/p/ has two allophones:[pʷ] syllable initially and[p̚] syllable finally.[3]
/t̪/ has two allophones:[t̪] syllable initially and[t̪]~[t̪͆] syllable finally.[4]
/k/ has two allophones:[k] syllable initially and[k]~[k̚]~[kʰ] syllable finally.[4]
Voiced stops/b/[bʷ],/d/, and/g/ only occur syllable initially. Plain and prenasalized voiced stops (i.e.,[ᵐbʷ],[ⁿd],[ᵑg]) are in free variation word initially. Voiced stops are nasalized word-medially between vowels and after non-nasal consonants.[ɖ], a "voiced alveolar slightly retroflexed stop" is also heard word medially.[5]
Sursurunga is famous for having a five-waygrammatical number distinction. The numbers beside singular,dual, and plural have been calledtrial andquadral;[12] however, these numbers, which only occur on pronouns, indicate a minimum of three and four, not exactly three and four the way the dual indicates exactly two.[13] They are equivalent to "a few" and "several", and Corbett has called them(lesser)paucal andgreater paucal. The trial cannot be used fordyadic kinship terms, whereas the quadral is used for two or three such pair relationships.
^Hutchisson, Don (1986). "Sursurunga Pronouns and the Special Uses of Quadral Number". In Wiesemann, Ursula (ed.).Pronominal Systems. Tübingen: Gunter Narr. pp. 1–20.
Hutchisson, Don; Hutchisson, Sharon (1975)."A preliminary phonology of Sursurunga". In Loving, Richard (ed.).Phonologies of five Austronesian languages. Ukarumpa: Summer Institute of Linguistics. pp. 163–202.
