| Iwam | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spoken in | Sandaun Province | |||
| Native speakers | 3,000 (1998) | |||
| Language family |
Sepik
|
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| Language codes | ||||
| ISO 639-3 | iwm | |||
|
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Iwam or May River Iwam is a language of Papua New Guinea spoken in Sandaun Province.[1]
Contents |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Mid | e | ə | o |
| Open | a |
In non-final positions, /u/ /o/, /i/, and /e/ are [ʊ] [ɔ], [ɪ], and [ɛ], respectively. /ə/ appears only in nonfinal syllables. When adjacent to nasal consonants, vowels are nasalized; nasalization may also occur when adjacent to word boundaries.[2]
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | ||
| Plosive | p | t | k | ||
| Fricative | s | h | |||
| Flap | r | ||||
| Approximant | j | w |
/p/ and /k/ are voiced fricatives ([β] and [ɣ]) respectively) when intervocalic and unreleased when final (/t/ is also unreleased when final). /ŋ/ is a nasal flap ([ɾ̃]) word-initially and between vowels. /s/ is [ts] initially and may otherwise be palatalized [sʲ].[2] Sequences of any consonant and /w/ are neutralized before /u/ where an offglide is always heard.
Bilabial and velar consonants and /n/ may be followed by /w/ when initial. Other initial clusters include /pr/, /kr/, /hr/, /hw/, and /hn/ and final clusters are /w/ or /j/ followed by any consonant except for /h/ or /ŋ/.[2]