Sawai_language

Sawai language

Sawai language

Austronesian language spoken in North Maluku, Indonesia

The Sawai language (also Weda) is a South Halmahera language of the Austronesian language family spoken in the Weda and Gane Timor districts of southern Halmahera, northern Maluku Province, Indonesia. There are approximately 12,000 speakers.

Quick Facts Native to, Region ...

Sounds

Below is a description of the Kobe dialect of Sawai spoken in the villages of Lelilef Woyebulan and Kobe Peplis, as well as from Whistler (1995).

Consonants

Sawai has 15 consonants:

More information Labial, Alveolar ...

Vowels

Sawai has eight vowels:

More information Front, Central ...

Syllable

Sawai has the following syllable structure:

(C)(C)V(C)

Examples:

More information word, gloss ...

References

  1. [1]
    Sawai at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

Bibliography

  • Burquest, Donald A.; & Laidig, Wyn D. (Eds.). (1992). Phonological studies in four languages of Maluku. The Summer Institute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington publications in linguistics (No. 108). Dallas: The Summer Institute of Linguistics, The University of Texas at Arlington, and Pattimura University. ISBN 0-88312-803-9.
  • Whistler, Ronald. (1992). Phonology of Sawai. In D. A. Burquest & W. D. Laidig (Eds.), Phonological studies in four languages of Maluku (pp. 7–32). Dallas: The Summer Institute of Linguistics, The University of Texas at Arlington, and Pattimura University.
  • Whistler, Ronald; & Whistler, Jacqui. (1995). Sawai: Introduction and wordlist. In D. T. Tryon (Ed.), Comparative Austronesian dictionary: An introduction to Austronesian studies (part 1: fascicle 1, pp. 659–65). Trends in linguistics, Documentation (No. 10). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
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