Kilmeri | |
---|---|
Native to | Papua New Guinea |
Region | Sandaun Province |
Ethnicity | 2,800 (2004)[1] |
Native speakers | 2,000 (2004)[1] |
Border
| |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | kih |
Glottolog | kilm1241 |
ELP | Kilmeri |
Coordinates: 2°54′59″S 141°17′53″E / 2.916313°S 141.298028°E |
Kilmeri, or bo apulyo is a Papuan language of Papua New Guinea near the border with Indonesian Papua. It is not being learned by children.
Kilmeri is spoken around Ossima ward (2°54′59″S 141°17′53″E / 2.916313°S 141.298028°E) in Bewani/Wutung Onei Rural LLG, Sandaun Province.[1][2]
Speakers of Kilmeri refer to their own language as bo apulyo, meaning sound in the middle.[3]
The two major dialect groupings have an estimated cognate percentage of 82% based on lexicostatistics.[4]
Kilmeri distinguishes 18 consonants, 12 of which are phonemic.[3]
Bilabial | Labiodental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Plosive | voiced prenasalised | b | d | ⌈g⌉ | |||
Voiceless | p | k | ⌈ʔ⌉ | ||||
Labialized | (pʷ̜) | ||||||
Nasal | m | n | |||||
Rhotic | ᵐʙ | r | |||||
Fricative | (β / ɸ) | ⌈f⌉ | s | ||||
Lateral | l | ||||||
Approximant | ʋ | j |
The sounds in parentheses are possible allophones of the bilabial trill. [β] can be intervocalical, [ɸ] can be the final sound, and [pʷ̜] can be syllable-initial. The sounds in half brackets occur extremely rarely and can likely be attributed to loan words. [3]
The exceedingly rare bilabial trill /ʙ/ is found in the areal-related Kwomtari and Sko languages, but not in other Border languages.[6] It likely developed from a prenasalized bilabial stop followed by a high back rounded vowel, hence why [mbu] occurs only in ten words.
Kilmeri has eight vowels, all of which are always short. [3]
(Near) Front | Central | (Near) Back | |
---|---|---|---|
High | i | u | |
Near-high | ɪ | ʊ | |
Mid | ɛ | ɔ | |
(Near) -low | æ | a |
The near-high and near-low vowels are especially rare.[3] Thus, Kilmeri was believed to have seven vowels[6] until a small selection of words, such as /bi/ (pig) and /bI/ (hole) show a clear distinction between /i/ and /I/.[3]
The main syllable structure is CV with two preferred syllables. [3]
The phonetic inventory easily translates into Latin letters. The near-low vowel uses ae and the near-high vowels use diacritics. Literate Kilmeri speakers much preferred the symbol p for the bilabial trill, but pp was selected to indicate two different phonemes.[3]
Phoneme | Grapheme |
---|---|
/b/ | b |
/d/ | d |
/k/ | k |
/l/ | l |
/m/ | m |
/n/ | n |
/p/ | p |
/ʙ/ | pp |
/r/ | r |
/s/ | s |
/ʋ/ | w |
/j/ | y |
/a/ | a |
/æ/ | ae |
/ɛ/ | e |
/i/ | i |
/I/ | î |
/ɔ/ | o |
/u/ | u |
/ʊ/ | û |
Kilmeri has eleven personal pronouns without gender distinction. [6]
Singular | Dual | Plural | |
---|---|---|---|
1st INCL | ko | dedukoyo | nuko |
1st EXCL | koyo | uke | |
2nd | de | deyo | ine |
3rd | ki ~ ke | kiyo | iki |
The dual forms end with the locative suffix -yo and is derived from the singular. The inclusive dual is often substituted with the inclusive plural, especially in narrative stories.[3]
Kilmeri verb forms can express complex modality. Examples:[6]
de-le | PROB-go | ‘will probably go’ |
lam < le-m | go-POT | ‘might go’ |
lou < le-ou | go-FRUST | ‘go in vain’ |
lap < le-p | go-IMP | ‘go!’ |
klam < k-le-m | NEG.IMP-go-NEG.IMP | ‘don’t go!’ |
loipap < le-ipe-p | go-first-IMP | ‘go first, and then…’ |
Circumfixes can also be applied to verbs in Kilmeri.
Number agreement in Kilmeri is absolutive rather than accusative.[6]
In Kilmeri, intransitive verbs, as well as the two transitive verbs ‘eat’ and ‘throw down to’, agree with subjects in number. This pattern is also present in Amanab. These verbs are:[6]
gloss | singular | plural |
---|---|---|
‘eat’ | ni | ile |
‘throw down to’ | pakʊne | pakʊpi |
‘come’ | pule | pulupi |
‘die’ | sui | supuli |
‘go’ | le | mole |
‘sit’ | nake | mape |
‘sleep’ | nui | sapi |
‘speak’ | mui | molive |
However, number marking for transitive verbs, except for ‘eat’ and ‘throw down to’, refers to the number of the object, rather than the subject.[6]
gloss | singular | plural |
---|---|---|
‘carry’ | wili | moli |
‘carry hanging’ | lali | laluli |
‘cook’ | si | sepi |
‘cut’ | suke | sukeli |
‘dig’ | rari | rararpi |
‘erect’ | newe | newaupi |
‘fetch someone’ | lakive | leki |
‘fill’ | norive | nororpi |
‘harvest’ | lapiye | lapapi |
‘mark’ | lopi | lopapi |
‘sharpen’ | merive | mererpi |
‘take out’ | pulive | puloli |
‘tear’ | pike | pikeki |