Kunesian

Erai Pe Andaidu tod te nok naito. Lino Berulan te nok naito ama ama Andaidu tod, wati tod dabai rêai.

There is a lot of dialectal variation, to the point that it is unclear whether Kunesian is one language or nine. In any case, this description focuses mostly on the standard variety which is based on the coastal dialects.

Phonology

Consonants

Broadly speaking, Kunesian has these consonants:

		Labial	Dental	Palatal	Velar	Uvular
Nasal		m	n		ŋ
Stop	Voiceless	p	t		k	q
	Voiced	b	d		g
Affricate	Voiceless		t͡s
	Voiced		d͡z	ɟ͡ʝ
Fricative		ɸ	s, θ, (ɬ)			/x~χ/
Approximant		β	(ð) l		ɰ
Rhotic			r			rʶ

The actual number of consonants is considerably larger as most of these "broad" consonant phonemes have several variants, also known as the "narrow" consonants. The exact inventory of narrow consonants varies considerably between different dialects, but in Standard Kunesian:

• Voiceless stops distinguish aspirated and non-aspirated variants word-initially.
• Every consonant except /q/, /ɟ͡ʝ/ and the rhotics has a palatalised version.
  • Voiceless stops, particularly the aspirated ones, become affricates when palatalised. These are transcribed as [p͡ç t͡ɕ c͡ç] respectively. /g/ also becomes and affricate and merges with /ɟ͡ʝ/.
  • The palatalised variants of /n/ and /ŋ/ merge as [ɲ].
  • The palatalised variants of /l/ and /ɰ/ are [ʎ] and [j] respectively.
• Like all other varieties of Kunesian, it does not have all three of /θ ð ɬ/, and like all coastal dialects, it merges /ɬ/ with /θ/ and /ð/ with /l/.
• Between vowels, the only rhotic is [ɾ].

Consonant clusters only appear between vowels. The following ones are possible:

• Nasal + stop. The nasal is always pronounced at the same POA as the following stop.
• /r/ + coronal consonant. These clusters are realised as retroflex consonants, often preceded by a faint [ɻ].
• [ɾχ] and its palatalised variant [ɾç].
• [st] and its palatalised variant [ɕt͡ɕ], which, especially in colloquial speech, is often realised as [ɕː].

Word finally, only the basic variants of /m n ŋ p t k q ɸ s θ ɬ x l/ appear. The word-final consonant which is realised as /x/ in Standard Kunesian is realised as a rhotic in some other varieties.

Vowels

In stressed syllables, the following monophthongs occur:

	Front		Cenral		Back
	Unrounded	Rounded		Unrounded		Rounded
Close	i	y ~ ʉ		ɨ ~ ɯ		u
Mid	ɛ ~ e	œ ~ ø		ʌ ~ ɤ		ɔ ~ o
Near-open	æ
Open	a

In addition, there are three stressed diphthongs: /aɨ̯/, /ei̯/ and /ɔɨ̯/.

In unstressed syllables, only /ɐ e ɨ ʊ/ and sometimes /əɨ̯/ occur. However, /əɨ̯/ merges with /ɨ/ for some speakers.

Supprasegmentals

Most Kunesian words are stressed on the first syllable, but a few are stressed on the second instead. The stressed syllable can have either a high or a low tone, and in addition each word may be pronounced with either modal or creaky voice. While phonation applies to a word as a whole, unstressed syllables tend to be pronounced with a medium tone regardless of what tone the stressed syllable has.

Orthography

Without twisting the truth too much, this can be called a mess.

Nouns

Classifying particles

Nouns may be followed by a classifying particle. In principle any noun may be used with any particle, though many combinations have lexicalised meanings, as is shown by the following examples:

• erai "word" > Erai Pe "Kunesian"
• abok "root" > abok itu "carrot"
• dsile "sky" > dsile nô "roof"

In addition, some nouns exclusively, or almost exclusively, occur with one particular particle, such as gâlo kem "poison", with just gâlo being ungrammatical outside the phrase gâlo nênte "to poison".

Plural

Plurals can be marked by the particle ti. Frequently it is combined with the classifier tai. Plural marking is not obligatory and is generally used either to stress that one is talking about a large group, or as a collective.

ti potrai tai
/t͡ɕí pʌ̀ʈɨ tʰáɨ̯/
PL house CL(many)
houses, many houses, a village

Relational particles

To indicate a noun's relationship to another one, Kunesian uses relational particles. Some of the most important relational particles and their uses are:

• li: possession, focus on possessed rather than possessor.
  • potrai mela li: the man's house
• du: possession, focus on possessor rather than possessed.
  • mela potrai du: the man who has a house
• me: the last noun is an important part of the first one.
  • potrai nipit me: house with books = library
• to: the last thing is located inside the first one.
  • mura rente to: a forest with monkeys
• kim: the first thing is inside the last.
  • rente mura kim: a monkey in the forest
• anku: the two nouns refer to the same.
  • mela kusto anku: the man who is a liar

Pronouns

Person	Singular	Plural
		Inclusive	Exclusive
1st	no, naik	ninke, lâm	bunai, pod
2nd	pas, paik	nili, paik
3rd	kai, te	enni, ten
4th	nuro	laite
All	tola
Some	kosse
No(ne)	pige
Interrogative	suk
Demonstrative	ama

When two forms are given, the first one is the subject form and the second one the object form.

The fourth person refers to things not mentioned earlier in the sentence, but only if there already is a third person. Compare:

No te tânku.
/nʌ́ t͡ɕé tà̰ŋkɨ/
1SG.SUBJ 3SG.OBJ hit
I hit him.

Kai te tânku.
/kʰáɨ̯ t͡ɕé tà̰ŋkɨ/
3SG.SUBJ 3SG.OBJ hit
He hits himself.

Kai nuro tânku.
/kʰáɨ̯ nɯ́ɾɐ tà̰ŋkɨ/
3SG.SUBJ 3SG hit
He hits him (someone else).

Verbs

The verbal complex consists of at least one verb and a number of particles which indicate tense, aspect, mood, evidentiality and the speaker's opinion. The general formula for the verb complex is:

• Evidentiality
• Tense/aspect I
• Verb root(s)
• Tense/aspect II
• Mood
• Speaker's opinion

Evidentiality

There are three evidential particles: akai (inferential), namai (belief; the word is identical to the word for "think") and palai (hearsay).

Ku naik jêtte mapot era. Te akai ne saiku ku.
/kɯ́ nɯ́k ɟ͡ʝèt͡ɕe mápɐt ǽɾɐ. t͡ɕé ákɨ ɲé sɔ́ɨ̯kʊ kɯ́/
NEG 1SG.OBJ bike find can / 3SG.OBJ INFER TEL steal PST
I can't find my bike. It must have been stolen.

Mura tod kai namai molas.
/mɯ́ɾɐ tʰʌ̀ kʰáɨ̯ námɨ mʌ́lɐs/
forest CL(place) 3SG.SUBJ think be
I think he's in the forest.

Rente tola ti pinokas lâm li palai ne peste ku.
/ræ̰̀nt͡ɕe tʰʌ́lɐ t͡ɕí p͡çɯ̰́kɐs làm ʎí pʰálɨ ɲé p͡çèɕːe kɯ́/
monkey all PL banana 1PL.INCL.OBJ of HS TEL eat PST
They say a monkey ate all our bananas.