Iwal language explained

Iwal
Also Known As:Kaiwa
States:Papua New Guinea
Region:Morobe Province
Speakers:2,100
Date:2011
Ref:e18
Familycolor:Austronesian
Fam2:Malayo-Polynesian
Fam3:Oceanic
Fam4:Western Oceanic
Fam5:North New Guinea ?
Fam6:Ngero–Vitiaz ?
Fam7:Huon Gulf
Fam8:South Huon Gulf
Iso3:kbm
Glotto:iwal1237
Glottorefname:Iwal

Iwal (also called Kaiwa from Jabêm Kai Iwac "Iwac highlanders") is an Austronesian language spoken by about 1,900 people from nine villages in Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea (Cobb & Wroge 1990). Although it appears most closely related to the South Huon Gulf languages, it is the most conservative member of its subgroup.

Name

The term Iwal is an endonym. Cognates in other related languages include Yabem Iwac and Numbami Yuwala.

Phonology

Iwal distinguishes 5 vowels and 16 consonants. Unlike most of its neighboring languages, it distinguishes the lateral /l/ from the trill /r/, the latter derived from earlier *s, as in aru from Proto-Oceanic (POc) *qasu 'smoke', ruru- from POc *susu 'breast', and ur from POc * 'rain'. Otherwise it appears to be the most phonologically conservative language in the South Huon Gulf chain (see Ross 1988:154–160). It has retained POc *t as /t/ (not /l/ or /y/) and POc *mw as /mw/ (not /my/ or /ny/), as in mwat 'snake' from POc *mwata.

Vowels (orthographic)

FrontCentralBack
Highiu
Mideo
Lowa

Consonants (orthographic)

BilabialAlveolarPalatalVelarGlottal
Voiceless stopptk
Voiced stopbdg
Nasalmnng
Fricativevs-h-
Laterall
Rhoticr
Approximantwy

Morphology

Pronouns and person markers

Free pronouns

PersonSingularPluralDualPaucal
1st person inclusiveeitittutlutotol
1st person exclusiveayeu ~ auameieilueitol
2nd personmieyemyemluyemtol
3rd personeieisirsulusotol

Genitive pronouns

PersonSingularPlural
1st person inclusivea-nd
1st person exclusivea-ngga-meimei
2nd persona-ma-im
3rd persona-nea-s

Possessive suffixes

PersonSingularPlural
1st person inclusive-(a)nd
1st person exclusive-(a)ngg-(a)nggamei
2nd person-m (-am > -em)-(a)nggaim
3rd person-Ø (-a > -e)-s

Deictics

Iwal deictics correlate with first, second, and third person, each of which has a long and a short form. The latter appear to be anaphoric in usage. Deictics also serve to bracket relative clauses: ete/ebe ... ok/nok/nik. By far the most common brackets are ebe ... ok, but if the information in the clause is associated with either speaker or addressee, the brackets are likely to be ete ... nik or ete ... nok. Deictics may occur either in place of nouns or postposed to nouns, as in 'that earth/soil'.

Numerals

Traditional Iwal counting practices started with the digits of the left hand, then continued on the right hand, and then the feet to reach '20', which translates as 'one person'. Higher numbers are multiples of 'one person'. Nowadays, most counting above '5' is done in Tok Pisin; in the Iwal New Testament, all numbers above '5' - except bage isgabu '10' - are written with Arabic numerals and most likely read in Tok Pisin.

NumeralTermGloss
1dongke/ti'one'
2ailu'two'
3aitol'three'
4aivat'four'
5bage tavlu'hands half/part'
6bage tavlu ano dongke'hands half right one'
7bage tavlu ano ailu'hands half right two'
8bage tavlu ano aitol'hands half right three'
9bage tavlu ano aivat'hands half right four'
10bage isgabu'hands both/pair'
15bage isgabu be va tavlu'hands both and feet half'
20buni amol ti'[?] person one'
100buni amol bage tavlu'[?] person hands half [= '5']'

Bioclassifying prefixes

One unusual feature of Iwal is a small set of bioclassifying prefixes: ei- (POc *kayu) for trees, wer- for edible greens, (POc *manuk) for birds, ih- (POc *ikan) for fish.

Syntax

Word order

The basic word order in Iwal is SVO, with (mostly) prepositions, preposed genitives, postposed adjectives and relative clauses. Relative clauses are marked at both ends, and so are some prepositional phrases. Negatives come at the ends of the clauses they negate. There is also a class of deverbal resultatives that follow the main verb (and its object, if any).

Verb serialization

Verb serialization is very common in Iwal. Within a serial verb construction, all verbs must agree in tense and the perfective marker is itself a serialized verb. Negatives come at the ends of the clauses they negate.

Note

The primary source for this article is Bradshaw (2001), whose copyright holder is Joel Bradshaw, whose contributions here are licensed under the GFDL.

References