Kwomtari language


Kwomtari is the eponymous language of the Kwomtari family of Papua New Guinea.
Spencer is a short grammar of Kwomtari. The language has an SOV constituent order and nominative–accusative alignment. Both subjects and objects are marked suffixally on the verb. Verbs are inflected for status rather than for tense or aspect.

Locations

Ethnologue lists Kwomtari as spoken in six villages in Komtari ward, Amanab Rural LLG, Sandaun Province.
Baron lists Kwomtari-speaking villages as Mango, Kwomtari, Baiberi, Yenabi, Yau'uri, and Wagroni.

Phonology

BilabialAlveolarRetroflexVelar
Stop
Nasal
Fricative
Trill
Lateral

The phoneme is realized as a voiced bilabial fricative intervocalically and voiceless bilabial fricative elsewhere. The realization of the phoneme is in free variation between a voiced retroflex lateral and a voiced retroflex stop.
FrontCentralBack
Close
Lowered Close
Mid
Open-Mid
Open

The unusual vowel phonemes and are of intermediate height between cardinal and respectively but without the centralization present in and. They have also been attested in Weri, a Goilalan language of south-east Papua, and certain Dani dialects.