Olrat language
Not to be confused with OLRAT.
| Olrat | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Vanuatu |
| Region | Gaua |
Native speakers | 3 (2012)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
olr |
| Glottolog | None |
Olrat is a moribund Oceanic language spoken on Gaua island in Vanuatu.
The three remaining speakers of Olrat live on the middle-west coast of Gaua.[2] They merged into the larger village of Jōlap where Lakon is dominant, after they left their inland hamlet of Olrat in the first half of the 20th century.[1]
Alexandre François identifies Olrat as a distinct language from its immediate neighbor Lakon, on phonological,[3] grammatical,[4] and lexical[5] grounds.
Phonology
Olrat has 14 phonemic vowels. These include 7 short /i ɪ ɛ a ɔ ʊ u/ and 7 long vowels /iː ɪː ɛː aː ɔː ʊː uː/.[6]
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Near-close | i ∙ iː | u ∙ uː | |
| Close-mid | ɪ ∙ ɪː | ʊ ∙ ʊː | |
| Open-mid | ɛ ∙ ɛː | ɔ ∙ ɔː | |
| Open | a ∙ aː |
Historically, the phonologization of vowel length originates in the compensatory lengthening of short vowels when the voiced velar fricative /ɣ/ was lost syllable-finally.[7]
References
Bibliography
- François, Alexandre (2005), "Unraveling the History of the Vowels of Seventeen Northern Vanuatu Languages", Oceanic Linguistics 44 (2): 443–504, doi:10.1353/ol.2005.0034
- François, Alexandre (2007), "Noun articles in Torres and Banks languages: Conservation and innovation", in Siegel, Jeff; Lynch, John; Eades, Diana, Language Description, History and Development: Linguistic indulgence in memory of Terry Crowley, Creole Language Library 30, Amsterdam: Benjamins, pp. 313–326
- François, Alexandre (2011), "Social ecology and language history in the northern Vanuatu linkage: A tale of divergence and convergence", Journal of Historical Linguistics 1 (2): 175–246, doi:10.1075/jhl.1.2.03fra.
- François, Alexandre (2012), "The dynamics of linguistic diversity: Egalitarian multilingualism and power imbalance among northern Vanuatu languages", International Journal of the Sociology of Language 214: 85–110, doi:10.1515/ijsl-2012-0022
External links
- Linguistic map of north Vanuatu, showing range of Olrat on Gaua.
- A book of traditional stories, monolingual in Olrat language (site of linguist A. François)
- Access to audio recordings in Olrat language (section of the Pangloss Collection of LACITO-CNRS)
- Petition to create ISO code for Olrat
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