Difference between revisions of "Oan language"

Revision as of 18:19, 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

Articles

Articles are neither definite nor indefinite. They indicated various things:

• The article "u" indicates a single person, eg. u loanu (boy)
• The article "ki" indicates more than one person, eg. ki loanu (boys)
• The article "i" indicates a non-person, eg. i reatu (island)
• The article "ti" indicates more than one non-person, eg. ti reatu (islands)
• The article "ku" indicates characteristics typically associated with a particular thing or person, eg. ku manu (manhood)

Verbs

Verbs are states of being. They hace three tenses: past, future and present. The ordinary tense is the present tense. They are simple eg. Ti manu haha (The men laugh). When the article of the subject precedes the verb, it functions like an auxiliary verb, eg. Ti manu ti tinini (The men are many). The second tense is the past tense. "-ile" is suffixed to the verb to indicate the past tense and the same article that precedes the noun, precedes the verb and functions like an auxiliary verb such as "was" or "did", eg. Ti manu ti hahaile (The men laughed). The third tense is the future tense. No suffix is attached to the verb. Instead the word "to" precedes the verb and succeeds the article, eg. Ti manu ti to haha (The men will laugh).

Infinitives

The infinitive is attached at the end of the clause. The verbal component of the infinitive is always in the present tense. The preposition "ta" indicates the beginning of the infinitive. The article that precedes the subject also precedes the infinitive indicator "ku". together they function as the Codexian "to". Eg. Ki manu ki koraile ta ki ku tanuha mali (The men worked to make money). The phrase can be transliterated as: T "The men worked for the making of money".

Prepositions

Prepositions indicate relation. There are different words to indicate different locations, but all prepository phrases must beginning with the word "ko" and the object must be suffixed by "-eni". Eg. Ki manu ki hanu ko reatueni (The men are on the island). The preposition functions as a verb. Eg. in the past tense: Ki manu ki hanuile ko reatueni (The men were on the island). Eg. in the future tense: Ki manu ki to hanu ko reatuenu (The men will be on the island).

Pronoun

Pronouns are nouns that take the place of the subject or object:

• Singular first person: au (I or me)
• Singular second person: autu (You)
• Singular third person: autuna (Him or her)
• Singular third person (non-person): lautuna (it or that)
• Plural first person: mau (we or us)
• Plural second person: mautu (you)
• Plural third person: mautuna (them or they)
• Plural third person (non person): kautuna (them or those)

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