Car language

Car
Car
Pū
Pronunciation	[puː]
Native to	India
Region	Nicobar Islands
Native speakers	37,000 (2005)
Language family	Austroasiatic Nicobarese Car; ;
Writing system	Latin script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	caq
Glottolog	carn1240
ELP	Car Nicobarese
	Car Car
	Coordinates: 9°11′N 92°46′E / 9.19°N 92.77°E

Car (Pū) is the most widely spoken Nicobarese language of the Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal.

Although a member of the Austroasiatic language family, it is typologically much more akin to nearby Austronesian languages such as Nias and Acehnese, with which it forms a linguistic area.^[2] Car is a VOS language and somewhat agglutinative.^[3] There is a quite complicated verbal suffix system with some infixes, as well as distinct genitive and "interrogative" cases for nouns and pronouns.^[4]

Phonology

Consonants

	Labial	Alveolar/ Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	p	t	c	k	ʔ
Nasal	m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Fricative	f v	s			h
Tap		ɾ ɽ
Approximant		l	j

The alveolar flap can typically be pre-stopped. Before a voiceless consonant, its pre-articulation is voiceless as [ᵗɾ], and elsewhere it is voiced [ᵈɾ].

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	ɨ	u
Close-mid	e	ɤ	o
Open-mid	ɛ	ə	ɔ
Open	(æ)	a

/æ/ only occurs in English loanwords.
Vowel sounds are also typically short when occurring before an /h/.^[5]

Vocabulary

Paul Sidwell (2017)^[6] published in ICAAL 2017 conference on Nicobarese languages.


Word	Car	proto-Nicobarese
hot	taɲ	*taɲ
four	fɛːn	*foan
child	kuːn	*kuːn
lip	(minuh)	*manuːɲ
dog	ʔam	*ʔam
night	hatəːm	*hatəːm
male	koːɲ	*koːɲ
ear	naŋ	*naŋ
one	heŋ	*hiaŋ
belly	(ʔac)	*ʔac
sun	(tavuːj)	-
sweet	(pacaːka)	-
overflow	tareːci	*roac
nose	mɛh	*moah
breast	tɛh	*toah
to cough	ʔɛhɛ	*ʔoah
arm	kɛl	*koal
in, inside	ʔɛl	*ʔoal
elbow	sikɔŋ	*keaŋ

Morphology

Shared morphological alternations: the old AA causative has two allomorphs, prefix ha- with monosyllabic stems, infix -um- in disyllabic stems (note: *p > h onset in unstressed σ).

ɲa - 'to eat' / haɲaː 'to feed'
pɯɲ - 'to cry' / hapɯɲ-ɲɔː 'to make cry'
kucik - 'be palatable' / kumcik 'to taste'
kale - 'brave' / kumle 'bravery'

References

^ Car at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^ Cysouw, Michael; Quantitative explorations of the world-wide distribution of rare characteristics, or: the exceptionality of north-western European languages Archived 2009-05-14 at the Wayback Machine; pp. 11-12
^ WALS: Nicobarese
^ Whitehead, Rev. G.; Dictionary of the Car (Nicobarese) language; published 1925 by American Baptist Mission Press; pp. xxvi-xxxii
^ Sidwell, Paul (2015). Car Nicobarese. The Handbook of Austroasiatic Languages: Leiden: Brill. pp. 1231–1240.
^ Sidwell, Paul. 2017. "Proto-Nicobarese Phonology, Morphology, Syntax: work in progress". International Conference on Austroasiatic Linguistics 7, Kiel, Sept 29-Oct 1, 2017.

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

[2] Cysouw, Michael; Quantitative explorations of the world-wide distribution of rare characteristics, or: the exceptionality of north-western European languages Archived 2009-05-14 at the Wayback Machine; pp. 11-12

[3] WALS: Nicobarese

[4] Whitehead, Rev. G.; Dictionary of the Car (Nicobarese) language; published 1925 by American Baptist Mission Press; pp. xxvi-xxxii

[5] Sidwell, Paul (2015). Car Nicobarese. The Handbook of Austroasiatic Languages: Leiden: Brill. pp. 1231–1240.

[Sidwell2017-6] Sidwell, Paul. 2017. "Proto-Nicobarese Phonology, Morphology, Syntax: work in progress". International Conference on Austroasiatic Linguistics 7, Kiel, Sept 29-Oct 1, 2017.

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