Nose Amebeltp Temporal6 Final
Nose Amebeltp Temporal6 Final
Nose Amebeltp Temporal6 Final
Guinea
Masahiko NOSE
Keywords: Amele, Bel, Tok Pisin, temporal expressions, loanwords
1. Introduction
This study considers the loanwords of three languages in the Madang Province, Papua New
Guinea: Amele, Bel, and Tok Pisin1. The study aims to analyze the contrasts between Amele, Bel, and
Tok Pisin with regard to temporal words. Grammatically speaking, there are different and various
means of expressing time. They are realized as tense, aspect, mood forms, and several temporal
markings (primarily temporal adverbials), such as on Sunday, before noon, after breakfast. The terms
on, before, and after are grammatical means of delimiting temporal moments and relations.
Furthermore, there are a number of lexical temporal words: morning, night, yesterday, Christmas, New
Year and so on. This study focuses on lexical temporal words, and as such, it was determined that
these lexical words are likely to have been borrowed from other languages (cf. Alverson 1994, Evans
2004, Wierzbicka 1993).
If one language lacks an appropriate word for a certain concept or thing, its speakers have several
options. One is to create a new word to express or rephrase it. Another is to borrow a word from a
foreign language. Especially, temporal words can be classified as either traditional or modern words
(cf. Sinha et al. 2011). Traditional words have been used since a long time in the language, such as
morning, night, and today. They are considered to be rather basic words (cf. Swadeshs list) that are
hard to borrow and unlikely to disappear. In contrast, modern, temporal-clock, or calendar-based
words, such as January, oclock, and minute, are easier to borrow.
In this study, section 2 presents general information about the three languages and explores several
previous studies on temporal expressions. Section 3 presents the data gathered for this study, and
section 4 presents a discussion of the data in terms of loanword typology and language contact.
Section 5 is the conclusion of the study.
2. Loanwords and temporal expressions
This section outlines several preliminary studies on loanwords and temporal expressions that are
associated with language contacts. Because of language contacts, morpheme orders or constituent
orders are borrowed and lexically, specific words are borrowedso called loanwords. Temporal words
are classified in the lexicon and they can be borrowed via language contacts. Thus, this section
introduces language contacts and outlines several previous studies on loanwords.
2.1. Language contacts
There are around 800 indigenous languages spoken in Papua New Guinea and its neighboring
areas. These languages are diverse in Austronesian, Trans-New Guinea, and other genera; and they
affect each other in the form of long and various contacts (Nose 2014). As a result of the contacts, one
language borrows grammatical structures from other language(s), while another language borrows
lexical words from other language(s). According to Thomason (2001:66-67), there are several kinds of
contacts in proportion to the duration of the contact period, as shown in (1)
(1) Borrowing scale (Thomason (2001:66-67):
1
Tok Pisin is an English-based creole and one of the official languages in Papua New Guinea. In fact, Tok
Pisin is functioning as a lingua franca in the field.
Some researchers pointed out that there is a mixed language as a result of language contacts. Specifically,
Media Lengua (derived from Spanish and Quichua) in the Caribbean area and Maa (derived from Cushitic
and Bantu) in Africa are famous examples (Muysken 2008). As far as the authors observation is concerned,
any clue of mixed feature has not been found in Madang suburban area.
3 Moreover, Haspelmath and Tadmors (2009) work has shown that English's dominance as a word
exporter is a sign of its importance as an international tongue, and that 42% of English words are
loanwords; nevertheless, some countries try to resist word borrowing, in an attempt to maintain the national
character of their languages. In: Database of loans shows that English is the World's top borrower and
lender of words
(http://www.popsci.com/article/science/database-loans-shows-english-worlds-top-borrower-and-lender-wor
ds); Access: 28. 07. 2014
Takia of Karkar Island. People in Madang communicate with each other by using Tok Pisin, one of the
official languages of Papua New Guinea.
Bel
Figure 1: Geographical map of the sample and other languages in Madang Province
First, Amele is a Trans-New Guinea language, spoken in the southern region of Madang city.
Amele speakers live in the bushland area and mainly cultivate yams and sell betel nuts. Amele
speakers are one of the biggest tribes in Madang city, together with Bel and Nobnobo (Roberts 1987,
Nose 2014). Second, Bel is an Austronesian language, spoken in and around Madang city, particularly
in the coastal area and on some small islands. Bel has several alternate names: Graged, Gedaged, Siar,
Tiara, and so on. Within the scope of this study, Bel and Bilbil are practically the same language
(Dempwolff n.d.). Third, Tok Pisin is an English-based creole, widely spoken in Papua New Guinea.
Tok Pisin has English, German, Malay, and other Austronesian languages within its lexicon and
pidginized grammar, similar in part to English grammar.
Questionnaire
This study examined 56 time words including nouns, verbs, and adjectives, based on Haspelmath
and Tadmor (2009) (see Appendix 1). I sought the corresponding words from Amele and Bel speakers,
and the Amele speaker provided the corresponding words in Tok Pisin as well. The main task was
conducted in Sein village, an Amele-speaking area, in 2012. Several Bel speakers were living there,
and Bel data was confirmed with another Bel speaker living in Madang town. Additionally, I sought
out several sentences with temporal words in each language.
