| West Makian | |
|---|---|
| Jitine,Moi | |
| Native to | Indonesia |
| Region | Western part ofMakian island and much ofKayoa. |
| Ethnicity | Makian (Jitine) |
Native speakers | (12,000 cited 1977)[1] |
West Papuan?
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | mqs |
| Glottolog | west2600 |
| ELP | Moi (Maluku, Indonesia) |
West Makian (also known by theendonymJitine[2] orMoi[3]: 104 ) is a divergentNorth Halmahera language of Indonesia. It is spoken on the coast nearMakian Island, and on the western half of that island.
West Makian has been strongly influenced by a neighboringAustronesian language or languages to the extent that it was once classified as Austronesian, asEast Makian (Taba) still is. As a family-level isolate, it is not closely related to any other language.[4][5] A brief description of the language can be found in Voorhoeve (1982). Much influence comes from Taba, as well asMalay,Ternate,Dutch, and potentiallyPortuguese.[1]
West Makian has 5 or 6 vowels: /a, e, ə, i, o/, and /u/,[1] with /ə/ not recorded by Watuseke.[6] Voorhoeve states that /ə/ is only found inIndonesian loans.
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Mid | e | ə | o |
| Open | a |
| Bilabial | Dental | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n̪ | (ɲ) | ŋ | ||
| Plosive | voiceless | p | t̪ | c | k | |
| voiced | b | d̪ | ɟ | g | ||
| Fricative | ɸ | h | ||||
| Approximant | l̪ | |||||
| Trill | r̪ | |||||
/ɲ/ is found almost exclusively in Indonesian loanwords. The only original Moi word with /ɲ/ is /miɲe/ - 'one.'
Consonant clusters are found almost entirely in the middle of words, with a few occurring word-initially during continuous speech. The majority of words have stress on the penultimate syllable, with a few having it on the syllable before or the last syllable. Stress is primarily phonemic.
There are two types of sentence intonation so far observed. One involves the tone rising sharply then sometimes falling again, a pattern used in emphatic imperatives and sometimes in questions. The other pattern is a sharp drop at the end of the sentence, used for declarative sentences and non-emphatic imperatives.
West Makian makes use ofregressivevowel harmony,[1] which affects the vowels of severalprefixes, thepossessive marker, and apreposition. Specifically, they affect the prefixesfa-,ma-, andfala-; theverbal subject prefixesta-,na-,ma-,fa-, andda-; the possessive markerda, and thelative,ablative, andlocative prepositionta.
In general, for an elementCV (consonant-vowel) the pattern is as follows:
| the form | precedes initial | example |
|---|---|---|
| Ca- | (C)a | fV- + abo =faabo fV- + dadi =fadadi |
| Ce- | (C)e | tV- + bebe =tebebe |
| Ce- | Ci | dV + pigir =de pigir |
| Ci- | i | tV- + i =tii |
| Co- | (C)o, (C)u | dV- + co =doco |
However, there are many exceptions. The stative verbgei ("to be dead") takes prefixesfa- (fagei, "to kill") andma- (magei, "to die") instead of the expectedfe- andme-. The directional verbs (naso "to go to",no "to come", etc.) and the verbam ("to eat") take only verbal prefixes of the formCi (tiam "I eat",minaso "we go to", etc.). Stative verbs are identical to directionals in terms of verbal prefixes, with the exception of the 3rd person singular, which isi- for inanimates andma- (no vowel harmony) for animates. Additionally, in theimperative, the 2nd singular (nV-) and 2nd plural (fV-) prefixes simply assimilate to the next vowel: the verbuba ("carry") producesnuuba ("you carry it!"),fuuba ("you all carry it!").