Sikaritai language
| Sikaritai | |
|---|---|
| Tori Aikwakai | |
| Native to | Indonesia |
| Region | New Guinea |
|
Native speakers
|
800 (1993) |
|
Lakes Plain
|
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | |
| Glottolog | sika1263 |
Sikaritai (Sikwari) is a Lakes Plain language of Papua, Indonesia. It is named after Sikari village. It's gone by various names: Aikwakai, Araikurioko, Ati, Tori, Tori Aikwakai.
Sikaritai, Obokuitai, and Eritai constitute a dialect cluster.
The following discussion is based on Martin (1991).
This small consonant inventory is typical of Lakes Plain languages. The complete lack of nasals is also a feature of these languages.
Sikaritai has five vowels.
Many other Lakes Plain languages have developed a series of extra high "fricativized" vowels from the loss of a final consonant. In Sikaritai the final consonants have been retained; however, extra-high [i] and [u] appear as allophones of /i/ and /u/ before final /g/ and /d/. Martin postulates that Sikaritai is in the process of developing contrastive fricativized vowels as other Lakes Plain languages have done.
The language has a two-height tone system with H and L tone. More than one tonal element can appear on a single syllable.
The syllable template is (C)(C)V(V)(C).
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