North and Central Vanuatu languages

Northern Vanuatu
North and Central Vanuatu
Geographic distribution:	Vanuatu
Linguistic classification:	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Southern Oceanic Northern Vanuatu
Subdivisions:	—
Ethnologue code:	2989-16

North and Central Vanuatu languages constitute a linkage within the Oceanic group, with about 95 languages. It is considered a branch of the Southern Oceanic languages.^[1]

Components

The internal structure of the linkage has been proposed as follows:^[2]

• East Santo
  • North East Santo languages
  • South East Santo languages
• Malekula Interior
  • Labo
  • Malekula Central languages
  • Small Nambas languages
• Northeast Vanuatu – Banks Islands
  • Central Vanuatu languages
  • East Vanuatu languages
  • Epi languages
  • Malekula Coastal languages
  • West Santo languages

Alternate proposal

The North and Central Vanuatu linkage, established by the comparative method, partly coincides with the Northern Vanuatu branch of the Austronesian tree, as determined by lexical cognacy rates. A 2008 analysis of the Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database,^[3] supports the following classification. Each node is fully supported, except for Santo–Malekula, which was given a 90% probability.

• Central Vanuatu
• Paama–Ambrym
  • Orkon
  • Paamese and Southeast Ambrym
• East Vanuatu (reduced)
• Santo–Malekula

The Paama–Ambrym languages have been separated from the East Vanuatu branch. The Epi languages were not covered by the 2008 analysis, but are traditionally classified with the North Vanuatu languages.

The results of this analysis, which are based exclusively on rates of cognacy in the lexicon, are not necessarily supported by the traditional comparative method, and must be taken with caution.

Notes

1. ^ See Clark 2009; Lynch et al. 2002.
2. ^ See Clark 2009.
3. ^ Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database

References

• Clark, Ross. 2009. *Leo Tuai: A comparative lexical study of North and Central Vanuatu languages. Canberra ACT.: Pacific Linguistics (Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, The Australian National University).
• Lynch, John, Malcolm Ross & Terry Crowley. 2002. The Oceanic languages. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press.