Tombonuwo language
Appearance
Tombonuo | |
---|---|
Lobu · Mutangar Tombonuo | |
Native to | Malaysia |
Region | Sabah |
Ethnicity | Tambanuo |
Native speakers | 10,000 (2000)[1] 3,000 Lingkabau (2003)[1] |
Dialects |
|
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | txa |
Glottolog | tomb1244 |
Tombonuwo (Tambonuo) is a Paitanic language spoken in the Pitas and Labuk-Sugut Districts of northwest Sabah, Malaysia.[2][3]
Consonants
[edit]Labial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Plosive | p b | t̪ | d | k g | ʔ | |
Fricative | s | |||||
Affricate | dʒ | |||||
Nasal | m | n | ŋ | |||
Lateral | l | |||||
Tap | ɾ | |||||
Semi-vowel | w | j |
The phonemes /p, t, k, s, ʔ/ are voiceless. All other expressions are voiced.
Vowels
[edit]Front | Back | |
---|---|---|
High | i | u |
Non-high | a | o |
/o/ is often pronounced as unrounded [ʌ].
/a/ is neutralized to [ʌ] in a pre-stressed syllable.
Morphology
[edit]Focus
[edit]Sabahan languages are characterized by "focus" morphology, which marks a syntactic relationship between the predicate of a clause and the "focused" noun phrase of the clause[5] (see Austronesian alignment).
Tombonuwo has four focus categories, conventionally labelled "actor", "patient", "referent" and "theme".[6] Focus is marked by affixation on the verb.
- Actor: -um- / m(u)-
- Patient: -on (Present tense) / -∅ (Past tense)
- Referent: -an
- Theme: i-
The only marked tense in Tombonuwo is past tense.
- Past tense: n- (-in-)
- Stative: o-
- Perfective: ko-
- Non-volitional past tense: n-o-
- Accomplishment: n-o-ko-
- Near the speaker: itu
- Far from the speaker: iri
- Medium distance from the speaker: ono
References
[edit]- ^ a b Tombonuo at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ King, Julie (1984). The Paitanic language family. Canberra: Australian National University. pp. 146. ISBN 0858832976.
{{cite book}}
:|work=
ignored (help) - ^ Lobel, Jason William (2013). Philippine and North Bornean languages: issues in description, subgrouping and reconstruction (PDF) (PHD dissertation). Manoa: University of Hawai'i. p. 370.
- ^ King, John Wayne (1993). Tombonuwo phonemics. Kota Kinabalu: Sabah Museum. pp. 97–106. ISBN 9789839638059.
{{cite book}}
:|work=
ignored (help) - ^ Boutin, Michael (1988). Problems in analyzing focus in the languages of Sabah. Dallas: SIL. p. 54. ISBN 0883122146.
{{cite book}}
:|work=
ignored (help) - ^ a b c King, John Wayne; Levinsohn, Stephen (1991). Participant reference in Tombonuo. Canberra: Australian National University. p. 76. ISBN 0-85883-406-5.
{{cite book}}
:|work=
ignored (help)