Wahgi language
| Wahgi | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Papua New Guinea |
| Region | Western Highlands Province |
|
Native speakers
|
86,000 (1999) |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Either: wgi – Mid-Wahgi whg – North Wahgi |
| Glottolog |
nucl1620 (Nuclear Wahgi)nort2921 (North Wahgi)
|
Wahgi is a Trans–New Guinea language of the Chimbu–Wahgi branch spoken by approximately 100,000 people in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. Like other Chimbu languages, Wahgi has some unusual lateral consonants.
The dental consonants are "distributed", with closure along a considerable distance of the vocal tract. This presumably means that they are laminal, and that the alveolar consonants are apical. The dental consonants have palatalized allophones in free variation.
The description of the (palatalized) dentals suggest they may be alveolo-palatal or something similar. This is further suggested by transitional vowels triggered by /ɬ̪/, apparently even by its non-palatalized allophone: /oɬ̪/ [oɪ̯ɬ̪] 'moon', /ˈéɬ̪é/ [ˈéɬ̪ɪ̯è] [sic] 'here'.
The nasal element of the prenasalized consonants is syllabic when not preceded by a vowel, but takes a noncontrastive low tone and is never stressed: /ˈmbà/ [m̩̀ˈba] 'but', /ˈpɪ̀ɬ̪mbé/ [ˈpɪ̀ɬ̪m̩̄bé] 'we know'. Prenasalized consonants are perceived as single segments word-initially, but as nasal + stop word-medially.
Nasals and semivowels have no notable allophony, apart from the optional palatalization of /n̪/. The other consonants vary markedly, with most variants being positional:
The southern Kuma dialect has these three laterals, though the alveolar is rather uncommon. (The northern Danga dialect has two laterals, dental fricative and alveolar flap.) The dental and velar laterals assimilate to [ɬ] or [ɬ̪] before dental and alveolar consonants; the alveolar only to [ɬ] before alveolar consonants. In locational forms with a suffix beginning with /t/, the /t/ is elided following the lateral, so that on the surface Wahgi distinguishes dental vs alveolar lateral fricatives and alveolar lateral fricatives vs flaps.
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