Cia-Cia, also known as (South) Buton or Butonese, is an

Austronesian language The Austronesian languages ( ) are a language family widely spoken throughout Maritime Southeast Asia, parts of Mainland Southeast Asia, Madagascar, the islands of the Pacific Ocean and Taiwan (by Taiwanese indigenous peoples). They are spoken b ...

spoken principally around the city of

Baubau Baubau is a city in Southeast Sulawesi province, Indonesia. The city is located on the southwest coast of Buton island. Baubau attained city status on 21 June 2001 after Law Number 13 of 2001 was passed. It covers an area of , of which about i ...

on the southern tip of

Buton Buton (also Butung, Boeton or Button) is an island in Indonesia located off the southeast peninsula of Sulawesi. It covers roughly 4,727 square kilometers in area, or about the size of Madura; it is the 129th List of islands by area, largest is ...

island, off the southeast coast of

Sulawesi Sulawesi ( ), also known as Celebes ( ), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the List of islands by area, world's 11th-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Min ...

, in Indonesia. It is written using the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

and

Hangul The Korean alphabet is the modern writing system for the Korean language. In North Korea, the alphabet is known as (), and in South Korea, it is known as (). The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs ...

scripts.

Demographics

In 2005, there were 79,000 speakers of Cia-Cia, many of whom also use Wolio, which is closely related to Cia-Cia, as well as Indonesian. Wolio is falling into disuse as a written language among the Cia-Cia, as it is written using the

Arabic script The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic (Arabic alphabet) and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world (after the Latin script), the second-most widel ...

, and Indonesian is now taught in schools using the

Latin script The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...

Cia-Cia has been privately taught to schoolchildren in the

Hangul script The Korean alphabet is the modern writing system for the Korean language. In North Korea, the alphabet is known as (), and in South Korea, it is known as (). The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs ...

since 2008. The students are also taught some basic Korean. The program remained active as of 2024.

Geographic distribution

Cia-Cia is spoken in

Southeast Sulawesi Southeast Sulawesi (, ; often abbreviated to Sultra, ), is a province on the island of Sulawesi, forming the southeastern peninsula of that island, together with a number of substantial offshore islands such as Buton, Muna, Kabaena and Wawon ...

, south

Buton Island Buton (also Butung, Boeton or Button) is an island in Indonesia located off the southeast peninsula of Sulawesi. It covers roughly 4,727 square kilometers in area, or about the size of Madura; it is the 129th List of islands by area, largest is ...

, Binongko Island, and

Batu Atas Island Batu may refer to: Geography *Batu City, a city in East Java, Indonesia *Batu Islands, an archipelago of Indonesia * Batu, Iran, a village in Razavi Khorasan Province, Iran *Batu, Kuala Lumpur, an area in Malaysia *Batu (town), Ethiopia * Batu L ...

. According to legend, Cia-Cia speakers on Binongko descend from Butonese troops sent by a Butonese sultan.

Name

The name of the language comes from the negator , "no". It is also known as Buton, Butonese, Butung, and in Dutch , names it shares with Wolio, and as South(ern) Buton or Butung. The ambiguous name "Buton", often referring generically to various ethnic and linguistic groups of the Buton area, is said to be of Ternatese origin (''butu'' – "market", "marketplace"). Names such as "South Buton" can be used to disambiguate from Wolio, the historically dominant language of the island.

Dialects

The language situation on the island of Buton is very complicated and not known in great detail. Dialects include Kaesabu, Sampolawa (Mambulu-Laporo), Wabula (with its subvarieties), and Masiri. The Masiri dialect shows the greatest amount of vocabulary in common with the standard dialect. The Pedalaman dialect uses ''gh''—equivalent to ''r'' in other dialects—in native vocabulary, and ''r'' in

loan word A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing (linguistics), borrowing. Borrowing ...

Phonology

Phonology according to Rene van den Berg (1991).

Consonants

Notes: * is realized as a palatal affricate before high vowels and * is either an alveolar trill , or a voiced velar fricative or uvular trill , depending on the dialect

Vowels

Cia-cia has a common five-vowel system. /, / may also be heard as open-mid

Orthography

Cia-Cia was once written in a Jawi-like script called '' Gundhul'', based on Arabic, with five additional consonant letters but no signs for vowels.

Hangul

In 2009, residents of the city of Baubau set about adopting

, the script for the

Korean language Korean is the first language, native language for about 81 million people, mostly of Koreans, Korean descent. It is the national language of both South Korea and North Korea. In the south, the language is known as () and in the north, it is kn ...

, to write Cia-Cia. The mayor consulted the Indonesian government on the possibility of making the writing system official.Lee Tae-hoon
"Hangeul didn't become Cia Cia's official writing"
''The Korea Times'', 6 October 2010. However, the project encountered difficulties between the city of Baubau, the Hunminjeongeum Society, and the

Seoul Metropolitan Government The Seoul Metropolitan Government () is a local government of Seoul, South Korea. The mayor is elected to a four-year term by the citizens of Seoul and is responsible for the administration of the city government. The Seoul Metropolitan Governmen ...

in 2011. The

King Sejong Institute The King Sejong Institute Foundation () is a foundation established by the South Korean government that encourages learning of the Korean language around the world. It was founded in 2007. Its name refers to Sejong the Great, the inventor of the ...

, which had been established in Baubau in 2011 to teach Hangul to locals, abandoned its offices after a year of operation, in 2012; it reopened them in 2022. In December 2023,

Agence France-Presse Agence France-Presse (; AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency. With 2,400 employees of 100 nationalities, AFP has an editorial presence in 260 c ...

again published an article with interviews showcasing the Hangul effort. In January 2020, the publication of the first Cia-Cia dictionary in Hangul was announced. It was published in December 2021. As of 2024, Hangul remains in use in schools and on local signs.

Examples

Words

Cia-Cia, like

Muna Muna may refer to: Arts and entertainment *Muna (band), an American pop band * ''Muna'' (Markéta Irglová album) * ''Muna'' (Muna album) * ''Muna'' (2019 film), a Nigerian film by Kevin Nwankwor * ''Muna'' (2023 film), a British short film Pl ...

, has three sets of numerals: a free form, a prefixed form, and a reduplicated form. The prefixed form is used before units of 10 (), 100 (), and 1,000 (), and before classifiers and measure nouns. The reduplicated form is used after units of ten when counting. is an irregular exception.

Sentences

An example of the Hangul script, followed by the Latin alphabet and IPA:Example is part of a textbook:

Rene van den Berg (1991) provides a few more examples.

References

Citations

Sources

* Mustafa Abdullah. 1985. ''Struktur bahasa Cia-Cia.'' Proyek Penelitian Bahasa dan Sastra Indonesia dan Daerah Sulawesi Selatan, Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan. *

External links

Cia-cia: Sampolawa language on Globalrecordings.net
*
Interview on the Cia-Cia's adaption of Hangeul
{{Languages of Indonesia Muna–Buton languages Languages of Sulawesi Hangul