Results and Findings in Appendix 1
The 56 temporal words from each language are illustrated in Appendix 1. First, modern words such
as clock, week, Monday, etc., are borrowed from (or by way of) Tok Pisin. These words are the
same in Amele and Bel, and it goes without saying that Amele and Bel borrowed from Tok Pisin and
Tok Pisin brought them from English. Nevertheless, it is remarkable that the word Sunday has its
proper words in Amele and Bel, individually. By contrast, traditional words are separately maintained,
There are dry and wet seasons in Papua New Guinea, and Amele has the words aa sain dry/ wa sain
wet season, and Bel has saen ifunen dry/ mou, mousen rainy season (Dempwolff n.d.: 88)
7
The words meaning today and now are also observed in Jabem, an Austronesian language spoken in
Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. In Jabem, the word form is galoc (Nose 2014).
6
(for further discussion, see Nose 2014)8. The word haun/faun is also the same in Amele and Bel, and
Roberts (1992: 13) determined that these words refer to new, young, fresh, again in both Amele and
Bel, and are also considered to have originated from Bel. According to Roberts (1992), Amele already
possessed the proper word bag for stranger or new, and later Amele replaced it (bag) with haun.
Overall, the contact between Amele and Bel is unidirectional from Bel to Amele, and their loanwords
are limited.
Second, we discuss the possibility of structural borrowing between Amele and Bel. As previously
pointed out, several words are represented by sain, as in (4), and are similar in Amele and Bel.
(4) Temporal words using sain:
a. always (English): sain gaid (Amele), sain dogan (Bel)
b. often: sain gaid, sain dogan
c. sometimes: sain osolosol, sain taitai
d. for a long time: sain erauna, sain melain
In (4), word orders for head (noun) and dependent (adjective) are N-A, such as in Amele sain gaid
(time-usual order), and Bel sain dogan (time-usual order), although their adjective forms (gaid in
Amele and dogan in Bel) are totally different. The orders they have in common can be considered to
be metatypy, as shown in section 2 of Takia and Waskia. Here we observe Appendix 2 to see the
spatial data of the three sample languages. In Appendix 2, their grammatical behaviors are partly
similar, although there is no lexical correspondence or borrowing between the three languages. The
only point in common is the postpositional tendency of Amele and Bel: jo na (postposition) in Amele
and abu-iron-nen (suffix) in Bel. Therefore, structural borrowing (a kind of metatypy) between Amele
and Bel is probable in part, but this does not occur in-depth (cf. Nose 2014).
Third, we discuss the influence of Tok Pisin on Amele and Bel. As previously stated, modern
temporal words that have been borrowed by Amele and Bel are based on Tok Pisin, as summarized in
(5). Ross (2009) explained that language contacts of Tok Pisin started in Madang after 1900, and new
modern and technological words have spread since then.
(5) Modern temporal words of Tok Pisin
Age (yaar), Year (yaar), clock (kilok), week (week), Monday to Saturday
Thus, the influence of Tok Pisin is limited to the modern temporal words (less than 10 words in Amele,
Appendix 1), and we can ask why Amele and Bel have the indigenous word Sunday (no. 43 in
Appendix 1). The word Sunday is sande in Tok Pisin, cuha in Amele and ubou in Bel. It is assumed
that Sunday basically means rest time and thats why both languages (Amele and Bel) have the
word (rest time) individually and it was not borrowed from Tok Pisin.
Next, no. 51 in Appendix 1, the word year differs amongst the three languages. Yaar/cabi gel
(also meaning garden fence) in Amele, yaar/umaz (also meaning garden fence) in Bel and yaar
in Tok Pisin. Thus, the word year is partly derived from the loanword yaar while also maintaining the
traditional meaning, garden fence. Here lies the question of why Amele and Bel each have a word
for year, that also means garden fence. The garden fence reference may have originated from
local words; at some time in the past, either language had borrowed the meaning of this (calque).
According to Roberts (1992: 3, 18), the Amele word gel was borrowed from Bel a long time ago, in
cabi gel (literally, garden fence) and gel, meaning fence. However, the word formation of
8
Roberts (1992) and Nose (2014) pointed out that sain in Amele can be used in a temporal conjunction
when-clause, but not in Bel.
(i) Sain ija haun-na. When I was young,
Moreover, the reduplication form sainsain in Amele means always, forever, but there is no corresponding
word in Bel.
garden-fence seems to have originated from Amele and then Bel borrowed its structure (i.e. calque,
or translation borrowing).
Lastly, the summation of the findings from the study. First in the findings was the determination
that Amele and Bel still maintain their indigenous nature with regards to temporal words. By contrast,
Tok Pisin has many English-based words and a few original words, such as isi isi slow, and belo
midday. The language contact between Amele and Bel is limited in temporal words and there are no
remarkable loanwords in terms of space-place, as per Appendix 2, but we observed several lexical and
structural borrowings in time and space words. The language contact of Tok Pisin is considered to
have commenced from 1900, and as a result, it has affected modern temporal words in both Amele and
Bel (see Freybergs 1977 description of Bel missionary history).
