Porapora languages

Porapora River
core Grass Porapora River
Geographic distribution	East Sepik Province and Madang Province, Papua New Guinea
Linguistic classification	Ramu Ramu proper Tamolan–Ataitan Porapora River
Subdivisions	Gorovu Adjora
Language codes
Glottolog	agoa1234

The Porapora languages (alternatively the core Grass or Porapora River languages) are a pair of closely related languages in the Ramu language family, Gorovu and Adjora (Abu), spoken along the border of East Sepik Province and Madang Province in Papua New Guinea. Foley classifies them as part of the Grass group of languages, but Usher break up the Grass languages. Foley (2018) included Aion (Ambakich) as well, ^[1] but it has since been shown to be one of the Keram languages.

Phonemes

Usher (2020) reconstructs the consonant inventory as follows: ^[2]

*m	*n		*ŋ
*p	*t	*s	*k
*mb	*nd	[*ndz]	*ŋg
*w	*ɾ	*j	*ɣ

Vowels are *i *ʉ *u *a.

Pronouns

Usher (2020) reconstructs the pronouns as: ^[2]

	singular	dual	plural
1st person	*[ŋg]u	*aŋgʉ	*ani
2nd person	*ŋu	*uŋgʉ	*uni
3rd person	*mV	?	*mV-nʉ

Adjora has 1SGna, but that derives from an oblique form.

References

1. Foley, William A. (2018). "The Languages of the Sepik-Ramu Basin and Environs". In Palmer, Bill (ed.). The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area: A Comprehensive Guide. The World of Linguistics. Vol. 4. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 197–432. ISBN   978-3-11-028642-7.
2. New Guinea World, Porapora River

External links

• Timothy Usher, New Guinea World, Proto–Porapora River