| Description:
Araki is a nearly extinct language spoken in the small island of Araki, south of Espiritu Santo Island in Vanuatu. The local name of the island is [ˈɾaki]. Araki language is named after the island, on which it is spoken.
Araki language belongs to the Oceanic group of Austronesian languages, and is often designated as a Melanesian language. More precisely, Araki language belongs to the set of 'North and Central Vanuatu languages'.
Araki is spoken today by about 8 native speakers; it is progressively being replaced by the neighbouring language of Tangoa. The rest of the population of Araki island have a passive knowledge of Araki language, which allows them to understand it, and even make whole phrases and sentences. Nevertheless, a large portion of the Arakian vocabulary, as well as idiosyncratic syntactic and phonetic phenomena of the language have been forgotten. Speakers of Araki can also speak the English-based pidgin Bislama; but this lingua franca is mainly used in the two towns of the country, Port-Vila and Luganville, and seldom in rural areas.
Araki was described in 2002 by the linguist Alexandre François.
Araki language has a phonological inventory of 16 consonant phonemes..... full article at Wikipedia |
