Tobati language

Tobati
Tobati
Yotafa
Native to	Indonesia
Region	Papua
Ethnicity	Tobati
Native speakers	100 (2007)
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Western Oceanic North New Guinea Sarmi – Jayapura Bay Jayapura Bay Tobati; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	tti
Glottolog	toba1266
ELP	Tobati
	Tobati is classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.

Tobati, or Yotafa, is an Austronesian language within the Oceanic branch, from the Sarmi–Jayapura subfamily, in Jayapura bay in Papua province, Indonesia.^[1] Notably, Tobati displays a very rare object–subject–verb word order.

Tobati was once thought to be a Papuan language because as recently as 1952, it had a characteristically Papuan subject–object–verb word order.^[2]

Phonology

Consonants
		Labial	Labio- dental	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m			n	ɲ	ŋ^[a]
Stop	voiceless				t	c	k
Stop	voiced	b		d		d͡ʒ
Fricative	voiceless	ɸ	f		s	ʃ	h^[b]
Fricative	voiced						ɣ ~ ɰ
Approximant		w				j	ɣ ~ ɰ
Rhotic					r

^ Before a vowel realized as [ŋɡ], otherwise nasalizes the preceding vowel.^[2]
^ Displays free variation as [h ~ ɦ ~ x ~ ɣ].

/f/ also shows allophony as [p]. However, it does not behave as a stop (see below).

Tobati has a five-vowel system of /a e i o u/, realized as [a ɛ i ɔ ʊ] in closed syllables.

Phonotactics

Tobati permits three consonants in the onset, and at most a single consonant or a nasal–stop cluster in the coda.

Nasal–stop clusters only permit a nasal and a stop of the same place of articulation. For the /nd/ sequence, /n/ becomes dental [n̪]. Neither the bilabial, consisting of /b/ and the /f/ allophone [p], nor palatal nasal–stop clusters distinguish voice (i.e. they are [pm ~ bm] and [cɲ ~ d͡ʒɲ] respectively). The /Nk/ sequence voices to [ŋɡ].^[2]

References

^ ^a ^b Tobati at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^ ^a ^b ^c Donahue (2002). "Tobati". In Crowley, Terry; Lynch, John; Ross, Malcolm (eds.). The Oceanic Languages. Routledge. pp. 186–8. ISBN 978-0-7007-1128-4.

[3] Before a vowel realized as [ŋɡ], otherwise nasalizes the preceding vowel.^[2]

[4] Displays free variation as [h ~ ɦ ~ x ~ ɣ].

[e18-1] Tobati at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

[Donohue02-2] Donahue (2002). "Tobati". In Crowley, Terry; Lynch, John; Ross, Malcolm (eds.). The Oceanic Languages. Routledge. pp. 186–8. ISBN 978-0-7007-1128-4.

[1]

[2]

[a]

[b]