Misima language

Misima-Panaeati, also called Misiman, is an indigenous Austronesian language spoken on the islands of Misima, Panaeati, and the islands of the eastern half of the Calvados Chain of Papua New Guinea.

Misima
Misima-Panaeati
Region	Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea
Native speakers	18,000 (2002) 4,000 monolinguals
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Western Papuan Tip Peripheral Kilivila–Misima Misima
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mpx
Glottolog	misi1243

Phonology

Vowels

Misima-Paneati has five vowel phonemes.

	Front	Back
High	i /i/	u /u/
Mid	e /e/	o /o/
Low	a /a ~ ə ~ ʌ/

Consonants

Misima-Paneati has 17 consonant phonemes.

		Bilabial		Alveolar	Palatal	Velar		Glottal
		Plain	Labialized			Plain	Labialized	Plain
Stop	Voiceless	p /p/	pw /pʷ/	t /t/		k /k/
	Voiced	b /b/	bw /bʷ/	d /d/		g /ɡ/	gw /ɡʷ/
Nasal		m /m/	mw /mʷ/	n /n ~ ŋ/
Fricative	Voiceless			s /s/				h /h/
	Voiced	v /β/
Approximant					y /j ~ ʝ/
Lateral approximant				l /l/

Syllables

In Misima-Paneati, the following syllable types commonly occur: V, CV, CVC, and VC.

The open syllables V and CV are found in all positions of words, whereas the closed syllables CVC and VC are only found word finally and across morpheme boundaries, with the exception of the following five words:

• /ˈamna/ – 'feelings'
• /ˈkimpos/ – 'centre pole'
• /kinˈbʷai/ – 'fingernail'
• /sinˈɡili/ – 'centre rib of coconut leaf'
• /tabˈnaha/ – 'sneeze'

The only monomorphemic consonant clusters that always occur across syllable boundaries are:

• /mn/
• /mp/
• /nb/
• /nɡ/
• /bn/

External links

• Materials on Misima are included in the open access Arthur Capell collections (AC1 and AC2) and the Malcolm Ross collection (MR1) held by Paradisec.

References

• Callister, Sandra (2005). Baaba ana talisi ana buki. Ukarumpa: Summer Institute of Linguistics. ISBN 9980-0-3055-0.
• Callister, William (1993). "Misiman phonology". Phonologies of Austronesian languages. 2: 1–24.