| Also Known As: Niuefekai,Niuean,Niue
Description:
The Niuean language or Niue language (Niuean: ko e vagahau Niuē) is a Polynesian language, belonging to the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian languages. It is most closely related to Tongan and slightly more distantly to other Polynesian languages such as Māori, Sāmoan, and Hawaiian. Together, Tongan and Niuean form the Tongic subgroup of the Polynesian languages. Niuean also has a number of influences from Samoan and Eastern Polynesian languages.
Niuean is spoken by 2,240 people on Niue Island (97.4% of the inhabitants) as of 1991, as well as by speakers in the Cook Islands, New Zealand, and Tonga, for a total of around 8,000 speakers. There are thus more speakers of Niuean outside the island itself than on the island. Most inhabitants of Niue are bilingual in English.
In the early 1990s 70% of the speakers of Niuean lived in New Zealand.
Niuean consists of two main dialects, the older motu dialect from the north of the island and the tafiti dialect of the south. The words mean, respectively, the people of the island and the strangers (or people from a distance).
The differences between the dialects are mainly in vocabulary or in the form of some words.
Examples of..... full article at Wikipedia |
