| Maia | |
| Also Known As: | Pila |
| Nativename: | Saki |
| Date: | 2000 census |
| Ref: | e18 |
| Familycolor: | Papuan |
| Fam1: | Trans–New Guinea? |
| Fam2: | Madang |
| Fam3: | Croisilles |
| Fam4: | Northwest Adelbert Range |
| Fam5: | Kaukombar |
| Iso3: | sks |
| Glotto: | maia1254 |
| Glottorefname: | Maia |
Maia is a Papuan language spoken in the Madang Province of Papua New Guinea, and is a member of the Trans-New Guinea language family.[1] [2] It has a language endangerment status of 6a, which means that it is a vigorous and sustainable language spoken by all generations. According to a 2000 census, there are approximately 4,500 living speakers of the language, who are split between twenty-two villages in the Almani district of the Bogia sub-district.[3]
There are variations in the Maia spoken between villages, but they can be generally categorized into two primary dialects. Of these two dialects, the Main Dialect accounts for approximately three-fourths of speakers and the Southern Dialect accounts for the remaining one-fourth. Variations of the Main Dialect tend to be predictable with only minor variations in pronunciation. The information presented in this article is based on the Wagedav dialect, a sub-dialect of the Main Dialect spoken in the Wagedav village.[2]
Other names for the language are Banar, Pila, Saki, Suaro, Turutap, and Yakiba.
The phonemic inventory of Maia is fairly small, as is typical of languages from Papua New Guinea.
In some cases, vowels and consonants are modified or deleted across morphemes in a word. These morphophonemic rules are detailed in this section.
The following table details these consonant phonemes and allophones for each, if any.[2]
| Plosives: Voiceless Voiced | p[p, pʰ, p̚ ] b [b, p] | t̪[t̪, t̪ʰ, t̪̚ ] d̪ [d̪, t̪ ] | k[k, kʰ, k̚ ] g [g, ɣ, k] | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n̪ | (ŋ) | |||
| Flap | ɾ[r, ɾ, ɾ̻ ] | |||||
| Fricative | β[β, ɸ] | s̪[s̪, ɕʷ ] | ||||
| Approximant | j | |||||
| Lateral Approximant | l |
Maia contains the five basic vowel phonemes in the chart below:[2]
| Close | i | u | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mid | ɛ | ɔ | ||
| Open | a |
Possible syllable structures in Maia are illustrated in the chart below. Onsets in Maia can end with a vowel, while codas can end in either a vowel or consonant.[2]
| V onset | enara (p. 12) | /ɔ.n̪a.ɾa/ | there | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CV onset | waraba (p. 26) | /wa.ɾa.βa/ | edge | |
| CCV onset | muira (p. 15) | /mwi.ɾa/ | boy | |
| CVC | yag (p. 23) | /jag/ | water | |
| CV coda | muata (p. 19) | /mwa.t̪a/ | custom | |
| CVC coda | inavat (p. 19) | /in.a.βat/ | always |
There are two instantiations of this rule. The first instance applies to adjacent vowels in a verb: when two vowels are adjacent to each other at the junction of two morphemes within a verb, the first vowel is deleted. For example, 'he is eating' is not nimɛ - a, as the 'ɛ' is deleted to give nima (p. 11).[2]
The second instance is more general: when there are two identical vowels adjacent to each other at the junction of two morphemes within any word, one is deleted. For example, 'he worked' is not '
In words with two verb suffixes, the vowel in the final suffix is repeated in the penultimate suffix. For example, 'I heard' is not
The consonant deletion rule applies to a few select clitics: -gat, -di, -no, -waka. When these clitics are appended to the end of another word that ends in a consonant, the initial consonant of the clitic is deleted. For example, 'always' is not inaβ - gat'
Maia is a synthetic fusional language, in which word-building is accomplished primarily through clitics and derivational affixes.
Maia does not have case markings, but does have agreement between nouns and their adjectives and between verbs and their objects.[2]
Clitics are an especially common means of word-building in Maia. Some clitics can be combined sequentially to produce a cumulative meaning, as in the case of combining the contrast marker clitic =(d)i and the topic marker =(n)o to indicate a topic that is in contrast with something else. The upper limit on the number of clitics that can be combined appears to be three.[2]
The following table summarizes the clitics in the Maia language. Consonants in parentheses are typically included only if the word to which the clitic is appended ends in a vowel.
| =(w)aka |
|
| |
| =(g)at |
|
| |
| =yag | Collective marker | 'bisibis' ('descendants'); 'bisibisyag' ('descendants' (collectively)) | |
| =mate | Manner marker to indicate similarity | ||
| =ga | Specific locative marker to indicate a location, position, time frame, origin, or recipient. This can be both in the literal or abstract sense. In all of these cases, it refers to a defined object. | Literal example: Abstract example: | |
| =ra |
| 'muanigo' means 'today', and 'muanigora' means 'sometime today'. | |
| =(n)o | Topic marker to indicate referential information. This clitic frequently marks the subject of the clause. | ||
| =(d)i | Contrast marker to indicate a shift or contrast in the clause. | ||
| =git | Contrafactual marker to indicate what did not or could not happen. | ||
| =ma | Emphatic marker used to emphasize a prominent person or situation in a clause. | =ma can be appended to the end of a person's name to signal importance, as in the name Abram: 'Abramma' | |
| =na | Attention marker used to signal to the audience that the next statement will be important. It can be used to indicate the turning point of a story, for example. It is placed at the end of the statement preceding the important one. |
Affixes in Maia are predominantly derivational suffixes.
