Last Updated: 2020-06-29
Background
Language Family: Austronesian / Malayo-Polynesian / Eastern Malayo-Polynesian / Oceanic / Western Oceanic / St. Matthias
- Mussau-Emira is spoken in Papua New Guinea, specifically in the province of New Ireland.
Phonology
Consonants
- Consonant gemination occurs contrastively (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2007, 13).
- Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo (2007) argue for the flap /ɾ/ rather than the trill (p. 13).
- Ross (2002) argues that the phonemes I have listed as voiced fricatives are actually stops in their underlying forms (p. 149).
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Place of Articulation
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Manner of Articulation
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Bilabial
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Alveolar
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Velar
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Stops
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p
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t
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k
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Fricatives
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β
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s
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ɣ
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Nasals
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m
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n
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ŋ
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Trills
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r
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Approximants
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l
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Vowels
- Vowel length is contrastive (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2007, 13).
- Ross (2002) argues for the more traditional five-vowel system of /i u e o a/ (p. 149).
- Because Crúbadán has instances of three vowel sequences, leaving diphthongs to be determined by syllable structure, they aren’t included in the rule set. However, for reference, the diphthongs found in Mussau-Emira are: /ɑi/, /ɑɛ/, /ɑu/, /ɑɔ/, /ɛi/, /ɔi/, and /ɔu/ (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2009, 4).
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Front
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Back
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High
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i
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u
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Mid
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ɛ
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ɔ
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Low
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ɑ
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Alphabet
- The Seventh-Day Adventist orthography varies slightly, using ⟨q⟩ for /ɣ/ and ⟨g⟩ for /ŋ/ (Ross 2002, 151). I have opted not to support that orthography by default, given that it is unused by the Crúbadán corpus. However, my rule set provides the option for alternation between the two orthographies.
- Graphemes ⟨j⟩, ⟨d⟩, ⟨f⟩, ⟨z⟩, and ⟨h⟩ represent sounds not found in native words, but these graphemes are still commonly found in loanwords and proper nouns. They correspond to /dʒ/, /d/, /f/, /z/, and /h/, respectively. According to Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo (2009), other such graphemes and sounds also exist, but these five are some of the most common (p. 12).
- Gemination and vowel length are written by doubling the relevant character.
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Grapheme
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Phoneme
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a
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/ɑ/
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b
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/β/
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e
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/ɛ/
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g
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/ɣ/
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i
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/i/
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k
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/k/
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l
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/l/
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m
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/m/
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n
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/n/
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o
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/ɔ/
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p
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/p/
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r
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/r/
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s
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/s/
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t
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/t/
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u
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/u/
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v
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/β/
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Digraph
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gh
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/ɣ/
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ng
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/ŋ/
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Misc. Rules
- Voiced fricatives become stops when geminated, and sometimes when word-initial (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2007, 13; Ross 2002, 149).
- Final vowels are frequently dropped (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2007, 15; Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2009, 11).
- In casual speech, syncope of vowels occurs between identical consonants (Brownie, John and Brownie, Marjo 2007, 16).
References
Brownie, John, and Brownie, Marjo. 2007. Mussau Grammar Essentials. SIL-PNG Academic Publications.
———. 2009. “Organised Phonology Data: Mussau-Emira, New Ireland Province.” SIL International.
Ross, Malcolm. 2002. “Mussau.” In The Oceanic Languages, edited by Lynch, John Ross, Malcolm and Crowley, Terry, 148–66. Routledge.