Ekari language
Trans–New Guinea language of Indonesia
title: "Ekari language" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["paniai-lakes-languages", "languages-of-western-new-guinea"] description: "Trans–New Guinea language of Indonesia" topic_path: "linguistics" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekari_language" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Trans–New Guinea language of Indonesia ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox language"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Ekari |
| nativename | Mee |
| states | Indonesia |
| region | Papua |
| ethnicity | Ekari |
| speakers | 100,000 |
| date | 1985 |
| ref | e25 |
| familycolor | Papuan |
| fam1 | Trans–New Guinea |
| fam2 | West Papuan Highlands |
| fam3 | Paniai Lakes |
| iso3 | ekg |
| glotto | ekar1243 |
| glottorefname | Ekari |
| notice | IPA |
| :: |
| name = Ekari | nativename = Mee | states = Indonesia | region = Papua | ethnicity = Ekari | speakers = 100,000 | date = 1985 | ref = e25 | familycolor = Papuan | fam1 = Trans–New Guinea | fam2 = West Papuan Highlands | fam3 = Paniai Lakes | iso3 = ekg | glotto = ekar1243 | glottorefname = Ekari | notice = IPA
::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/Moanamani.jpg" caption="A view of Moanemani, Papua"] ::
Ekari (also Ekagi, Kapauku, Mee) is a Trans–New Guinea language spoken by about 100,000 people in the Paniai lakes region of the Indonesian province of Central Papua, including the villages of Enarotali, Mapia and Moanemani. This makes it the second-most populous Papuan language in Indonesian New Guinea after Western Dani. Language use is vigorous. Documentation is quite limited.
Phonology
Consonants
::data[format=table]
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Nasal | Obstruent | plain | voiced | Approximant |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| :: |
The voiced velar affricate is pronounced with lateral release before front vowels. Doble describes both /k/ and /ɡʟ̝/ as being labialized after the back vowels (i.e., okei , euga ), with having 'varying' degrees of the lateral. Staroverov & Tebay describe as being velar lateral before front vowels and uvular non-lateral before non-front vowels.
is a "more palatalized " (perhaps or ) before the high front vowel (e.g., yina ).
Vowels
Staroverov & Tebay (2019) describe five vowel qualities plus length and diphthongs. Doble (1987) analyses the long vowels and diphthongs as sequences.
::data[format=table title="Monophthongs"]
| front | central | back | high | mid | low |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| :: |
::data[format=table title="Diphthongs"]
| front | central | back | mid | low |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ɛi ɛu | ou | |||
| ai au | ||||
| :: |
Tone
Ekari has pitch accent. One syllable in a word may have a high tone, contrasting with words without a high tone. If the vowel is long or a diphthong and not at the end of the word, the high tone is phonetically rising.
CV words have no tone contrast. CVV words may be mid/low or high. (In all of these patterns, here and following, initial C is optional.)
Words of the following shapes may have a contrastive high tone on the final syllable: CVCV, CVCVV. Words of the following shapes may have either a rising or a falling tone on the first long syllable: CVVCV, CVVCVV, CVCVVCVV, CVVCVCV (rare), CVVCVCVV (rare). The following word shapes do not have contrastive tone: CVCVCV, CVCVVCV, CVCVCVV, and words of 4 or more syllables.
References
Bibliography
References
- {{harvp. Doble. 1987
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