Fuano
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| Fuano | |
|---|---|
| fuano, lan fuan | |
| Pronunciation | fwano |
| Created by | Jukethatbox |
| Date | 2024 |
| Native to | Fuano Island |
| Ethnicity | Fuano Creole people |
| Native speakers | 600,000 (2024) |
French-Spanish Creole
| |
| Official status | |
Official language in | Democratic Republic of Fuinoa |
Fuano[1] is a French and Spanish mixed language spoken natively on Fuano Island[2] by around 600,000 Fuanos.
Phonology
Consonants
| Bilabial/ Labiodental |
Alveolar | Postalveolar | Velar | Palatal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | p b | t d | k g | ||
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | ɲ | |
| Fricative | f v | s z | ʃ ʒ | x | |
| Approximant | w | l | j | ||
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Close-mid | e | o | |
| Open | a |
Sound changes
From French
/ʁ/ after a consonant becomes /w/ (borrowed from Haitian Creole)
- (fromage > fuomaj)
intervocalic /ʁ/ becomes /r/
- (fréro > fuero)
(applies to both spanish and french) /ʁ/ before a consonant is often deleted
- (barbu > babu)
/ʁ/ in any other position is usually deleted (apart from rue which becomes ru)
- (racine > asin)
/ə/ and /ø/ become /e/
- (feuilleté > feyte, œuf > efe)
/ɛ/ and /ɔ/ merɡe with /e/ and /o/, /wa/ becomes /we/
- (forêt > fore, soirée > suere)
From Spanish
/oj/ becomes /uj/
- (estoy > estuy, doy > duy, soy is an exception and remains the same)
/tra/ becomes /ta/ (trabajo > tabaho > baho)
/v/ and /b/ merge, /θjon~sjon/ becomes /son/ (revolución > reboluson)
/ks/ becomes /ʃ/, /ʃs/ becomes /ʃ/ (contradicción > kontadixon)
(applies to both spanish and french) /r/ before a consonant is often deleted (barba > baba)
Grammar
Pronouns
Demonstrative
Fuano demonstrative pronouns are entirely inherited from Spanish, though the purposes of esto/eso and este/ese are swapped, while the distal demonstratives are entirely dropped.
| Masc. | Fem. | Neut. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Prox. | Sing. | esto | esta | este |
| Pl. | estos | estas | estes | |
| Medial | Sing. | eso | esa | ese |
| Pl. | esos | esas | eses | |
Personal
| Person | Singular | Plural | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| nom. | acc. | gen. | nom. | acc. | gen. | |
| 1. | yo | me | ma | nos | nu | notue |
| 2. | tu | tue | ta | vos | vu | votue |
| Masc. | el | lue | su | os | luere | |
| Neut. | iel | |||||
| Fem. | ea | eya | (as) | (luare) | ||
as and luare are bracketed to show that they are rarely used even in appropriate context. For example, though it would be grammatically correct to refer to a group of women or girls as as, a native speaker is realistically more likely to still refer them to as os out of convention.
vos holds the same purpose as French vous, in which it simultaneously acts as a plural and a formal second-person pronoun.
iel is a more modern pronoun borrowed from French to act as a gender neutral singular pronoun, similar to singular they in English. However, unlike its country of origin of France, iel has been widely embraced in common speech in Fuano, even by older native speakers.
The accusative forms are also used as vocative forms, as in Y lue, k'el pansa? "And him, what does he think?"
The genitive forms can also be used as dative forms when placed after the noun, e.g. don la luere mesa "give their table" vs don la mesa luere "give the table to them"