Table of Contents

North Berau Gulf

­ Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute

Situation

The North Berau Gulf family is comprised of perhaps 10 languages spoken in the southern portion of the Bird's Head Peninsula in the Teluk Bintuni and Sorong Selatan regencies of Indonesia's West Papua province and in an enclave across the gulf on the north coast of the Bomberai peninsula.

Subclassification

The internal classification of North Berau Gulf is as follows:

North Berau Gulf

Yabin

Konda

Yahadian

South Bird's Head

West South Bird's Head

Duriankari

Inanwatan

East South Bird's Head

Kais

Iwaro-Kaburi

Iwaro (Puragi)

Kaburi

Kokoda-Arandai

Kokoda

Arandai

Dombano

Kemberano

Berry and Berry (1987: 84) provide lexical similarity figures for twelve Yabin and South Bird's Head villages as follows, with Kokoda represented by Kasuweri, Tarof and Negri Besar villages, Dombano by Tomu and Kemberano by Kalitami and Wariagar:

Konda Mugim Inan. Kais Puragi Kaburi Kasuweri Tarof Negri B. Tomu Kalitami Wariagar
Konda — 62 13 10 11 13 8 8 8 8 7 8
Mugim 62 — 13 11 12 11 10 10 11 10 14 13
Inan. 13 13 — 17 17 17 18 15 16 15 14 18
Kais 10 11 17 — 28 32 28 45 30 45 41 41
Puragi 11 12 17 28 — 48 34 50 41 50 30 38
Kaburi 13 11 17 32 48 — 46 48 46 48 38 37
Kasuweri 8 10 18 28 34 46 — 86 77 56 55 53
Tarof 8 10 15 45 50 48 86 — 82 63 70 67
Negri B. 8 11 16 30 41 46 77 82 — 57 71 60
Tomu 8 10 15 45 50 48 56 63 57 — 71 66
Kalitami 7 14 14 41 30 38 55 70 71 71 — 86
Wariagar 8 13 18 41 38 37 53 67 60 66 86 —

Sources

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Historical phonology

[under construction]

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Pronouns

[under construction]

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