Tobian (, literally "the language of Tobi") is the language of

Tobi Tobi may refer to: Palau * Tobi (island), island in the Palauan state of Hatohobei * Tobian language, the language of Tobi * Hatohobei, an island and the southernmost of Palau's sixteen states Media and entertainment * ''Tobi!'', a 2009 te ...

, one of the Southwest Islands of Palau, and the main island of

Hatohobei Tobi, or Hatohobei (Tobian language, Tobian), is the southernmost of Palau's sixteen States of Palau, states, consisting of Tobi Island and Helen Reef. The total land area is about 0.88 km². The population was 25 in 2015. Tobian language, ...

state. Tobian is a

Micronesian language The Micronesian languages form a family of Oceanic languages. The twenty languages are known for their lack of plain labial consonant and have instead two series, palatalized and labio-velarized labials, similar to the related Kanak languages. ...

spoken by approximately 150 people, about 22 are native speakers. The speakers are located in either the island of Tobi or in

Echang Southwest Islanders Village is a small village near Meyuns in Koror, Palau. It consists of a village called Echang (pronounced "Aye-ong") and a jetty A jetty is a man-made structure that protrudes from land out into water. A jetty may se ...

, a hamlet of

Koror Koror is the state comprising the main commercial centre of the Republic of Palau. It consists of several islands, the most prominent being Koror Island (also ''Oreor Island''). It is Palau’s most populous state. History In the oral tradition of ...

, the former capital of Palau. Tobian and Sonsorolese are very close, and appear to be gradually merging towards a new dialect called "Echangese". Earlier in the 20th century, about 1000 people lived on the island. Shortly before and during the First World War, those numbers dropped severely due to an abundance of disease.

Classification

Tobian and the dialects of

Sonsorol Sonsorol is one of the sixteen states of Palau. The inhabitants speak Sonsorolese language, Sonsorolese, a local Chuukic languages, Chuukic language, and Palauan language, Palauan. The islands of the state of Sonsorol, together with the islands ...

Merir Merir, or Melieli, is a small outlying island of the Palau group, in the western Pacific Ocean. The island has an area of and is very long and narrow, stretching approximately from north to south but only approximately at its widest point. It ...

, and

Pulo Ana Pulo may refer to: Places * Pulo, Cabuyao, a village in the Philippines * Pulo do Lobo, a waterfall in Portugal * Pulo Gadung, a subdistrict in Jakarta, Indonesia * Pulo Jehat, an island in Malaysia * Duri Pulo, Gambir, a village in Indonesia * Is ...

, the other inhabited Southwest Islands, are closely related to the languages spoken in the

Federated States of Micronesia The Federated States of Micronesia (, abbreviated FSM), or simply Micronesia, is an island country in Micronesia, a region of Oceania. The federation encompasses the majority of the Caroline Islands (excluding Palau) and consists of four Admin ...

outer islands of

Yap Yap (, sometimes written as , or ) traditionally refers to an island group located in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, a part of Yap State. The name "Yap" in recent years has come to also refer to the state within the Federate ...

and

Chuuk Lagoon Chuuk Lagoon, previously Truk Atoll, is an atoll in the central Pacific Ocean. It lies about 1,800 kilometres (970 nautical miles) northeast of New Guinea and is part of Chuuk State within the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM). A protective ...

. These include

Ulithi Ulithi (, , or ; pronounced roughly as YOU-li-thee) is an atoll in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, about east of Yap, within Yap State. Name The name of the island goes back to Chuukic languages, Proto-Chuukic ''*úlú-diw ...

and the

Central Carolines Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

. Altogether, these languages form a sub-group within the Micronesian languages. The names of these dialects are the terms that are commonly used in European terms. Below are the native names as compared to the common names: Tobi is the basis of a local

pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...

Examples

* animal = ''mar'' * coconut palm = ''ruh'' * goodbye = ''sabuho'' * language = ''ramarih'' * soldierfish = ''red''

Counting

* one = ''sewo'' * two = ''huwou'' * three = ''soruo'' * four = ''fauwo'' This is only base counting. There are different numerals for a lot of different objects.Base Counting Words by Isauro Andre

Isauro Andrew

Phonology

Vowels

"œ" is used rarely and sounds similar to the French "eu" but the lips do not round out at the end of the sound and has critical meaning in words. There is a central low vowel that sounds like the "u" in "but", but it does not have semantic value and it has very rare occurrence.

Diphthongs

There are a lot of diphthongs in Tobian and according to Capell, "several of them are difficult for Europeans".

Homonyms and near homonyms

Like most other languages, Tobian has examples of homonyms but they are not as abundant. Meanings can vary solely on vowel length. Also small differences in sounds can produce major differences in meanings. For example, the difference between voiceless (f) and voiced (v) consonants are important but there are many exceptions where it does not affect the meaning.

Some minimal pairs

Stress and prosody

Tobian utilizes both stress and pitch accents or tones. Compared to the other dialects, it uses less musical tone. It is not a tonal language because the tone does not change the meaning of the word. Although it is not tonal, the speech has a wide variety of tone variations that appear to be emotional rather than linguistic and either show emphasis or other semantic components. Stress accents are used but not as much as English or Russian. In the past, the stress marks would normally be placed on the last syllable of the words. In the present, the stress marks can be placed either on the last syllable or the second to last syllable. # Stress on the

penultimate ''Penult'' is a linguistics term for the second-to-last syllable of a word. It is an abbreviation of ''penultimate'', which describes the next-to-last item in a series. The penult follows the antepenult and precedes the ultima. For example, the m ...

(second to last) # Stress on the final syllable # Stress on the

antepenultimate In linguistics, the ultima is the last syllable of a word, the penult is the next-to-last syllable, and the antepenult is third-from-last syllable. In a word of three syllables, the names of the syllables are antepenult-penult-ultima. Etymology Ul ...

(third to last) # Sentence stress #

Vowel harmony In phonology, vowel harmony is a phonological rule in which the vowels of a given domain – typically a phonological word – must share certain distinctive features (thus "in harmony"). Vowel harmony is typically long distance, meaning tha ...

Vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived or actual length (phonetics), duration of a vowel sound when pronounced. Vowels perceived as shorter are often called short vowels and those perceived as longer called long vowels. On one hand, many ...

# Furtive vowels (Slightly heard or silent vowels)

Consonants

References

External links

Tobian language at ''Friends of Tobi Island''
*Open access recordings o
Hatohobei word lists, paradigms and narratives
are available through

Kaipuleohone Kaipuleohone is a digital ethnographic archive that houses audio and visual files, photographs, as well as hundreds of textual material such as notes, dictionaries, and transcriptions relating to small and endangered languages. The archive is stored ...

{{Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages Chuukic languages Languages of Palau Hatohobei Endangered Austronesian languages