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Dom language
Dom is a Trans–New Guinea language of the Eastern Group of the Chimbu family, spoken in the Gumine and Sinasina Districts of Chimbu Province and in some other isolated settlements in the western highlands of Papua New Guinea.[2] Sociolinguistic BackgroundThe Dom people live in an agricultural society, which has a tribal, patrilocal and patrilineal organization. There is only small dialectal differentiation among the clans. The predominant religion is Christianity.[3] Language Contact SituationThere are three different languages spoken by Dom speakers alongside Dom: Tok Pisin, Kuman and English. Tok Pisin serves as the Papuan lingua franca. Kuman, which is a closely related eastern Chimbu language of high social and cultural prestige, functions as the prestige language used in ceremonies and official situations. School lessons are mostly held in English.[4] Grammar
PhonologyVowels
Minimal pairs
AllophonesVowel lengthening in a contour pitched syllable has allophonic character.
Vowel Sequencesiu,io,ia uo
ConsonantsSource:[6] The Dom consonant system consists of 13 indigenous and 3 loan consonants.
Minimal pairs˩˥su 'two' ~ ˩˥tu 'thick'
Allophones
Variants can be determined by the factors of dialect or age. Certain exceptions show archaic variants, for example the existence of intervocal [b] in the word ˥˩iba 'but' or the otherwise non-existent sequence [lk], which is used only by elderly people or in official situations. Brackets "()" show, that the allophone is used only in loanwords. TonesSource:[7] Dom is a tonal language. Each word carries one of three tones as shown in the examples below:
Minimal pairswam˥˩ (personal name) ~ wam˩ 'to hitch.3SG' ~ wam˥ 'son.3SG.POSS' Non-phonemic Elements
MorphologyDom is a suffixing language. Morpheme boundaries between person-number and mood morphemes can be combined. SyntaxSource:[8] Phrase StructureNoun Phrase
yal man i DEM kal thing 'the thing of the man'
na you bola-n pig-2SG.POSS 'your pig'
o hand.3SG.POSS pal by bin-gwa produce-3SG.SRD kal thing 'thing produced by hand'
bola pig sipsip sheep 'sheep'
yal man su two 'two men'
gal child bl big 'big child'
ge girl apal woman gal child 'girl, female child'
yal man i DEM 'this man' If a noun phrase includes a demonstrative element, it has always the last position of the phrase: yal man su two i DEM 'the two men' Adjective Phrase
er tree wai good won truly ta a 'a very good tree' Postpositional Phrase
m-na mother-1SG.POSS bol with 'with my mother' Verbal Phrase
yal man su two al-ipke stand up-2/3DU.IND 'two men stand up'
na 1.EXCL keepa sweet.potato ne-ke eat-1SG.IND 'I eat a sweet potato'
orpl-d quickly u-o come-2SG.IMP 'come quickly'
er to ila inside na-l go-1SG.FUT d Q u-ke come-1SG.IND 'I came to go inside'
bl-n head-2SG.POSS de burn.INF bla burst d-na-wdae (say)-FUT-3SG.MUT 'Your head will be burnt and explode (as a matter of course)'
mol-me stay-1SG.IND =krae =MUT 'he/she stay as we know'
yo-gwa be-3SG.IND ime down.there 'There it is down over there' There are no zero-place predicates in Dom. As a subject ˩˥kamn 'world' is used: ˩˥kamn rain ˥˩su-gwe hit-3SG.IND 'It rains' Constituent OrderSource:[9] The predominant constituent order is SOV. Only the predicate has to be expressed overtly. An exception are absolute-topic type clauses, which consist only of one noun phrase.[10] Characteristics of the constituent order
In the case of a three place predicate the recipient noun always follows the gift noun: ˥Ella tribe.name Noun ˩˥Naur tribe.name adjunct ˥˩moni money Gift ˥na 1.EXCL Recipient ˥˩te-na-m=˥˩ua give-FUT-3SG=ENC.WA V 'The Naur subtribe of the Ella tribe shall give me money.' Unknown glossing abbreviation(s) (help); The only position which can be optionally filled is the sentence topic. Possible constituents can be the subject of an equational sentence (default), an extrasentential or a topicalized constituent:
˩˥apal woman ˩˥su two ˥˩i DEM ˥na 1.EXCL ˥˩ep-na wife 'These two women are my wives'
˩˥apal woman ˩˥su two ˥˩i DEM ˥na 1.EXCL ˥˩ep-na wife-1SG.POSS ˩˥mo-ip-ke stay-2/3DU-IND 'As for these two women, they are my wives'
˩˥apal woman ˩˥su two ˥˩i DEM ˥na 1.EXCL ˥i take.INF ˩˥war-ke move.around-1SG.IND 'As for these two women, I have them as spouses' Marking of Syntactical RelationsPerson and NumberSource:[12] Dom has three different person-number-systems: for pronouns, possessive suffixes on nouns and cross reference markers on verbs.
The marking of dual and plural is not obligatory in all cases but depends on the sem ±human ±animate:
TenseSource:[13] Dom has an unmarked non-future tense and a marked future tense. Non-FutureNon-future tense is used, if
˥ere to ˥˩e-ke go-1SG.IND 'I go/I went' Future tenseFuture tense is marked by the suffix -na (-na~-ra~-a)[14] and is used, if
˥ere to ˥˩na-ke go.FUT-1SG.IND 'I will go'
'I am the kind of person, who goes' NegationA predicate is negated by the suffix -kl. The preceding negation particle ˥ta is optional. ˥na 1.EXCL ˥˩kurl fear ˥ta NEG ˥go die +˩˥k NEG -pge 1PL.IND 'We (excl.) did not fear' LexicNoun ClassifiersSource:[16] Noun classifiers are lexical items preceding a noun with a more specified meaning. Phonetically and syntactically they form one unit with the following noun and thus differ from an apposition, which consists of two or more phonetic constituents. Noun classifiers can have the following functions:
˥˩nl water ˥nul river 'river'
˥ere tree ˥˩aml peanut/pandanus 'pandanus which bears the nut-like fruit' ˥kul grass ˥˩aml peanut/pandanus 'peanut'
˥˩nl water ˥˩bia alcohol 'Alkohol' ˥˩bola pig ˥˩sipsip sheep 'sheep' RepetitionA noun can be repeated to express the following relations:[17]
˥˩birua enemy ˥˩birua enemy ˩˥me-ipka stay-2/3.SRD 'The two are enemies for each other'
˥˩kal thing ˥˩kal thing 'several things' LoanwordsTok Pisin is the main source for lexical borrowing, borrowings from English are often made indirectly via Tok Pisin. Borrowed lexemes mostly refer to new cultural objects and concepts as well as proper names and high numbers.,[4] which did not exist in the Dom language before:
But recently some already existing Dom words have begun to be replaced by Tok Pisin lexical items:
The Demonstrative System Source:[18] Dom has a spatial referencing demonstrative system, i.e. there are certain demonstrative lexemes bearing information about the spatial relation of the referred object to the speaker alongside neutral demonstratives. A Dom speaker also uses different lexemes for visible and invisible objects. In the case of visible objects, the speaker locates it on a horizontal and vertical axis as to whether it is proximal, medium or distal from the speaker and on the same level, uphill or downhill. Demonstratives with spatial alignment:[19]
For invisible objects one must be aware of the cause for its invisibility. If it is invisible because the object is behind the speaker, a proximal demonstrative is used. Objects obscured behind an obstacle are referred to with distal demonstratives and invisible objects by their nature with downhill demonstratives. Invisible objects, that are very far away, are referred to with the downhill distal demonstrative ˩˥ime. References
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