This article includes a list ofgeneral references, butit lacks sufficient correspondinginline citations. Please help toimprove this article byintroducing more precise citations.(August 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Bunak
Native to	Indonesia,East Timor
Region	centralTimor
Ethnicity	Bunak
Native speakers	76,000 (2010)[1]
Language family	Trans–New Guinea ? Berau Gulf West Bomberai[2] Timor–Alor–Pantar Bunak
Official status
Recognised minority language in	East Timor
Language codes
ISO 639-3	bfn
Glottolog	buna1278
ELP	Bunak
Distribution of Bunak in East Timor (West Timor not shown)

TheBunak language (also known asBunaq,Buna',Bunake, pronounced[bunaʔ]) is the language of theBunak people of the mountainous region of centralTimor, split between the political boundary betweenWest Timor,Indonesia, particularly in Lamaknen District andEast Timor. It is one of the few on Timor which is not anAustronesian language, but rather aPapuan language of theTimor–Alor–Pantar language family. The language is surrounded byMalayo-Polynesian languages, likeUab Meto andTetum.

Bunak distinguishes between animate and inanimate noun classes.^[3]

• Plosive sounds /p t k/ can be heard as unreleased allophones [p̚ t̚ k̚], in word-final position.

• Sounds /b d ɡ/ can be heard as [β r ɣ] in intervocalic positions.

• /ɡ/ can be heard as [dʒ] when preceding /i/.

• /z/ can have allophones [ʒ dʒ] in free variation.

• /tʃ/ is heard as [s] when preceding /i/.

• /l/ in word-final position can also be heard as a fricative [ɬ] in free variation.^[4]

Pronouns seem to tie Bunak more closely to theAlor–Pantar languages, in a group Ross (2005) calls "West Timor", than with the PapuanEast Timor languages. The independent pronouns and object prefixes, which appear to retain the proto-Trans–New Guinea dual suffix *-li, are as follows:

• Schapper, Antoinette (2009).Bunaq: A Papuan Language of Central Timor (Ph.D. thesis). Australian National University.doi:10.25911/5d611d87406d0.hdl:1885/150147.
• Schapper, Antoinette (2011a)."Crossing the border: Historical and linguistic divides among the Bunaq in central Timor".Wacana, Journal of the Humanities of Indonesia.13 (1):29–49.doi:10.17510/wjhi.v13i1.8.
• Schapper, Antoinette (2011b). "Finding Bunaq: The homeland and expansion of the Bunaq in central Timor". In McWilliam, Andrew; Traube, Elizabeth G. (eds.).Land and Life in Timor-Leste: Ethnographic Essays. ANU Press.doi:10.22459/lltl.12.2011.08.ISBN 978-1-921862-59-5.
• Schapper, Antoinette (2022).A Grammar of Bunaq. Mouton Grammar Library. Vol. 86. Mouton deGruyter.ISBN 9783110714500.

• ELAR archive ofZapal, an oral literature genre of the Bunaq Lamaknen
• Timothy Usher, New Guinea World,Bunaq

ThisTimor-Leste–related article is astub. You can help Wikipedia byexpanding it.

• v
• t
• e

This article aboutTrans–New Guinea languages is astub. You can help Wikipedia byexpanding it.

• v
• t
• e

• Languages of Indonesia
• Languages of Timor-Leste
• Timor–Alor–Pantar languages
• Timor-Leste stubs
• Trans–New Guinea language stubs

• Pages containing links to subscription-only content
• Language articles citing Ethnologue 18
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles lacking in-text citations from August 2024
• All articles lacking in-text citations
• Pages with plain IPA
• All stub articles