| Ngkolmpu | |
| Also Known As: | Ngkontar |
| Region: | New Guinea |
| Ethnicity: | Kanum |
| Familycolor: | Papuan |
| Fam1: | Trans-Fly – Bulaka River? |
| Fam2: | Yam |
| Fam3: | Tonda |
| Dia1: | Ngkâlmpw (Ngkontar) |
| Dia2: | Bädi |
| Speakers: | 100 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| Ld1: | Ngkâlmpw Kanum |
| Lc1: | kcd |
| Ld2: | Bädi Kanum |
| Lc2: | khd |
| Glotto: | ngka1236 |
| Glottorefname: | Ngkantr |
Ngkolmpu Kanum, or Ngkontar, is part of a dialect chain in the Yam family spoken by the Kanum people of New Guinea. The Ngkâlmpw (Ngkontar) and moribund Bädi varieties have limited mutual intelligibility may be considered distinct languages.[1]
Languages spoken by the Kanum have variously been referred to as Ngkâlmpw Kanum, Enkelembu, Kenume, and Knwne.[2] Carroll describes three varieties forming a dialect chain. Ngkolmpu is divided into Ngkontar and the moribund variety Baedi (Bädi).
Ngkolmpu Kanum has 15 consonant phonemes (plus two marginal phonemes) at three points of articulation: bilabial, coronal, and velar. Prenasalized voiceless stops and fricatives contrast with voiceless and nasal realizations, which is typologically unusual. The orthography is enclosed in angle brackets.
| Bilabial | Coronal | Velar | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| Plosive | voiceless | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| prenasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | ||
| voiced | pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /ink/) | |||
| Fricative | plain | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| prenasal | pronounced as /ink/, | ||||
| Trill | pronounced as /ink/ | ||||
| Liquid | pronounced as /ink/ | ||||
| Glide | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
The Ngkolmpu (Ngkâlmpw) Kanum variety is notable for its complex verbal inflection and tendency to distribute grammatical features throughout an utterance, referred to as distributed exponence.
. Nicholas Evans (linguist) . Palmer . Bill . 2018 . The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area: A Comprehensive Guide . The languages of Southern New Guinea . The World of Linguistics . 4 . Berlin . De Gruyter Mouton . 641–774 . 978-3-11-028642-7.