Marangis a.k.a. Watam is a
Ramu language of
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...
. Like
Bosmun, it shares a number of irregular plural markers with the
Lower Sepik languages
The Lower Sepik a.k.a. Nor–Pondo languages are a small language family of East Sepik Province in northern Papua New Guinea. They were identified as a family by K Laumann in 1951 under the name Nor–Pondo, and included in Donald Laycock
Do ...
, supporting the proposal of a
Ramu – Lower Sepik language family.
It is spoken in the two villages of:
*Watam village,
Marienberg Rural LLG
Marienberg Rural LLG (also Marienberg Hills Rural LLG) is a local-level government (LLG) of East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. The Marienberg languages are spoken in this LLG, as well as various Lower Sepik-Ramu languages and the isolate ...
,
East Sepik Province
East Sepik is a province in Papua New Guinea. Its capital is Wewak. East Sepik has an estimated population of 450,530 people (2011 census) and is 43,426 km square in size. Its density is 10.4 people per square kilometer.
History
Cherubim D ...
()
*Marangis village,
Yawar Rural LLG
Yawar Rural LLG is a local-level government (LLG) of Madang Province, Papua New Guinea.
The Lower Ramu languages (Ottilien–Misegian) are all spoken in this LLG.
Wards
*01. Marangis ( Marangis language speakers)
*02. Kaiyan ( Kaian language s ...
,
Madang Province
Madang is a Provinces of Papua New Guinea, province of Papua New Guinea. The province is on the northern coast of mainland Papua New Guinea and has many of the country's highest peaks, active volcanoes and its biggest mix of languages. The capi ...
()
Pronouns
The pronominal system of Watam has a four-way distinction, with there being a
paucal
In linguistics, grammatical number is a feature of nouns, pronouns, adjectives and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions (such as "one", "two" or "three or more"). English and many other languages present number categories of singula ...
("a few", "more than two") number for pronouns in addition to singular, dual, and plural.
:
Nouns
Nominal plural formatives include:
:
Verbs
Watam verbal conjugation for the verb ''ndo'' ‘to see’:
:
References
{{Ramu–Lower Sepik languages
Ottilien languages
Languages of Madang Province
Languages of East Sepik Province