Fordata language

Fordata
Vaidida
Native to	Indonesia
Region	Tanimbar Islands
Native speakers	50,000 (2000)[1]
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Central–Eastern Kei–Tanimbar Kei–Fordata Fordata
Language codes
ISO 639-3	frd
Glottolog	ford1242

Fordata (Vai Fordata, Vai Tnebar) is an Austronesian language spoken in the Tanimbar Islands of the Moluccas. It is closely related to Kei, and more distantly to Yamdena, both also spoken in the Tanimbar Islands.^[2]

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Dental/ Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal		m	n		ŋ ⟨ng⟩
Plosive	voiceless		t̪		k	ʔ ⟨'⟩
	voiced	b	d
Fricative	voiceless	f	s			h
	voiced	v
Lateral			l
Trill			r
Semivowel		w		j ⟨y⟩

• Glottal sounds /h ʔ/ only occur intervocalically.
• /v/ can often be heard as [w] among younger speakers.
• /r/ can also be heard in free variation with a flap sound [ɾ].

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	e		o
Open		a

• Sounds /i e/ have lax sounds of [ɪ ɛ]
• /a/ can have an allophone of [ə] when before a consonant, or in word-final position.^[3]

References

1. Fordata at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
2. Mills, Roger F. (1991). "Tanimbar-Kei: An Eastern Indonesian Subgroup". In Robert Blust (ed.). Currents in Pacific Linguistics: Papers on Austronesian Languages and Ethnolinguistics in Honour of George W. Grace. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 241–263.
3. Marshall, Craig (2000). "A Phonological Description of Fordata". In Grimes, C. E. (ed.). Spices from the East: Papers in Languages of Eastern Indonesia. PL-503. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 181–235. doi:10.15144/PL-503.181.

External links

• www.bahasafordata.net