Lampung language
| Lampung | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Indonesia |
| Region | Southern Sumatra |
| Ethnicity | Lampung people |
|
Native speakers
|
1.5 million (2000 census) |
| Lampung script, Latin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Variously: ljp – Lampung Api abl – Lampung Nyo kge – Komering |
| Glottolog | lamp1241 |
Lampung is the language of the Indonesian province of Lampung at the southern tip of Sumatra. It is a dialect cluster with two main dialects, perhaps distinct enough to be considered distinct languages: Abung/Pepadun (Lampung Nyo) and Pesisir/Say Batin (Lampung Api). A third, Komering, is sometimes considered part of Lampung Api, by others a distinct language. Lampung Api is the prestige variety.
Before the introduction of the Roman script, Lampung was written in a script called "Aksara Lampung" or "Had Lampung", which is a variant of the Ulu scripts used throughout central and south Sumatra. The script is seldom used today but is taught in schools throughout Lampung as a means of preserving its linguistic history.
Voiceless stops occur in word-initial, word-medial, and word-final position. Word-final stops are generally unreleased. Voiced stops generally do not occur word-finally. There seems to be only moderate evidence for a phonemic glottal stop. /r/ has a range of phonetic realizations but is most often a velar or uvular fricative [x],[ɣ], [χ],[ʁ].There is minor disagreement between the two earlier phonologies about /r/, described as an apical trill by Abdurrahman and as a voiceless velar fricative by Walker. Walker stated that this phoneme (written as /x/ in 1976 and as /r/ in his 1975 word lists) occurs in all major environments and is sometimes voiced intervocalically. Walker (1976:3) noted that [r] (apical trill) ‘occurs in unassimilated loanwords’ and alternates with [x] in many cases.
The nasals occur in word-initial, word-medial and word-final positions, with the exception of /ɲ/, which does not occur word-finally. /l/ occurs in word-initial, word-medial, and word-final position. /w/ and /y/ occur word-initially and word-medially and, depending on one's analysis, word-finally as part of diphthongs discussed below. Both phonemes occur word-medially in positions where they are not considered as transitions from [u] and [i] respectively.
Gemination, particularly consonant gemination, is a prominent feature in Lampung.It is not easy to generalize except to say that gemination happens most frequently in Nyo, less so but still frequently in Api, and almost never (at least as we and others have transcribed it) in Komering. Lampung people often did not agree among themselves which lexemes exhibit gemination but one can see that the phenomenon as we documented it clusters around specific lexemes. Several cases each of gemination are recorded for every consonant in medial only position (either between vowels or as part of a consonant cluster) except /ɲ/, /ŋ/, /s/, /w/ and /y/. Gemination is most frequently associated with one of two related environments: 1) penultimate schwa; and 2) reduction of voiceless nasal-stop clusters to the stop component. In this case other vowels are in some isolects neutralized to schwa. Gemination therefore can be significant for reconstruction.
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