Huon languages

The Huon languages are a family within the original Trans–New Guinea (TNG) proposal, and William Foley considers their TNG identity to be established. They share with the Finisterre languages verbs which are suppletive depending on the person & number of the object, strong morphological evidence that they are related.

Internal structure

Huon and Finisterre, and then the connection between them, were identified by Kenneth McElhanon (1967, 1970). They are clearly valid language families. However, their internal classification is difficult. Below is the classification of the 16th edition of Ethnologue, which follows McElhanon (1975).

• Huon family
  • Kovai language
  • Eastern Huon branch: Dedua, Kube, Kâte, Borong (Kosorong), Mape, Migabac, Momare, Sene
  • Western Huon branch: Burum (Mindik), Kinalakna, Komba, Kumokio, Mese, Nabak, Nomu, Ono, Sialum, Selepet, Timbe, Tobo

Kâte is the local lingua franca.

References

• Ross, Malcolm (2005). "Pronouns as a preliminary diagnostic for grouping Papuan languages". In Andrew Pawley, Robert Attenborough, Robin Hide, Jack Golson, eds. Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan-speaking peoples. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 15–66. ISBN 0858835622. OCLC 67292782.