Enga language
| Enga | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Papua New Guinea |
| Region | Enga Province |
Native speakers | 230,000 (2000 census)[1] |
Trans–New Guinea
| |
| Latin script | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | enq |
| Glottolog | enga1252 |
Enga is a language of the East New Guinea Highlands spoken by a quarter-million people in Enga Province, Papua New Guinea. It has the largest number of speakers of any Trans–New Guinea language, as well as any native language in New Guinea, and is second over all after Papuan Malay.
| Arafundi-Enga Pidgin | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Papua New Guinea |
| Region | Enga Province |
Native speakers | None |
Enga-based pidgin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | enq |
| Glottolog | araf1245 |
An Enga-based pidgin is used by speakers of Arafundi languages.
Population[edit]
There are currently over 150,000 Enga people occupying the mountainous region ranging from Mount Hagen and westward to Porgera. Enga people are traditionally sedentary gardeners who grow sweet potatoes as their staple crop, and who keep pigs and fowls. Coffee and pyrethrum are also grown as cash crops in Enga culture. Pigs, pearls, shells, axes, and plumes are items of wealth and signify social occasions when exchanged or circulated. Enga clans have boundaries defining their homesteads across the territory and have been known to fight with each other over land, marriage exchanges, or vengeance. Men and women traditionally occupy different homes because Enga myths postulate that women may be unclean and dangerous to men. [2] Enga society is not organised around a single chief or headman, rather it is wealthy men who have political and administrative control. [3]
Phonology[edit]
Vowel sounds include /i e ɑ o u/.
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stop | voiceless | p | t | k | ||
| prenasalized | ᵐb | ⁿd | ᵑɡ | |||
| Affricate | voiceless | t͡s ~ s | ||||
| prenasalized | ⁿd͡z | |||||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | ||
| Flap | ɽ | |||||
| Approximant | plain | j | w | |||
| lateral | ʎ | |||||
/k/ is pronounced as fricative [x] between low and back vowels. /t/ is pronounced as [r] intervocalically. /ts/ may also be realised as [s]. All final vowels are devoiced. Alveolar stops /t, ⁿd/ may be realised as retroflex [ʈ, ᶯɖ].[4][5]
The Enga alphabet includes 21 different letters, only two of which not being in the English alphabet.
Word classes[edit]
Nouns[edit]
Enga nouns co-occur with modifiers dóko and méndé as the and a, some, or else, which play a role in the noun class system of the language. [2]
Akáli
man
dóko
the
epe-ly-á-mo.
come-PRES
The man is coming.
Akáli
man
méndé
a
epe-ly-á-mo.
come-PRES
A man is coming.
Noun classes in Enga appear to be cued primarily through syntactic patterns. The classes denote animates, inanimates, body parts locationals, events, colors, inner states, and other minor classes. Nouns may also be inflected for cases such as agentive AG , instrumental INST, possessive POSS, locative LOC, and temporal. In the chart below it shows the case distribution and the noun classes in relation to one another. [2]
| Noun Class | DET
dóko or méndé |
AG | POSS | INST | LOC |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| animate | dóko/méndé | x | x | ||
| animate
(pronoun) |
x | x | |||
| animate
(body part) |
dóko/méndé | x | x | ||
| animate
(artifacts) |
dóko/méndé | x | x | ||
| location | x | ||||
| events | dóko/méndé | ||||
| color | dóko/méndé | ||||
| inner state | x |
Animates can occur in different subclasses such as proper names. Some examples of animates can include takánge (father), endángi (mother), Aluá (a man's name), Pasóne (a woman's name), or mená (pig). All of which would include a determiner being either demonstrative or indefinite and can be with the agentive or possessive cases, but not used instrumentally or locative.
Body parts are in the animate class and can include words like kíngi (arm), pungí (liver), and yanúngí (skin, body). These differ from the previous classes in which they may have a determiner occur either instrumentally or locative, but not in the agentive or possessive cases. Location nouns are used to determine the place. These words can include kákasa (bush), Wápaka (Wabag- a place), or Lakáipa (Lagaipa- a river). This class only uses a determiner in the location case and nothing else.[2]
The noun morphology of Enga is an exclusively suffixing language. These suffixes are generally the last member of the noun phrase, being either the determiner or the adjective. This expresses the inflectional categories of the noun such as tense, aspect, person, number, gender or mood. The suffixes can be broken down into two main groups: case suffixes and others. Case suffixes are exclusively expressed in noun and noun phrases while other suffixes can be on either noun and noun phrases or verb and verb phrases.[3] Enga differentiates nouns from noun phrases though the case endings. There are seven different cases in which these are formally marked: associative -pa (only two)/ -pipa (two or more), agentive -me/-mi, instrumental -me/mi, possessive -nya, locative -nya/-sa/-ka, temporal -sa/-nya/-pa, and vocative -oo.[3] Other suffixes, besides case suffixes, are broken into six different categories and occur only on nouns. There is the conjunctive suffix -pi meaning 'and' or 'even', two different suffixes -le meaning 'rather' or -yalé 'like' to indicate similarity, two different suffixes -mba 'very' or an argumentative -mba to indicate emphasis or contrast.[3] These two forms of -mba differ in meaning as well as tone. When it is used in a argumentative sense it is said with a higher tone than previous syllables versus when it is used to emphasize.
