Mengen language

Mengen and Poeng are rather divergent dialects of an Austronesian language of New Britain in Papua New Guinea.

Mengen
Poeng
Native to	Papua New Guinea
Region	New Britain
Native speakers	(8,400 cited 1982)[1]
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Western Oceanic Ngero–Vitiaz Mengen languages Mengen
Dialects	Mengen Poeng
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mee
Glottolog	meng1267

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Dorsal	Uvular
Nasal		m	n	ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	p	t	(k)	q
	voiced	b	(d)	g
Fricative			s
Rhotic			r
Lateral			l
Glide		(w)		(j)

• Both palatalization and labialization [ʲ, ʷ] is said to occur in all consonants. Palatalized consonants only occur before back vowels, and labialized consonant sounds may occur before all vowels accept /u/.
• /k/ is typically pronounced as uvular [q], but can also be heard as a velar [k] in free variation.
• Gemination or length, may also occur among consonant sounds.
• Sounds /b, ɡ/ are pronounced as voiced stops [b, ɡ], but are also heard as fricatives [β, ɣ] in intervocalic position.
• /r/ may have variation between a trill [r], a tap [ɾ], or a voiced stop [d] within vocabulary.
• Sounds /j, w/ are said to exist as a result of palatalization or labialization, but only in very few root words in word-initial position.

Vowels

	Front	Back
High	i	u
Mid	e	o
Low		a

• Sounds /a, o/ are raised to [ʌ, o̝] within the environment of consonant length.^[2]