The nominalizing suffix -arav can be used to create nouns from verb roots. For example, 'wadib' means 'to argue', but 'wadib-arav' means 'the arguing' (p. 40).[2]
The verbalizing suffix -(n)a can be used to create verbs from nouns and adjectives, as in the case of the word for white, 'waia' (p. 45):[2]
There are four classes of derived causative verb suffixes, which may be affixed to the end of a preexisting verb root to emphasize a causal relationship. These suffixes are -tate, -te, -rate, and -de. For example, 'ebe' ('wake up') is the progenitor of 'ebetate' ('to wake up (somebody)') (p. 46).[2]
The only class of non-derivational affixes in Maia are possessor prefixes. These prefixes are appended in front of an adjective to indicate the possessor of the noun, as summarized in the table below. The distinction between singularity and plurality is established with a difference in stress patterns.[2]
| i- | 1st person singular | |
| ni- | 2nd person singular | |
| u- | 3rd person singular | |
| 1st person plural | ||
| 2nd person plural | ||
| 3rd person plural |
These prefixes are also frequently, but not always, appended to verbs to indicate the recipient of an action. Transitive verbs with objects require the presence of such a prefix, while intransitive verbs are more variable. The following example illustrates this (p. 43):[2]
There are a few words in Maia in which two existing nouns are combined to give rise to a new word. This includes compounds such as '
Full or partial reduplication of nouns in Maia can indicate plurality, a diminutive form of the original word or alternatively, the derived adverb form of the word. The Maia word '
Full or partial reduplication of verb roots indicates an augmentation of the action or indicates a repeated action. Typically reduplication occurs in two different forms: either repetition of only the first syllable or repetition of the entire root. For example, '
Reduplication or partial reduplication of adjectives can serve three different purposes: to indicate augmentation, plurality, or diminishment. An example of reduplication used to express augmentation, repeating the Maia word for 'good' ('
Numeral quantifiers utilize a special case of reduplication. Complete reduplication of a number indicates something in succession ('
Stress patterns are used to differentiate between 1st and 2nd person singular and plural inalienably possessed nouns. (Maia has some nouns that are inalienably possessed, which include body parts, kinship terms, and position nouns.) For example, ‘my skin’ is /i’ dia/, but ‘our skin’ is /’idia/ (p. 13).[2]
In transitive clauses, the verb must agree in both person and number with the object. In the following example, the verb for 'divide' must include the third-person-singular marker 'a' to indicate that it applies to a singular object in the third person (the pig):[2]
In intransitive clauses, the verb must agree in both person and number with the subject. The example below demonstrates that the verb for 'go' must be modified to indicate that it applies to a first-person plural subject:[2]
The non-derivational possessor affixes described above in this section also agree in person and number with the noun they describe.
The basic word order of Maia is SOV for transitive clauses, as illustrated by the transitive sentence example below:[2]
The basic word order is SV for intransitive clauses:
For clauses that have both an indirect object and a direct object, the indirect object typically comes before the direct object. The following example, in which 'Kunia' is the indirect object and 'plate' is the direct object, illustrates this:
The verb phrase in the example above illustrates that the verb + object phrase in Maia is head final, as the verb 'chase' comes after the object 'pig'.
The example above also demonstrates that the determiner+noun phrase is also head final, as the determiner ono ('that') comes after its complement kani ('pig').
The possessee+possessor phrase is also head final, as the possessee 'garden' comes after the possessor 'Mamudia':
An exception is the complementizer/subordinator+clause phrase, which is head-initial. In the example below, 'me maianane' translates to 'because'. This complementizer precedes the rest of the clause.
Adverbs are placed before the verb in adverbial phrases:
Adjectives are placed immediately after the noun that they describe:
AD2:the additive adverb 'da'ATN:attention activator markerCFT:contrafactual markerCT:contrast markerD1:distal-1 demonstrativeDIST: distributive derivational suffixEM:emphatic markerINTP:intensified pronounIR:irrealis moodLIM:limitation markerLOC1:specific locative markerLOC2:non-specific locative markerPF:perfect aspect (+past)PROX:proximal demonstrativeRL:realis moodSEQ:sequential medial verb markerTP:topicVR2:derived stative/process verbalizer