| Mamanwa | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Philippines |
| Region | Agusan del Norte andSurigao provinces,Mindanao |
Native speakers | (5,200 cited 1990 census)[1] |
| Latin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | mmn |
| Glottolog | mama1275 |
TheMamanwa language is aCentral Philippine language spoken by theMamanwa people. It is spoken in the provinces ofAgusan del Norte andSurigao del Norte in theLake Mainit area ofMindanao,Philippines. It had about 5,000 speakers in 1990.
Mamanwa is a grammatically conservative language, retaining a three-way deictic distinction in its articles which elsewhere is only preserved in some of theBatanic languages.[2][3]
Before the arrival of Mamanwa speakers in centralSamar Island, there had been an earlier group ofNegritos on the island.[4] According toLobel (2013), the Samar Agta may have switched toWaray or Northern Samarenyo, or possibly even Mamanwa.
In addition to this, Francisco Combes, a Spanish friar, had observed the presence of Negritos in theZamboanga Peninsula "in theMisamis strip" in 1645, although no linguistic data had ever been collected.[5] The traditional Mamanwas believe in Tahaw as their supreme deity who is given prayers of supplications and petitions, as well as True, a deity of the forest and herder of hunting animals.[6]
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | |||
| Plosive | voiceless | p | t | k | ʔ | |
| voiced | b | d | ɡ | |||
| Fricative | voiceless | s | h | |||
| voiced | z | |||||
| Trill | r | |||||
| Lateral | l | |||||
| Approximant | w | j | ||||
/r/ can be heard as a flap [ɾ] or a trill [r] in free variation.
/z/ may also be heard as [ʒ] in free variation, and even as [dʒ] when occurring after /d/ or in free variation with the allophone [ʒ].
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | ɨ | |
| Mid | o | ||
| Open | a |
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