No. 1 and no. 40 in Appendix 1, the most frequent word sain/ saen in Amele and Bel for time
and hour has originated from Bel, Austronesian. This study concludes that there was no concept of
time in Trans-New Guinea languages up to that point (Nose 2014, Davies 1989).
5. Conclusion
This study has clarified that there are limited language contacts among Amele, Bel and Tok Pisin,
and as a result, lexical borrowings have occurred between them. There were findings of temporal
words, as per Appendix 1, and several spatial words as per Appendix 2 (cf. Lakoff and Johnson 1980).
First, Amele and Bel each maintain traditional temporal words, such as morning, night, and today.
This means that basic traditional words are being kept in use within each language as these are
difficult to borrow from other languages. Historically, Amele has borrowed words from Bel, and the
structural borrowing and calque (translation borrowing) have been derived from Amele into Bel.
However, their contact is limited and it is hard to define the contact they do have as metatypy.
Second, the influence of Tok Pisin is limited only in modern temporal words, possibly after 1900.
Both Amele and Bel borrow modern temporal words from Tok Pisin, such as year, Monday, and clock.
However, other traditional words and verbs to do with time have not been borrowed. Needless to say,
more modern words will be introduced via Tok Pisin in the future.
Third, the reality and history of contacts in the Madang area have been reported by previous
studies (Dempwolff n.d.; Freyberg 1977; Roberts 1987, 1992). Nevertheless, this present study cannot
clarify the direction from which borrowings have occurred, and it is also noteworthy that frequent
lexical contacts were not observed, as far as the temporal/spatial data depicts in Appendix 1 and 2.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Nere Tamo, Nelau Lagia, and Tami Weslydak for their contributions to the data
and kindness. I claim sole responsibility for any errors. This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI,
Grant Numbers 23720211 and 15K02478, and CASIO Scientific Foundations (2011-36)
Appendix 1: Investigation of temporal words
English
Amele
1: time
sain
2: age
yaar
3: new
haun
4: young
etac
5: old
hirah
6: early
mahu
7: late
mahu qee
8: now
9: immediately
10: fast
bila =today
mahu
mahu odi
Bel
Tok Pisin
sain
taim
umas
yaar
haun
nupela
dabeel
young
getnen/ samai
oldpela
pasak
mok
(get, early/ hurriup
wagam=earlier)
teaa (alou, loan tap: late
later)
gaso =today
nau
pasak
hurriup tru
pasak mok
hurriup
11: slow
12: to hurry
13: to be late
14: to begin
15: beginning
16: to last
17: end
18: to finish
19: to cease
20: ready
21: always
22: often
23: sometimes
24: soon
25: for a long time
26: never
27: again
28: day
29: night
30: dawn
31: morning
32: midday
33: afternoon
34: evening
35: today
36: tomorrow
37: day after tomorrow
38: yesterday
39:
day
before
yesterday
40: hour
41: clock
42: week
43: Sunday
44: Monday
45: Tuesday
46: Wednesday
47: Thursday
48: Friday
49: Saturday
50: month
51: year
cetna
mahu odi ac
*
sanan magac
sanan mec
itboc
bemenac
bemeyac
bemudugac
saiadoya
sain gaid
sain gaid
sain osolosol
nag odi
sain erauna
qee bahic
haun odoga
deel
witic
qasil
qasil
ahinec
wes
wes
bila
uba dac
ele dac
cum
*
kinkin
pasak mokein
late
fun nau
fun nauk
funati
biniime
ibinii
wadan funati
kibimei ime
sain dagan
sain dagan
sain taitai
kitek sa
sain melain
tea wok
faun naa
sain (nal, ad)
tidon(bo)
bomong
bomong
aad(ad: sun)
yusu
yusu
gaso
buani (boyanip)
naar lusek (zabop)
noosnen (noz)
elen
isi
wokin hurriup
em bai late
statim
stat bilong em
finis bilong em
end
pinis
pinisim
ready
oltaim
olgeta taim
smapela taim
i no long taim
longpela taim
i no save
gen
dai
nait
moning
moning
belo/ belo taim
abinun
abinun
today
tumora
haptomorrow
asde
*
sain
kilok
week
cuha
mande
tunde
trinde
fonde
fride
sarare
jagel
yaar/ cabi gel
52: winter
53: spring
54: summer
55: autumn/fall
56: season
*
*
sun sain
*
*
sain
kilok
week
ubou
mande
tunde
trinde
fonde
fride
sarare
hurei(fulei)
yaar(umaz:
fence)
*
*
*
*
*
winter
*
*(saen ifunen)
*
season
aua
kilok
week
sande
mande
tunde
trinde
fonde
fride
sarare
muun
garden yaar
udun/ aben
5: To sit
6: here
7: there
biliga
ene
Auna
Bel
abu-iron-nen
abu naon-nen
rat-nen
panu
(Abe/ matalik/ aben)
matal
erak
Merak
Tok Pisin
long haus
bipo haus
antap long haus (face
blong haus)
ples
sindaun
hia
Long hap
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