Although it includes conjunctive suffixes, Enga does not actually include any conjunction words such as 'and' other than pánde 'or'. Instead those conjunctive suffixes are used to combine the noun or noun phrase with all the noun phrases and then typically followed by the determiner.[3]
Pronouns[edit]
Enga pronouns stand out morphosyntactically but can vary from dialects:
- nambá I
- émba you
- baá he, she, it
- nalímba we two
- nyalámbo you two
- dolápo they two
- náima we plural
- nyakáma you plural
- dúpa they plural
These pronouns are similar to animates in that determiners may occur in agentive, and possessive cases, but not used instrumentally or locative.
Morphosyntax[edit]
Enga verbs play a central role in the syntax of the language, showing highly complex morphology.[3] Enga is a mostly suffixing language. The basic word order is SOV.
Akáli
man
dokó-mé
DET-AG
mená
pig
dóko
DET
p-í-á.y
hit-PAST
The man hit the pig.
Enga verbs convey ideas such subordination or coordination which in Indo-European languages are often cued via syntactic means (conjunctions such as ‘and’, or ‘because’, etc.). Enga verbs also express different types of modality, such as ability, possibility, or need, as well as interrogation via suffixes (i.e. -pe/-pi):
Akáli
man
dokó-mé
DET-AG
mená
pig
dóko
DET
p-i-á-pe?
hit-PAST
Did the man hit the pig?
Verbal inflection[edit]
Enga verbs inflect for person, number, and tense-aspect. There are five different tense-aspect categories and three grammatical numbers in Enga. Tense-aspects include a future tense, a present tense, and three different past tenses. The numbers are singular, plural, and dual (expressed via the prefix na-).
Tense-aspect-mood[edit]
The immediate past refers to actions that occurred within the day. The near past refers to actions that occurred the previous day, a time in which the speaker does not recall, or a time before the previous day but is intending on comparing it to other events in the past. Finally, the far past refers to actions that occurred before the previous day.[3] I
The suffix i-la indicates consecutiveness between sentences with the same subject. Finally, the -pa marker conjoins sentences with different subjects but still contain consecutiveness.
Baa-mé
he-AG
kalái
work
pé-ta-la
do-COM-LA
yólé
wage
ny-í-á.
get-PAST
Having done the work, he received his wage. Unknown glossing abbreviation(s) (help);
Coordination[edit]
In sentences that express two different subjects or two different actions collectively, so that a sentence such as ‘he went and worked’ would be expressed in Enga via a coordinating suffix (-o) on the first verb:
Baá
he
p-é-á.
go-PAST.
Baa-mé
he-AG
kalái
work
p-i-á.
do-PAST.
He went. He worked.
The suffix -o (allophone -u in verbs with high vowels) also expresses actions originating, existing, or happening during the same period of time.
Baa-mé
she-AG
andá-ka
house-LOC
pitu-ú
sit-O
kalái
work
pi-ly-a-mó.
do-PRES
She is working while she is sitting in the house.
Namba-mé
I-AG
meé
for no reason
pyó-o
do-O
kat-e-ó-pa
stand-PAST-TEMP
baa-mé
he-AG
kalái
work
andáke
big
p-i-á.
do-PAST
While I was doing nothing he did a lot of work.
Or
I did nothing and then he did a lot of work.[3]
There are two different causal suffixes -pa and -sa. When the verb ends in a suffixed vowel regarding the past, these two suffixes are added together to fully conjugate the verb.
Baá-mé
he-AG
kalái
work
pyá-a
do-INF
ná-ep-e-a-mo-pa
NEG-come-PAST-CAUS
nambá
I
tánge-me
sefl-AG
kalái
work
ná-i-o.
NEG-do-PAST
Since he didn't come to work, I didn't work myself.
Namba-mé
I-AG
kalái
work
pyá-a
do-INF
ná-ep-e-o-pa/sa
NEG-come-PAS-CAUS
baá
he
tánge-me
self-AG
kalái
work
ná-p-i-a.
NEG-do-PAST
Since I didn't come to work, he didn't work himself.
Enga also includes conditional suffixes. These help distinguish what is considered 'real' conditions and 'irreal' conditions. A real condition is one in which real consequences can occur versus an irreal condition which denies the reality of the actions that are expressed as well as their consequences. To express a real conditional clause in the future tense the suffix -mo/-no are added to the verb with the addition of kandao dóko followed immediately after. For example when connecting the following two sentences:
Akáli
man
dóko
DET
p-é-á.
go-PAST
The man went.
and
Énda
woman
dóko
DET
p-á-a-mo.
go-PAST-AUG.
The woman went.
Together, as a conditional clause, it would form:
Akáli
man
dóko
DET
alémbo
day before yesterday
pá-t-a-mo
go-FUT-AUG
kanda-ó
see-O
dóko
DET
énda
woman
dóko
DET
wámba andípu
before today
p-á-a-mo.
go-PAST-AUG
If the man went the day before yesterday, then the woman went earlier today.
References[edit]
- ^ Enga at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ a b c d e Lang, Adrianne (1975). Semantics of Classificatory Verbs in Enga (And Other Papua New Guinea Languages). Linguistics Circle of Canberra. pp. 23–25. ISBN 978-0-85883-123-0.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Lang, Adrianne (1973). Enga Dictionary with English Index. Linguistic Circle of Canberra. pp. xi-xviii. ISBN 0858830930.
- ^ Organised Phonology Data: Enga Language [ENQ] Enga Province (PDF).
- ^ Hintze, O. C. (1975). A phonemic statement of Mai Enga. pp. 145–185.
External links[edit]
- Phonology of Enga
- A collection of open access recordings of Enga archived with Kaipuleohone.