Futunan language

Futunan
Faka futuna
Region Futuna Island, Wallis and Futuna and New Caledonia
Native speakers
 (6,600 cited 1986–1987)[1]
3,600 in Wallis and Futuna (2011)
Language codes
ISO 639-3 fud
Glottolog east2447[2]

Futunan or Futunian is the Polynesian language spoken on Futuna (and Alofi). The term East-Futunan is also used to distinguish it from the related West Futunan (Futuna-Aniwan) spoken on the outlier islands of Futuna and Aniwa in Vanuatu.

Ca. 1987, Fakafutuna was spoken by 3,600 on Futuna, as well as by some of the 3,000 migrant workers in New Caledonia.[1]

Phonology

Futunan has five vowels; a, e (/e/), i, o, u (/u/) which can be short or long. Long vowels are denoted by a macron: ā, ē, ī, ō, ū. Futunan has 11 consonants: 4 plosives (p, k, t and a glottal stop /ʔ/, noted by an apostrophe); 3 nasals m, n and g (/ŋ/) and 4 fricatives f, v, l and s[3]. /ŋ/ corresponds to the sound ng as in "parking".

The Futunan has a syllabic structure of CVCV type, which means that two consonants are necessarily separated by a vowel; The opposite is not true (examples: eio (yes), tauasu (meeting where one drinks kava), aua (particle of the negative imperative), etc.). Words end with a vowel.

References

  1. 1 2 Futunan at Ethnologue (16th ed., 2009)
  2. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "East Futuna". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  3. ↑ Moyse-Faurie, Claire (1993). Dictionnaire futunien-français avec index français-futunien. Peeter Selaf.


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