The Touo language, also known as ''Baniata'' (''Mbaniata'') or ''Lokuru'', is spoken over the southern part of

Rendova Island Rendova is an island in the Western Province (Solomon Islands), Western Province of the Solomon Islands in the Pacific Ocean, South Pacific, east of Papua New Guinea. Geography Rendova Island is a roughly rectangularly-shaped island, located in t ...

, located in the Western Province of the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 900 smaller islands in Oceania, to the east of Papua New Guinea and north-west of Vanuatu. It has a land area of , and a population of approx. 700,000. Its ca ...

Classification

Touo is generally seen to be a member of the tentative Central Solomons family, although Glottolog considers it an isolate. Pedrós (2015) cautiously suggests Lavukaleve as the closest relative to Touo. Most of the surrounding languages to Touo belong to the Oceanic subgroup of the Austronesian language family.

Names

The Touo language is sometimes called the ''Baniata'' (''Mbaniata'') or ''Lokuru'' language, after the largest two villages where the language is spoken. The word ''Touo'' comes from the ethnonym that Touo speakers use to refer to themselves.

Phonology

Consonants

Touo consonants are: :

Vowels

Touo vowels have phonemically contrastive tense/lax vowels. Some minimal pairs showing the tense/lax vowel phonemic distinction in Touo: :

Grammar

Word order in Touo is SOV. Touo has four genders. *masculine *feminine *neuter I (generic) *neuter II (certain trees) Only in certain paradigms of the singular number can neuter I and II be distinguished. Touo distinguishes four numbers. *singular *dual *enumerated (i.e., numerically specified; can be used for both few or many numbers) *non-enumerated (i.e., not numerically specified; used for numbers greater than three)

Notes

* Paradisec has two collections of Arthur Cappell's materials
AC1AC2
that include Touo language materials.

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Touo Language Languages of the Solomon Islands Western Province (Solomon Islands) Central Solomon languages