
- Muysken, Pieter (2008). From Linguistic Areas to Areal Linguistics. John Benjamins Publishing Company. p. 134. ISBN 9789027231000.
- Palmer, Bill (2018). "Language families of the New Guinea Area". 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. 1–20. ISBN 978-3-11-028642-7.
- Holton, Gary; Klamer, Marian (2018). "The Papuan languages of East Nusantara and the Bird's Head". 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. 569–640. ISBN 978-3-11-028642-7.
- Miedema, J. and Welling, F.I. "Fieldnotes on languages and dialects in the Kebar district, Bird's Head, Irian Jaya". In Adams, K., Lauck, L., Miedema, J., Welling, F., Stokhof, W., Flassy, D., Oguri, H., Collier, K., Gregerson, K., Phinnemore, T., Scorza, D., Davies, J., Comrie, B. and Abbott, S. editors, Papers in New Guinea Linguistics No. 22. A-63:29-52. Pacific Linguistics, The Australian National University, 1985. doi:10.15144/PL-A63.29
- Greenhill, Simon (2016). "TransNewGuinea.org - database of the languages of New Guinea". Retrieved 2020-11-05.
Further reading
- Odé, Cecilia (2002). "A Sketch of Mpur". In Ger P. Reesink (ed.). Languages of the Eastern Bird's Head. Pacific Linguistics. 524. Canberra: Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University. pp. 45–107. hdl:1885/146144.
- 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.
External links
- Materials on Karnai are included in the open access collections AC1 and CVL1 held by Paradisec.
- Audio and video recording are also available at the DoBeS archive.