Difference between revisions of "Oan language"

Revision as of 09:28, 12 August 2017

The Oan language (natively called Oalanu) is widely spoken in Konoa, The Oan Isles, East Polynesia, and to a lesser degree, Asian Pacific Islands. It forms the part of the West Polynesian branch of Polynesian languages. It is the only surviving member of the Oanoana family. It spoken by 90 million people across the South Pacific Ocean, and forms one of the official languages of the Polynesian Union. Various accents and dialects of the language exist, the "core" dialect being Rokalanunyanataoalanu of the Oan capital La Rochelle. In Codexian, it is frequently referred to as Oan (which is also the Codexian demonym for the Oan Isles).

Phonology

This is the Oan National Emblem (it is not a çoat of arms as it does not contain an escutcheon). The text is in the Oan native script called Pounamu. The top text reads "Kia hoa a ro komotua" and the bottom text reads "Oareatu".

Vowels:

Consonants

Words and Morphemes

The two most basic language units of the Oan language are words and morphemes after letters and syllables. The Oan language has a high amount of morphemes. It is regarded as a synthetic language. Morphemes are letter clusters that carry meaning, but cannot stand alone. Words are always free standing. For example the letter "a" when placed alone before a word or morpheme group represents a negation whereas an "a" affixed to the end of a word or phrase represents a relation.

There are a small group of words that form the basis of the entire Oan language. Most of them are morphemes. They are often fused together to create many other words. For example the word "komotua" means boundary or space between islands. It is formed from the word komo meaning space (which is infact derived from the morphemes for location and here), and tu(a) meaning a single object.

Phrases

Words and morphemes, while they form the most basic units in a language, cannot be used alone in a sentence. Words and phrases must appear together in groups called phrases, in order to make sense. For example "u Manu ua pala ro u solo". The word "manu" which means "man" cannot appear alone. It must appear with a morpheme, in this "u" which indicates a singular idea.

In all Oan noun, verb and other phrases, the presence of the morpheme "a" before the actual noun or verb phrase, represents a negation. The phrase rather than the word is the simplest grammatical unit. The Oan language is, morphologically a synthetic language.

Nouns

There are 16 noun classes. A word is preceded by a morpheme that indicates the noun class to which it belongs and forms a part of the noun phrase that forms the basis of grammar.

Locative

The locative is a noun form that indicates a location associated with the noun. It can translate to a variety of English prepositions, such as "in", "at", "on", "to" or "from", and is thus quite general in meaning. The locative is formed in two different ways, depending on the class of the noun.

For nouns in class 1 to 3, which include all proper names of people, the locative is formed by prefixing "ko" before the entire phrase.

• eg. (1) Ko u manu (at/to/in/from the person)
• eg. (2) Ko tiu manu (at/to/in/from the people)
• eg. (3) Ko nu papa (at/to/in/from the father)
• eg. (4) Ko tinu papa (at/to/in/from the fathers)

For nouns that are not in class 1 to 4, the locative is formed by adding "-eni" the end of the word.

• eg. ku huaeni (locative for light)
• eg. i kuoanoeni (locative for a room)

Possessive

The possessive form is similar to the genitive case of some other languages. It indicates the possessor, or a more general association, and corresponds in meaning to the English preposition "of" which is "ta". It is placed after the noun that is possessed and prefixed to the prefix of the noun that is possessive. The second syllable in the morpheme assumes a high tone.

• eg. Ku hua tai solo (The light of the sun).
• eg. Tinu papa tatinu loanu (The fathers of the boys)

Copulative

expresses identity, and has a meaning similar to the English copula be. However, it is a noun form rather than a verb, so no verb is needed, at least in the present tense. The copulative is formed by prefixing the so-called "identifying prefix", which takes one form: "ki". It is attached to the prefix of the word and adds a high tone to the syllable after:

• eg. Kinu mama

A "y" is added as a transitional sound between the copula and the prefix of nouns from class 7

• eg. Kiyi iano

It is the equivalent of "it is (a/an/the)", rendering the need for a verb useless.

• eg. Tinu papa kinu mano

Verb

Particles

Preceding morpheme

Gerunds - Preceding morpheme: U Gerundives - Preceding morpheme: U to

All verbs

Idioms

The Oan language is extremely idiomatic. For example the phrase "u manu ua pala ro u solo" literally means the man meets with the sun. In actual fact it means the man has awoken. This expression is used instead of "u manu ua (ki)tika". Which would mean, the man rises.

Sentence Construction

Numerical system

After the invention of the number "0" nearly a thousand years ago, the Oan numerical system began to resemble the Arab system. The only differences are the notational differences. For example the number 1,000 would be represented by the 1 and a symbol that represent 1,000. After the number 1,000, all notational symbols are fusions of the symbols for 1,000; 100 and 10. Separate symbols were invented for a million, billion, trillion and quadrillion several decades ago.

Basic phrases