Kaian

Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute

Kaian (Kayan) is spoken by 322 people (1975) living in a village of the same name on the coast in the northwest corner of Papua New Guinea's Madang province (Z'graggen 1975: 79.)

Z'graggen (1971: 90-91) 12 Kaian reflexes of proto-Ramu River or proto-Ramu Coast cognate series and (pp. 110-118) Kaian 120 singular-plural pairs

Z;graggen (1972) 400 comparative terms for Kaian

Foley (2005: 116-118) 60 comparative terms for Kaian

[under construction]

…

Z'graggen (1972) gives free pronouns for Kaian as follows:

The most conspicuous feature of Kayan nominative morphology is the existence of lexically-specified plural formatives, which have led some (e.g. Foley 1999) to posit that proto-Ramu Coast had a large number of noun classes. Z'graggen (1971: 110-118) gives singular-lural pairs for 120 nominals and careful analysis along with comparison to Watam and Bore (Parrish 1989: 10-13) examples shows that they form only three classses, the allomorphs of the first class being determined by the quality of the inal of the root..These three classes are abstractly summarized as follows, where /C/ following /N/ is homoorganic with /N/ and umlaut is singified by /i/ although its effect varies depending upon the preceding vowel (below):

Class I roots with final nasals are suffixed with a homoorganic voiceless stop and the vowel of the final syllable of the root is umltaued by an element /*i/ (below)::

When the initial consonant of the previous syllable is a prenasalized voiced stop the root-final nasal is dropped in the plural:

Class I roots with final non-nasal consonants remian the same in the plural except that the vowel of the final syllable of the root is umlauted by an element /*i/ (below.) There are no known examples of class I roots with final apical voiceless stop /t/. All roots with final glottal stop /ʔ/ rather than /k/ belong to class I:

Class I roots undergo umlaut in which an originally suffixed element /*i/ has been transposed to the final syllable vowel of the root, affecting it as follows:

There are no vowel-final roots in class I.

Class II roots take a plural suffix /-Vr/. Often the addition of this suffix induces syncope of the vowel in the final syllable of the root and sometimes the metathesis of its vowel to an adjacent syllable, presumably due to a change in stress:

Roots with final glottal stop /ʔ/ are generally found in class I (above,) but there is one unexplained exception:

Class II roots with final velar nasal /ŋ/ in the singular change it to /ŋg/ when suffixed with /-Vr/, suggesting final [ŋ] to be underlyingly prenasalized voiced stop /ŋg/ which otherwise does not occur root-finally:

In a number of class II plurals with root-final apical voiceless stop /t/, /t/ is dropped. Because the vowel of the final syllable always remains the same, which is not the case with plurals /-t-Vr/ (above,) we assume this to results from the reduction of /-Vr/ to /-r/ followed by the simplication of derived cluster /tr/ to /r/. Probably relatedly, most of these are either trisyllables or disyllables with medial clusters, which also pattern with trisyllables in being immune to syncope (below):

One example however appears to be a disyllable, suggesting an erstwhile medial cluster which has been simplified:

One trisyllabic root with final /t/ does not undergo the expected reduction, perhaps suggesting that it is a compound:

All vowel-final roots fall into either class II or III (below.) Those with final simple vowels generally take the suffix /-ar/:

Another example patterns with these, but with a suffix in the singular and a reduplication in the plural (cf. Gamei i.e. Bore [wɛ], Watam [weːna] Z'graggen 1972):

There is however one exception which regularly reflects Ramu Coast [*rao] < /*aro/:

If the final vowel of the root is a diphthong /ai au/, the vowel of the class II suffix is dropped. At least half these words are loans from Manam (below):

The vowels of /-Vr/ suffixes following final consonants are not fully predictable from the forms of the singulars, suggesting the former presence of final vowels which have been dropped in the singulars but surface in or affect the forms of the plurals:

Monosyllabic roots of the form /oC/ undergo umlaut when followed by high front vowel suffixes /-ir -ɛr/; this would probably be true of /a/ as well (see class I umlaut above) but there are no clear examples in monosyllables while most disyllables undergo syncope (below):

In disyllabic roots with medials which simple medials and simple second vowels, the addition of the class II plural suffix and concomitant change in stress results in the syncope of the vowel of the final syllable of the root:

If the vowel pattern of a consonant-final disyllabic root in class II which undergos syncope is /(C)aCɛC/ or /(C)aCuC/, high vowel /i/ or /u/ is metathesized to the first syllable. This is probably true of roots /(C)aCiC/ as well, see metathesis in class III roots (below,) but Z'graggen gives no examples:

One exeption which undergoes neither syncope nor vowel metathesis is probably due to the fact that he medial and final consonants are identical:

Another disyllable which resists syncope is likely a reduplication and once had a medial cluster /rw/; cf. Gamei (i.e. Bore) [wʉrwʉr] (Z'graggen 1972):

Trisyllabic roots in class II generally do not undergo syncope, nor do apparently disyllabic roots with medial clusters, uggesting the latter to be in some sense underlyingly trisyllabic:

Similarly, disyllables in class II with an apparent diphthong in the second syllable generally do not undergo syncope, perhaps suggesting these too to be trisyllabic; however the diphthong is reduced to a simple vowel:

There is however one exception in which an apparent diphthong in the seocnd syllable is dropped rather than merely simplified:

One trisllabic root appears to undergo syncope of the vowel in the first syllable rather than that in the second; however Z'graggen (1972) gives ['ndakai] (cf. Watam [dakʌɩ]) so the singular form as quoted may be in error:

One conspicuous exception to looks to be entirely irregular, suggesting the singular form to be a compound although it is tracable to proto-Ramu River:

That class II remains productive may be seen as several recent loans from Tok Pisin fall into this class, the suffix in these instances being /-ar/:

Class III plurals are formed by the addition of a suffix /-®ɛm-p/, itself a pluralized member of class I, the base of which is presumably /-rem/, as final prenasalized stops do not otherwise occur. In roots with final vowels, this suffix is realized as [-rɛmp]:

In roots with final consonants, initial apical non-stop /r/ of the the class III plural suffix is dropped such that it is realized as [-ɛmp -amp]:

In disyllabic roots, the addition of the class III plural suffix and concomitant change in stress results in the syncope of the vowel of the final syllable of the root::

If the vowel pattern of a consonant-final disyllabic root in class III is /(C)aCiC/, high front vowel /i/ is metathesized to the first syllable:

There are no known trisyllabic roots or disyllables with medial clusters in class III.

No information about Kaian verbal morphology is curretnly available to us.

[under construction]