Drehu language

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Drehu
Spoken in: Lifou, New Caledonia
Total speakers: 11,338 (1996 census)
Language family: Austronesian
 Malayo-Polynesian
  Central-Eastern
   Eastern
    Oceanic
     Central-Eastern
      Remote
       Loyalty Islands
        Drehu
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: map
ISO 639-3: dhv
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Drehu ([ɖehu]; also known as Dehu[1], Lifou[2], Lifu[3], qene drehu[4]) is an Austronesian language mostly spoken on Lifou Island, Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia. It has about twelve-thousand fluent speakers and the status of a French regional language. This status means that pupils can take it as an optional topic for the baccalauréat in New Caledonia itself or French mainland[5]. It has been also taught at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO) in Paris since 1973 and at the University of New Caledonia since 2000. As for other Kanak languages, Drehu is now regulated by the "Académie des langues kanak", officially founded in 2007.

There is also a respective register in Drehu, called qene miny[6]. In time past, this was used to speak to the chiefs (joxu). Today very few people still know and practice this language.

Contents

[edit] Phonology

[edit] Vowels

Front Central Back
High i iː u uː
Mid e eː ø øː o oː
Open æ æː ɑ ɑː

[edit] Consonants

Bilabial Labiodental Dental Alveolar Retroflex Alveopalatal Velar Glottal
Stops and
affricates		 Voiceless p t ʈ ʧ k
Voiced (b) d ɖ (ʤ) ɡ
Nasals Voiceless m̥ n̥ ɲ̊ ŋ̊
Voiced m n ɲ ŋ
Fricatives Voiceless f θ s x h
Voiced (v) ð z
Laterals Voiceless l̥
Voiced l
Semivowels Voiceless ʍ
Voiced w

/b ʤ v/ occur only in loanwords.

[edit] Writing system

Drehu was first written in the Latin alphabet by the Polynesian[7] and English missionaries of the London Missionary Society during the 1840s, with the help of the natives. The first complete Bible was published in 1890. The bible writing system didn't distinguish between the dental (written "d", "t") and the alveolar/retroflex ("dr" and "tr") consonants, which for a long time were written indifferently "d" and "t". In drehu θ and ð are not dental but interdental consonants. The new writing system was created during the 1970s.

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Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion.


[edit] Grammar

[edit] Personal pronouns

Singular

  • Eni/ni : I, me
  • Eö/ö : you
  • Nyipë/nyipëti : you (a polite form of address to a chief (joxu)or an older man)
  • Nyipo/nyipot(i) : you (a polite form of address to an older woman)
  • Angeic(e) : he, him, she
  • Nyidrë/nyidrët(i) : he, him (a polite form of address to a chief (joxu)or an older man)
  • Nyidro/nyidrot(i) : you (a polite form of address to an older woman)
  • Ej(e) : it

Dual

  • Eaho/ho : we two (exclusive)
  • Easho/sho (easo/so) : we two (inclusive)
  • Epon(i)/pon(i) : you two
  • Eahlo : they two
  • Lue ej(e) : they two for things and animals

Plural

  • Eahun(i)/hun(i) : we, us (exclusive)
  • Eashë/shë, easë/së : we all, all of us (inclusive)
  • Epun(i)/pun(i) : you
  • Angaatr(e) : they, them
  • Itre ej(e) : they , them (for things and animals)

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ In missionary time
  2. ^ In french
  3. ^ In english
  4. ^ Qene means language (literally "qe" : mouth, "ne" : of)
  5. ^ Only five of the twenty-eight Kanak languages (in the 1999 Rapport Cerquilini or 40 according to the Académie des langues kanak) have this status: Drehu (island of Lifou), Nengone (island of Maré), A'jië (around Houaïlou), Paicĩ (around Poindimié) and Xaracuu (around Canala and Thio).
  6. ^ As Maurice Leenhardt did ("Langues et dialectes de l'Austro Mélanésie" (1946), the Académie considers qene miny not only as a respective register but also a distinct language
  7. ^ Most were from the Cook Islands.

[edit] Bibliography

  • (French) (1882) Notes Grammaticales sur la langue de Lifu (Loyaltys). 
  • (English) Ray, Sidney H. (Jul.–Dec. 1917). "The People and Language of Lifu, Loyalty Islands". The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland 47: 239–322. doi:10.2307/2843343. 
  • (English) Walsh, D. T. (1967). Dehu Grammar. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. 
  • (French) Le drehu, langue de Lifou (Iles Loyauté): phonologie, morphologie, syntaxe. ISBN 2-85297-142-9
  • (French) Maurice Lenormand, Dictionnaire de la langue de Lifou. Le Qene Drehu, 1999, Nouméa, Le Rocher-à-la-Voile, 533p

[edit] External links

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