Tikopia language

The Tikopia language, or Fakatikopia, is a Polynesian Outlier language from the island of Tikopia in the Solomon Islands. It is closely related to the Anuta language of the neighboring island of Anuta; some linguists^[who?] believe they are dialects of the same language. Tikopia is also spoken by the Polynesian minority on Vanikoro, who migrated from Tikopia several centuries ago.

Tikopia
Native to	Solomon Islands
Region	Tikopia
Native speakers	(3,300 cited 1999)[1]
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Polynesian Ellicean–Eastern Tikopia
Language codes
ISO 639-3	tkp
Glottolog	tiko1237

The language is spoken by approximately 3,320 speakers, and is not considered endangered.^[1]

The language has benefitted from a thorough description by anthropologist Raymond Firth (1901-2002).

History

Because of its remote and isolated location, Tikopia had little contact with outsiders until well into the twentieth century. One exception is the Melanesian population of Vanikoro, with whom Tikopia islanders have been in regular contact for several centuries.^[2][3]

Tikopians occasionally visited other islands, but these trips were limited by the large distances and great hazards involved in making the journey using canoes. Contact with Westerners began sporadically around the beginning of the nineteenth century; in 1927, when Raymond Firth did his initial fieldwork in Tikopia, the indigenous culture was largely intact. The major groups to contact Tikopians were missionaries and labor recruiters. By the 1950s, all the Tikopians had become Christianized, and most of the native ritual practices had ceased. Much of the Tikopian life style has remained intact, although Westernization has occurred.^[4]

Phonology

Consonants

Tikopia has eleven consonant phonemes. They are written ⟨f, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, ng⟩.^[5]

Consonants^[6]

	Labial	Dental/ Alveolar	Velar
Nasal	m	n	ŋ
Plosive	p	t̪	k
Fricative	f v	s
Trill		r
Lateral		l̪

• /p, t̪, k/ are aspirated ([pʰ], [t̪ʰ], [kʰ]) before /u/.^[7]
• /v/ is [w] medially before /u/.^[8]

It is debated whether or not Tikopia uses ⟨l⟩ or ⟨r⟩. Samuel Elbert claimed /l/ was used but not /r/.^[9] Raymond Firth said, "Dumont D'Urville published a small dictionary in 1834 where 235 words were collected."^[9] ⟨R⟩ appeared in 50 words while ⟨l⟩ appeared in only 15. The language changed in over a century and modernly more words are used with ⟨l⟩. Raymond Firth's own work shows that both ⟨l⟩ and ⟨r⟩ phonemes are used, but that words with ⟨l⟩ are far less common.^[10]

Vowels

Vowels^[11]

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	e		o
Open		a

• /e/ shows free variation between [e] and [ɛ], e.g., /peti/ [ˈpeti ~ ˈpɛti] 'fat'.^[12]
• /o/ shows free variation between [o] and [ɔ], e.g., /foŋa/ [ˈfoŋa ~ ˈfɔŋa] 'above'.^[13]
• /a/ shows free variation between [a] and [ʌ], e.g., /muna/ [ˈmuna ~ ˈmunʌ] 'speak'.^[13]

Dodenhoff (1982) did not find contrastive vowel length,^[14] but notes that W. J. Durrad found two examples and Raymond Firth found one.^[15] This vowel length can be transcribed by doubling the vowel, or with a macron on the vowel.

Orthography

This orthography is used by Dodenhoff:^[16]

Phoneme	Allophones	Orthography
/m/	[m]	m
/n/	[n]	n
/ŋ/	[ŋ]	ng
/l/	[l]	l
/r/	[r]	r
/f/	[f]	f
/v/	[v], [w]	v
/s/	[s]	s
/i/	[i]	i
/e/	[e], [ɛ]	e
/a/	[a], [ʌ]	a
/o/	[o], [ɔ]	o
/u/	[u]	u

Grammar

Basic word order

The basic word order in Tikopia is subject-verb-object, but sometimes verb-subject-object is used.^[5]

Reduplication

Tikopia uses partial reduplication, usually to encode plurality on the verb.^[5]

Vocabulary

Loanwords

The main sources of loanwords are from Anuta, Mota, Hawaiian, and English.

• pakutini - "pumpkin"
• atamole - "watermelon"
• rais - "rice"
• pīni - "beans"
• poi - "tinned Meat"
• piksha - "picture"
• kastom - "custom"
• leta - "letter"

Materials in the language

Most of the recorded documents on this language come from the linguist Raymond Firth; Tikopia did not have much documentation until this time. In 1928 Firth stayed for a year; he revisited in 1952 for five more months and again in 1966. Only one person, Reverend W. J. Durrad in 1910 who stayed for a duration of 2 months, had recorded documents before.

Raymond Firth created a dictionary for the Tikopian language.^[17] Other materials in the language include: a translation of the Bible; a few YouTube videos; some song books. Linguist A. François has also made a handful of audio recordings while doing fieldwork with the Tikopian community of Vanikoro.^[18]