Dorig language
Dorig (formerly called Wetamut) is a threatened Oceanic language spoken on Gaua island in Vanuatu.
| Dorig | |
|---|---|
| Dōrig | |
| Pronunciation | [ⁿdʊˈriɣ] |
| Native to | Vanuatu |
| Region | Gaua |
Native speakers | 300 (2012)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | wwo |
| Glottolog | weta1242 |
| ELP | Dorig |
 Dorig is classified as Definitely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
The language’s 300 speakers live mostly in the village of Dorig (IPA: [ⁿdʊˈriɰ]), on the south coast of Gaua. Smaller speaker communities can be found in the villages of Qteon (east coast) and Qtevut (west coast).
Name
The name Dorig is derived from the name of the village where it is spoken.
Phonology
Dorig has 8 phonemic vowels. These include 7 short monophthongs /i ɪ ɛ a ɔ ʊ u/ and one long vowel /aː/.[3]
| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| Close | i ⟨i⟩ | u ⟨u⟩ |
| Near-close | ɪ ⟨ē⟩ | ʊ ⟨ō⟩ |
| Open-mid | ɛ ⟨e⟩ | ɔ ⟨o⟩ |
| Open | a ⟨a⟩, aː ⟨ā⟩ | |
Dorig has 15 consonant phonemes.[4][5]
| Labiovelar | Bilabial | Alveolar | Dorsal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voiceless stop | k͡pʷ ⟨q⟩ | t ⟨t⟩ | k ⟨k⟩ | |
| Prenasalized stop | ᵐb ⟨b⟩ | ⁿd ⟨d⟩ | ||
| Nasal | ŋ͡mʷ ⟨m̄⟩ | m ⟨m⟩ | n ⟨n⟩ | ŋ ⟨n̄⟩ |
| Fricative | β ~ ɸ ⟨v⟩ | s ⟨s⟩ | ɣ ⟨g⟩ | |
| Rhotic | r ⟨r⟩ | |||
| Lateral | l ⟨l⟩ | |||
| Approximant | w ⟨w⟩ |
The phonotactic template for a syllable in Dorig is: /CCVC/ — e.g. /rk͡pʷa/ ‘woman’ (< *rVᵐbʷai); /ŋ͡mʷsar/ ‘poor’ (< *mʷasara); /wrɪt/ ‘octopus’ (< *ɣurita). Remarkably, the consonant clusters of these /CCVC/ syllables are not constrained by the Sonority Sequencing Principle. Historically, these /CCVC/ syllables reflect former trisyllabic, paroxytone words */CVˈCVCV/, after deletion of the two unstressed vowels:[6] e.g. POc. *kuRíta ‘octopus’ > *wərítə > /wrɪt/.
Grammar
The system of personal pronouns in Dorig contrasts clusivity, and distinguishes four numbers (singular, dual, trial, plural).[7]
Spatial reference is based on a system of geocentric (absolute) directionals, which is typical of Oceanic languages.[8]
References
Bibliography
- François, Alexandre (2005), "Unraveling the history of the vowels of seventeen northern Vanuatu languages" (PDF), Oceanic Linguistics, 44 (2): 443–504, doi:10.1353/ol.2005.0034, S2CID 131668754
- —— (2010), "Phonotactics and the prestopped velar lateral of Hiw: Resolving the ambiguity of a complex segment" (PDF), Phonology, 27 (3): 393–434, doi:10.1017/s0952675710000205
- —— (2011), "Social ecology and language history in the northern Vanuatu linkage: A tale of divergence and convergence" (PDF), Journal of Historical Linguistics, 1 (2): 175–246, doi:10.1075/jhl.1.2.03fra, hdl:1885/29283.
- —— (2012), "The dynamics of linguistic diversity: Egalitarian multilingualism and power imbalance among northern Vanuatu languages" (PDF), International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 2012 (214): 85–110, doi:10.1515/ijsl-2012-0022, S2CID 145208588
- —— (2015). "The ins and outs of up and down: Disentangling the nine geocentric space systems of Torres and Banks languages" (PDF). In Alexandre François; Sébastien Lacrampe; Michael Franjieh; Stefan Schnell (eds.). The languages of Vanuatu: Unity and diversity. Studies in the Languages of Island Melanesia. Canberra: Asia-Pacific Linguistics. pp. 137–195. hdl:1885/14819. ISBN 978-1-922185-23-5.
- —— (2016), "The historical morphology of personal pronouns in northern Vanuatu" (PDF), in Pozdniakov, Konstantin (ed.), Comparatisme et reconstruction : tendances actuelles, Faits de Langues, vol. 47, Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 25–60
- —— (2022). "Presentation of the Dorig language, and audio archive". Pangloss Collection. Paris: CNRS. Retrieved 28 Sep 2022.