Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute
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Iwaro, also known as Puragi, is spoken by 1,400 people (2004) living in four villages, Puragi, Saga, Bedare and Isogo, situated along the Metamani (Mitimani) River and the coast in Indonesia's ….. Iwáro /i'waro/ is the native term for their own language (Berry and Berry 1987: 93, de Vries 2004: 129, 137.)
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Berry and Berry (1987) survey notes, typological sketch and (pp. 88-117) 165 comparative terms for Puragi
de Vries (2004: 137-143) grammar sketch and 165 comparative terms for Puragi of Puragi village
De Vries (2004: 137) gives 15 consonants and 8 vowels for Puragi as follows:
| m | n | |||
| p | t | ɕ | k | ʔ |
| b | d | ɟ | g | |
| β | ||||
| w | r | j |
| i | u | |
| e | o | |
| ɛ | ə | ɔ |
| a |
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Neither final consonants nor consonant clusters occur.
De Vries (2004: 140-141) gives Puragi free pronouns and inalienable possessors as follows:
| free | inalienable | |
| 1 sg. | neʔi | no- |
| 2 sg. | eʔi | a- |
| 3 sg. m. | nide | nide- |
| 3 sg. f. | nido | nido- |
| 1 pl. | nididi | nida- |
| 2 pl. | eʔenu/ididi | ididi- |
| 3 pl. | ni'dao | nidao- |
Alienable possession is signified by the simple preposition of the free pronoun.
Like other South Bird's Head languages, Puragi distinguishes nominals, demonstratives and adjectives by gender, with the latter inflecting in agreement with the former. For a small number of animate nominals, gender is contrastive and semantically determined. To other nominals gender is assigned according to the final vowel, with front vowels generally indicating masculine and non-front vowels feminine (de Vries 2004: 141-142):
| masculine | feminine | |
| i e a | o u | |
| parent | ade'ʔe | adɔ'ʔɔ |
| 3 sg. | nid-e | nid-o |
| that | 'da-i-ʔa | 'da-u-ʔa |
| dog | 'rog-a | 'rog-o |
Some inanimates use feminine gender marking to indicate large size:
| normal/small | large | |
| i | o | |
| wind | a'mepur-i | a'mepur-o |
| stone | be'ʔon-i | be'ʔon-o |
Adjectives agree with the gender of their referents using one of two suffxes:
| masculine | feminine | |
| -to | -'omo | |
| good | nasi-to | nasi-'omo |
Plurals are marked with /-u/:
| masculine | feminine | plural | |
| i | o | u | |
| person | dane'ʔ-i | dane'ʔ-u | |
| man | ra'bin-i | ra'bin-u | |
| house | 'ein-o | 'ein-u |
De Vries (2004: 142-143) gives Puragi subject desinences in three tense forms as follows:
| realis subject | future subject | past | present | future | |
| -ra- ≈ -da- | -ʔa- | -ra-/-βa- | |||
| 1 sg. | -no | -ʔo | -'da-no | -ʔa-no | -'ra-ʔo |
| 2 sg. | -de(-ro) | ? | -'da-de | -ʔa-dero | -'βe |
| 3 sg. m. | -nedo | -ma-i | -'da-nedo | -ʔa-nedo | -'βa-ma-i |
| 3 sg. f. | -nomo | -ma-o | -'da-nomo | -ʔa-numo | -'βa-ma-o |
| 1 pl. | -ninio | -bani-ʔo | -'da-ninio | -ʔa-ninio | -'ra-bani-ʔo |
| 2 pl. | -duro | -ma-o-ro | -'da-duro | -ʔa-duro | -'βa-ma-o-ro |
| 3 pl. | -numo | -ma-o-mo | -'da-numo | -ʔa-numo | -'βa-ma-o-mo |
De Vries states that the form of the past tense of /-ra/ except on verbs with final /i/ where it is /-da/, as is also the case in Kokoda; the forms above are given for /ni-/ “eat”.
The second person singular future form /-'βe/ is also used for the imperative.