Language name: |
YAWA |
UPSID number: |
8629 |
Alternate name(s): |
YAVA |
Classification: |
Papuan, Geelvink Bay |
This language has |
19 segments |
Its Frequency index is |
0.538335862 (average percentage of segments; 0.1: many very rare segments; 0.39: average; 0.7: many common segments) |
The language has these sounds: |
p
t
k
b
d
dZ
s
sJ
m
n
nJ
r[
j
w
i
"e
a
"o
u
|
Comment: |
Yawa is spoken on Yapen island, Irian Jaya, Indonesia. Stress placement is unpredictable. After /u/ the palato-alveolar affricate has the allophone [g]. Nasal + obstruent clusters occur but Jones (1986) reports that they are not homorganic if the obstruent is velar or palato-alveolar, and are phonetically heterosyllabic where intervocalic; hence, even initial cases are analyzed as sequences. Many two-vowel sequences occur. |
Source(s): |
Jones, L.K. 1986. Yawa phonology. Papers in New Guinea linguistics, no. 25, 1-30. Pacific Linguistics, Series A, No. 74. Australian National University, Canberra. |