Kosraean language
| Kosraean | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Federated States of Micronesia |
| Region | Kosrae |
|
Native speakers
|
9,000 (2001) |
|
Austronesian
|
|
| Official status | |
|
Official language in
|
Federated States of Micronesia |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | kos |
| ISO 639-3 | |
| Glottolog | kosr1238 |
Kosraean /koʊˈʃaɪən/, sometimes rendered Kusaiean, is the language spoken on the islands of Kosrae (Kusaie), Caroline Islands, and Nauru. In 2001 there were approximately 8,000 speakers.
Kosraean features possessive classes such as "sihk" for "mine" when referring to dwellings, and "nihmuhk" for "mine" when referring to drinks.
According to Ethnologue, there are about 8,000 speakers in Micronesia, and in population total about 9,000. The people are recognized by the government, as Kosraean is the official language of Kosrae.
Kosraean is classified as, Austronesian, Malayo-Polynesian, Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, Oceanic, Central-Eastern Oceanic, Remote Oceanic, Micronesian, Micronesian Proper, Kusaiean.
Kosraean has 11 plain consonants that are p, t, k, m, n, ng, l, r, s, and sr (Kinnaman).
Kosraean has the vowels .I, e, ac, ah, ih, uc, uh, a, u, o, oh, and oa (Kinnaman).
The main word order in Kosraean is SVO, but can sometimes change with the different kind of sentences said. Lee (1975) presented a sentence in Kosreaen that said “mwet ah tuh ahscak ik ah”, which means ‘the men caught the fish” (“mwet” meaning men, “ahscak” meaning “to catch”, and “ik” meaning “fish”). For interrogative sentences, which are used to ask questions, the word order relatively stays the same, but can change as well. Lee (1975) writes a question in Kosraean “Kuh kom mas?”, which means “Are you sick?” But when the sentence includes an interrogative word such as the word “fuhka” which means “how”, then the structure can change. For example, “kuh kom mas” means “are you ok”, but when you include the word “fuhka” at the end of the sentence, “Kuh kom fuhka”, it means “How are you?”. So there are a couple ways you could interpret an interrogative sentence in Kosraean, but most of the sentences are in SVO form.
Reduplication is actually a big part of Kosraean, and is used in all sorts of ways. It can be used for verbs, nouns, and pretty much anything. Lee (1975), states that there are two types of reduplication, with one being complete reduplication, which is when an entire word is repeated, and the other one being partial reduplication, which is when only part of the word is repeated. There are different kinds of reduplication, as it depends on the vowels and consonants in the word. For example, complete reduplication of a CV: C(consonant, long vowel, consonant) word “fact”, which means “fat”, turns into the word “factfact” and the meaning becomes “rather fat”. The same goes with the word “lahs” which means “coral”. The word changes into “lahs-lahs”, which means “lots of coral”. Many of the words when completely reduplicated, often try to emphasize that there is more of what the original word was. The complete reduplication of V:C (long vowel, consonant) words are a little different. Lee (1975) states that “when monosyllabic words of the V:C shape undergo complete reduplication, the glide y appears before the second syllable in some words”. So the word “af” (rain), is “af-yaf”, which translates into “rainy”. Then we have partial reduplication, where Lee (1975) states that “when a monosyllabic word undergoes partial reduplication, the first consonant and the vowel are repeated”. For example, the partial reduplicated form of “fosr” (smoke), is “fo-fosr” which means “to emit smoke”. For more complex words such as “fule”, which has two syllables “fu” and “le”, the reduplication for this word would be “ful.fu.le”. This comes to show how much reduplication is used in Kosraean and how important it is to the language.
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