Tami language

Last updated
Tami
Native to Papua New Guinea
Region Morobe Province
Native speakers
2,100 (2010) [1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3 tmy
Glottolog tami1290

Tami is an Austronesian language on the Tami Islands and in a few villages at the tip of the Huon Peninsula in Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. It is not closely related to the other Huon Gulf languages, but like other North New Guinea languages in Morobe Province, its basic word order is SVO.

Contents

Phonology

Tami distinguishes five vowels (i, e, a, o, u) and the following consonants (Colich 1995). Voiced obstruents do not occur in syllable-final position, while glottal stop only occurs at the end of a syllable.

Bilabial Labiovelar Dental Alveopalatal Velar Glottal
Voiceless ppwtk-c [ʔ]
Voiced bbwdj [d͡ʒ]g
Prenasalized mbmbwndnjŋg
Nasal mmwnŋ
Fricative v [β]s
Liquid l
Approximant wy

Numerals

Traditional Tami counting practices begin with the fingers of the hands, then continue on the feet to reach twenty, which translates as 'whole person'. Higher numbers are multiples of 'whole person'. Nowadays, most counting above five is done in Tok Pisin. An alternate form of the numeral one, dan, functions as an indefinite article. Distributive numerals are formed via reduplication: lualu 'two by two', tolatol 'three by three' and so forth (Bamler 1900:204).

Numeral TermGloss
1te'one'
2lu'two'
3tol'three'
4pat'four'
5lim'five, hand'
6lim ma te'hand and one'
7lima ma lu'hand and two'
8lima ma tol'hand and three'
9lim ma pat'hand and four'
10limantalu'hands both'
20damo monte'person whole'

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References

Footnotes

  1. Tami at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)