Bunama language

Bunama
Native to	Papua New Guinea
Region	Milne Bay Province
Native speakers	(4,000 cited 1993) [1]
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Western Oceanic Papuan Tip Nuclear Papuan Tip North Papuan Mainland – D'Entrecasteaux Dobu–Duau Bunama
Language codes
ISO 639-3	bdd
Glottolog	buna1276

Bunama is an Austronesian language spoken in the D'Entrecasteaux Islands of Papua New Guinea.

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial		Dental/ Alveolar	Palatal	Velar		Glottal
		plain	lab.			plain	lab.	plain	lab.
Plosive	vless/asp.	p	pʷ	t̪ʰ				ʔ	ʔʷ
	voiced	b	bʷ	d		ɡ	ɡʷ
Fricative				s				h	hʷ
Nasal		m	mʷ	n
Lateral				ɺ
Approximant				j		w

• /p/ can fluctuate to aspirated [pʰ] in stressed syllables.
• /bdɡ/ can also be heard as [ᵐbⁿdᵑɡ] word-initially in stressed syllables.
• /b/ can be heard as a fricative [β] intervocalically in word-medial position.
• /d/ can be heard as a tap [ɾ] intervocalically in word-medial position.
• /s/ can be heard as a more fronted [s̪] in unstressed syllables following vowels /ɛ,a/.
• Prevoicing of the lateral flap [̬ɺ] may also occur in initial positions.
• /ɺ/ may also be heard as a retroflex flap [ɽ] depending on the dialect of the speaker. It can also be heard as [̬ɽ] when realized as prevoiced in word-initial positions.
• /w/ may fluctuate to a labio-dental [v] among some speakers.
• /j/ may be realized as a dental approximant [ð̞] when before /a/.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		ʊ
Mid	ɛ		o
Open		a

• /a/ is heard as [ɒ] before and after a labialized consonant, or with sounds /w/, /ʔ/. It is also heard as [ʌ] word-medially and word-finally in unstressed syllables.
• /ʊ/ is heard as [ʊ] word-medially and word-finally but never following labialized consonants, or semivowels /w,j/. It is heard as [u] when following sounds /st̪ʰ/.
• /o/ can be heard as [ɔ] when preceding a glottal stop /ʔ/. ^[2]

References

1. Bunama at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
2. Hughes, Ngaire; Leckie, Isabel (1976). Bunama Phonemics.