Pontianak Malay (''Bahase Melayu Pontianak'', Indonesian: Bahasa Pontianak,

Jawi script Jawi (; ace, Jawoë; Kelantan-Pattani: ''Yawi''; ) is a writing system used for writing several languages of Southeast Asia, such as Acehnese, Banjarese, Kerinci, Maguindanaon, Malay, Minangkabau, Tausūg, and Ternate. Jawi is bas ...

: بهاس ملايو ڤونتيناك) is a

Malayan language The Malayic languages are a branch of the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian language family. The most prominent member is Malay, which is the national language of Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia; it further serves as basis for Ind ...

spoken in

Pontianak Pontianak or Khuntien is the capital of the Indonesian province of West Kalimantan, founded first as a trading port on the island of Borneo, occupying an area of 118.31 km2 in the delta of the Kapuas River at a point where it is joined ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Gui ...

and the surrounding area. It is one of the two major varieties of Malayic languages spoken in West Kalimantan, the other being

Sambas Malay Sambas may refer to: *Sambas Regency, a regency in West Kalimantan * Sambas (town), a town in West Kalimantan *Sultanate of Sambas, a Malay sultanate in West Kalimantan *Plural of samba Samba (), also known as samba urbano carioca (''urban Ca ...

. Pontianak Malay is a close relative of Sambas as well as Sarawak Malay in neighbouring

Sarawak Sarawak (; ) is a state of Malaysia. The largest among the 13 states, with an area almost equal to that of Peninsular Malaysia, Sarawak is located in northwest Borneo Island, and is bordered by the Malaysian state of Sabah to the northeast, ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Mal ...

. Elements from Johor-Riau Malay, Chinese, Banjarese, Indonesian, various

Dayak languages The Dayak (; older spelling: Dajak) or Dyak or Dayuh are one of the native groups of Borneo. It is a loose term for over 200 riverine and hill-dwelling ethnic groups, located principally in the central and southern interior of Borneo, each w ...

as well as many localism can be seen in the language, reflecting the various ethnic origins residing in the city. Although Pontianak is relatively homogeneous, some regional sub-dialects are notable. The Malay varieties spoken in

, Kubu Raya,

Ketapang Ketapang or ''Tau-pang'' in Teochew is the capital city of Ketapang Regency (''Kabupaten Ketapang''), one of the regencies of West Kalimantan province on the island of Borneo in Indonesia. Ketapang city is located at and is a small city on t ...

and

Mempawah Mempawah Regency (formerly the Pontianak Regency) is a regency of West Kalimantan Province of Indonesia. Since 2007 it covers 1,276.90 km2, and had a population of 234,021 at the 2010 Census and 301,560 at the 2020 Census; the official estimat ...

differ slightly from each other. Differences exist both in terms of vocabulary and phonology.

Linguistic features

The pronunciation system in Pontianak Malay language stressed the usage of the /ə/, this is closely resembles Johor-Riau variant compared to the other Bornean Malay dialects and the related standard Indonesian language. Another notable feature of the accent is the

Voiced velar fricative The voiced velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound that is used in various spoken languages. It is not found in Modern English but existed in Old English. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , ...

in pronouncing the letter ''R'' which similarly used in Sarawakian Malay. In addition, the spoken

interjection An interjection is a word or expression that occurs as an utterance on its own and expresses a spontaneous feeling or reaction. It is a diverse category, encompassing many different parts of speech, such as exclamations ''(ouch!'', ''wow!''), curse ...

of ''Bah'' is widely used in Pontianak , corresponding to the usage of language observed throughout coastal Borneo. Languages of Indonesia Malay dialects {{malayic-lang-stub Malayic languages