Download coordinates as: Pouye (Bouye) is a language spoken in Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea, by a thousand people, and growing.
A fairly large nine-vowel inventory is also seen: In addition there are seven diphthongs /au̯ əu̯ ou̯ ai̯ əi̯ ei̯ ɪi̯/ which act as discrete vowel units.
The trial orthography is as in the IPA except for /tʷ tʲ kʷ j/ which are tw ty kw y and the vowels /ɨ ɪ ɛ ə/ which are i i e a.
The nominal object marker -rɨ loses its initial consonant following /r/ or /l/ or a monosyllable ending in /n/:/jar-rɨ/ → [jarɨ] who-OBJ "whom" /pol-rɨ/ → [polɨ] Paul-OBJ "Paul"
"Compare for instance /nam-ki/ → [namki] 1P-ACP "with us", where the sequence /mk/ appears intervocalically and can be syllabified to two distinct syllables without requiring epenthesis.
Two identical nasals, trills or laterals (/mm nn rr ll/) degeminate when brought together./t-ətɨn-nɨn/ → [tətɨnɨn] R-sew-PAS "has sewn" /t-ɪl-lai̯/ → [tɪlai̯] R-weave-CONT "weaving"With the imperative prefix n-, epenthesis occurs prior to this rule, meaning that imperatives remain distinct./n-nək/ → [nɨnək] IMP-hold "hold!"
This prevents stress shifting leftwards./wan-wo-kʷɨ/ → [waˈnokʷɨ] 1S-only-POS "my/mine only"Compare /wan-wo/ → [ˈwanwo] 1SG-only "I only" or /kʷ-atu-wo-ke-nɨn/ → [kʷatuwoˈkenɨn] QCK-hang.up-up-PRF-PAS "quickly hung up (sth.)