| Namia | |
| States: | Papua New Guinea |
| Region: | Namea Rural LLG in Sandaun Province; East Sepik Province |
| Speakers: | 6,000 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| Ref: | e18 |
| Familycolor: | Papuan |
| Fam1: | Sepik |
| Fam2: | Yellow River |
| Iso3: | nnm |
| Glotto: | nami1256 |
| Glottorefname: | Namia |
Namia (Namie, Nemia) is a Sepik language spoken in Namea Rural LLG, Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea. It goes by various names, such as Edawapi, Lujere, Yellow River. Language use is "vigorous" (Ethnologue).
In Sandaun Province, it is spoken in Ameni (-3.9816°N 141.7662°W), Edwaki, Iwane (-3.9066°N 141.7554°W), Lawo, Pabei (-3.927°N 141.7763°W), and Panewai villages in Namea Rural LLG, and in the Wiyari area. It is also spoken in 19 villages of Yellow River District in East Sepik Province.[1] [2]
Namie dialect groups are:[3]
Namia has only 7 phonemic consonants:[4]
| Plosive | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | ||
| Tap | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| Lateral |
Some analyses present /tʃ/ as an eighth phoneme, although its distribution is predictable. [tʃ] and in some cases /r/ are positional variants of /t/, as described in the table below.
| Phones | Examples | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Attested | In variation | Unattested | |||
| [t], [l] | [t~r] |
| [tip] 'basket', [lip] 'ditch' | |
| _ # | [r], [l] |
| [er] 'we two', [el] 'woman' | ||
| [i u] _ | [tʃ], [r], [l] |
| [titʃei] 'stone', [irei] 'digging stick', [ilei] 'name' | ||
| [e ə o a] _ | [r], [l] |
| [ari] 'already', [alu] 'branch' | ||
| V _ C V | [r], [l] |
| [irno] 'face', [ilpok] 'storm front' | ||
| V C _ V | [r], [l], [t] |
| [amral] 'width', [amtou] 'red pandanus', [emomle] 'awaken' | ||
There are 6 vowels in Namia:
| Front | Central | Back | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Close | pronounced as /ink/ | |||
| Mid | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | |
| Open | pronounced as /ink/ |
Unlike other Sepik languages, Namia has an inclusive-exclusive distinction for the first-person pronoun, which could possibly be due to diffusion from Torricelli languages.[5] Inclusive-exclusive first-person pronominal distinctions are also found in the Yuat languages and Grass languages.
The following basic vocabulary words are from Foley (2005)[6] and Laycock (1968),[7] as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:[8]
| gloss | Namia | |
|---|---|---|
| head | magu | |
| ear | mak | |
| eye | eno | |
| nose | nəmala; nɨmala | |
| tooth | pinarɨ; pinarə | |
| tongue | lar | |
| leg | liː; lipala | |
| louse | nanpeu | |
| dog | ar; ara | |
| pig | lwae | |
| bird | eyu | |
| egg | puna | |
| blood | norə | |
| bone | lak | |
| skin | urarə | |
| breast | mu | |
| tree | mi | |
| man | lu | |
| woman | ere | |
| sun | wuluwa | |
| moon | yem | |
| water | ijo; ito | |
| fire | ipi | |
| stone | lijei | |
| name | ilei | |
| eat | (t) | |
| one | tipia | |
| two | pəli |
Languages of the World
. 22nd . Eberhard . David M. . Simons . Gary F. . Fennig . Charles D. . 2019 . Dallas . SIL International.