Nengone language

Nengone
Region	Maré Island, New Caledonia
Native speakers	8,700 (2009 census)
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Southern Oceanic New Caledonian – Loyalties Loyalty Islands Nengone
Language codes
ISO 639-3	nen
Glottolog	neng1238
Nengone is not endangered according to the classification system of the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

Nengone is a language of the Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia.

Phonology

The phonological inventory of consonants is atypically large for an Oceanic language. Many sounds which are allophones in other sub-families are distinct phonemes in the Nengone language:

Consonant sounds

		Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	voiceless	p		t	ʈ		k	ʔ
	voiced	b		d	ɖ		ɡ
Affricate	voiceless					t͡ʃ
	voiced					d͡ʒ
Fricative	voiceless	(f)	θ	s		ʃ	(x)	h
	voiced			z			ɣ
Nasal	voiceless	m̥		n̥			ŋ̊
	voiced	m		n		ɲ	ŋ
Rhotic				r
Approximant	voiceless	w̥
	voiced	w			ɭ	j

Phonemes in parentheses only occur in words borrowed from other languages.

Vowel sounds

	Front	Back
High	i	u
Mid	e	o
	ɛ	ɔ
Low	a

Bibliography

• Tryon, D.T. and Dubois, M.J. Nengone dictionary. Part I: Nengone-English. C-9, viii + 452 pages. Pacific Linguistics, The Australian National University, 1969. doi:10.15144/PL-C9
• Tryon, D.T. and Dubois, M.J. Nengone dictionary. Part II: English-Nengone. C-23, iv + 205 pages. Pacific Linguistics, The Australian National University, 1971. doi:10.15144/PL-C23