Mengen and Poeng are rather divergent dialects of an Austronesian language of New Britain in Papua New Guinea.

Phonology

• Both palatalization and labialization [ʲ, ʷ] is said to occur in all consonants. Palatalized consonants only occur before back vowels, and labialized consonant sounds may occur before all vowels accept /u/.
• /k/ is typically pronounced as uvular [q], but can also be heard as a velar [k] in free variation.
• Gemination or length, may also occur among consonant sounds.
• Sounds /b, ɡ/ are pronounced as voiced stops [b, ɡ], but are also heard as fricatives [β, ɣ] in intervocalic position.
• /r/ may have variation between a trill [r], a tap [ɾ], or a voiced stop [d] within vocabulary.
• Sounds /j, w/ are said to exist as a result of palatalization or labialization, but only in very few root words in word-initial position.

• Sounds /a, o/ are raised to [ʌ, o̝] within the environment of consonant length.^[2]