Blagar language
Language in Indonesia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Blagar is a Papuan language of Pantar island in the Alor archipelago of Indonesia. The Tereweng dialect spoken on Tereweng Island off the southeast coast of Pantar[2] is sometimes considered a separate language.[3] The Blagar speakers themselves describe their language as pi abaŋ hur (lit. 'our village language').[4][5]
| Blagar | |
|---|---|
| pi abaŋ hur | |
| Native to | Indonesia |
| Region | Pantar Island |
| Ethnicity | Blagar |
Native speakers | 10,000 (2014)[1] |
| Latin script | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | beu |
| Glottolog | blag1240 |
| ELP | Blagar |
Languages of the Alor Islands; Blagar is shown in yellow. | |
The increasing prominence of Indonesian and Alor Malay has been putting pressure on the Blagar language although the language is still used by all age groups.[4] By the 1970s, Indonesian and Alor Malay replaced Blagar as the language of churches and mosques, and in the early 2000s the spread of Indonesian and Alor Malay was furthered by the introduction of electricity on Pura Island.[4]
Phonology
Vowels
Blagar has five vowels, with a sharp contrast between short and long vowels.[6]
Consonants
Grammar
The morphological typology of Blagar is categorized as isolating.[8]
Writing system
Blagar uses the 26 letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet, and has two digraphs: ⟨ng⟩ and ⟨sy⟩.
⟨c⟩, ⟨q⟩, ⟨x⟩, ⟨z⟩ and ⟨sy⟩ are only used in foreign place names and loanwords.[3]
Another writing system is also used, which is phonemic and is similar to the writing system of Indonesian.[9]
