Amis (Sowal no 'Amis or Pangcah) is a Formosan language of the Amis (or Ami), an indigenous people living along the east coast of Taiwan. Currently, the largest of the Formosan languages, it is spoken from Hualien in the north to Taitung in the south, with another population in the Hengchun Peninsula near the southern end of the island, though the northern varieties are considered to be separate languages.
Government services in counties where many Amis people live in Taiwan, such as the Hualien and Taitung railway stations, broadcast in Amis alongside Mandarin. However, few Amis under the age of 20 in 1995 spoke the language. It is not known how many of the 200,000 ethnic Amis speak the language, but overall a third of the aboriginal Taiwanese population does.
Dialects
Amis is a dialect cluster. There are five dialects: Southern Amis, Tavalong-Vataan, Central Amis, Chengkung-Kwangshan, and Northern Amis (Nanshi Amis, which includes Nataoran).
Sakizaya is a moribund language spoken among the northernmost ethnic Amis but is mutually unintelligible with the Northern Amis dialect.
Phonology
The following discussion covers the central dialect of Amis.
Consonants
The voiced velar fricative /ɣ/ is in parentheses because it only occurs in some loanwords, such as rigi /riˈɣiʔ/ 'ridge between sections of a rice field'.
The epiglottal consonants have proven difficult to describe, with some sources describing them as pharyngeal or even uvular as opposed to epiglottal. It's unclear if [h] is a separate phoneme from [ʜ] or if it's just an allophone of it. The voiceless pharyngeal fricative [ħ] is a word-final allophone of /ʜ/.
The voiceless plosives /p t k ʡ/ and the affricate /t͡s/ are released in clusters, so that cecay "one" is pronounced [t͡sᵊt͡saj]; as is /s/: sepat "four" is [sᵊpatʰ]. The glottal stop is an exception, frequently having no audible release in final position. The voiced fricatives, /v ɮ ɣ/ (the latter found only in loanwords) are devoiced to [f ɬ x] in utterance-final and sometimes initial position. /ɮ/ may be interdental or post-dental. The sibilants, /t͡s s/, are optionally palatalized ([t͡ɕ ɕ]) before /i/. /j/ does not occur in word-initial position. /ɺ/ is often post-alveolar, and in final position it is released: [ʡuʡuɺ̠ᵊ] "fog".
/ɮ/ shows dramatic dialectal variation. In Fengbin, a town in the center of Amis territory, it is pronounced as a central dental fricative, [ð], whereas in the town of Kangko, only 15 km (9.3 mi) away, it is a lateral [ɮ̪]. In Northern Amis, it is a plosive [d̪], which may be laxed to [ð] intervocalically. The epiglottals are also reported to have different pronunciations in the north, but the descriptions are contradictory. In Central Amis, /ʜ/ is always voiceless and /ʡ/ is often accompanied by vibrations that suggest it involves an epiglottal trill [ʢ]. Edmondson and Elsing report that these are true epiglottals initially and medially, but in utterance-final position they are epiglotto–pharyngeal.
Sakizaya, considered to be a separate language, contrasts a voiced /z/ with voiceless /s/.
In the practical orthography, /ts/ is written ⟨c⟩, /j/ ⟨y⟩, /ʡ/ ⟨'⟩, /ʔ/ ⟨^⟩, /ɮ/ ⟨d⟩, /ŋ/ ⟨ng⟩, and /ʜ/ ⟨x⟩.
Vowels
Amis has three common vowels, /i a u/. Despite the fact that a great deal of latitude is afforded by only needing to distinguish three vowels, Amis vowels stay close to their cardinal values, though there is more movement of /a/ and /u/ toward each other (tending to the [o] range) than there is in front-vowel space (in the [e] range).
A voiceless epenthetic schwa optionally breaks up consonant clusters, as noted above. However, there are a small number of words where a short schwa (written e) may be phonemic. However, no contrast involving the schwa is known, and if it is also epenthetic, then Amis has words with no phonemic vowels at all. Examples of this e are malmes "sad", pronounced [maɺə̆mːə̆s], and ’nem "six", pronounced [ʡnə̆m] or [ʡə̆nə̆m].
Stress
Stress regularly falls on the final syllable.
Examples of words
- Compare with Tagalog baboy (pig), aso (dog), tatlo (3), apat (4), lima (5), anim (6), pito (7), walo (8)
- Compare with Kapampangan asu (dog), atlo (3), apat (4), lima (5), anam (6), pitu/pito (7), walu/walo (8), siyam (9), apulu/apulo (10) and ama (father) and ima (mother)
- Compare with Ilokano baboy(pig), aso (dog), maysa (1), dua (2), tallo (3), uppat (4), lima (5), inem (6), pito (7), walo (8), siam (9), sangapulo (10)
- Compare with Javanese lutung (monkey), babi (pig), asu (dog), siji (1), loro (2), telu (3), papat (4), lima (5), enem (6), pitu (7), wolu (8), sanga (9), sepuluh (10)
- Compare with Sundanese lutung (monkey), babi (pig), hiji (1), dua (2), tilu (3), opat (4), lima (5), genep (6), tujuh (7), dalapan (8), salapan (9), sapuluh (10)
- Compare with Malay lotong/lutung (monkey), babi (pig), satu (1), dua (2), tiga (3), empat (4), lima (5), enam (6), sembilan (9), sepuluh (10)
- Maolah kako a mimali = I like to play sports.
- Takaraw ko pita’kod = I jump very high.
- Kalamkam ko kacomikay = I run very fast.
- Ira ko tata’angay a mata ako = I have big eyes
- mamangay a ngoyos = A small mouth
- takaya’ay a fokes = long hair
- Sowal san ko kahacecay to makapahay a tamdaw kako = Everyone tells me that I am beautiful.
- Mafana’ay a miasik, misawsaw to kaysing, milidong to fodoy = I can sweep the floor, wash dishes and clothing.
- Maolah a midemak kako to tayal no loma’ = I love to do household chores.
- nawhani maolah kako to loma’ no mako = Because I love my home.
Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights translated into Pangcah:
- Chiyu mahufuchay tu tamlaw, maemin pingdeng ichunyan a kngli. Iraay chaira lishing a naay a naay a harateng, pimaulahsha u harateng nu kaka shafa.
- English: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Grammar
Verbs in the Amis language have some inflections including existential clause, active voice, passive voice, disposal sentence, imperative mood, optative mood, and prohibitive mood.
Case markers
Cases are marked by case particles.
Syntax
There are two word orders in Amis called "General" Word Order and "Special" Word Order.
Below are some examples of Amis sentence:
"General" Word Order Sentence I : Verb–subject
Example
- Maomahay ci wama. (The father is working in the field.)
- mimaomahay: working (in the field)
- ci: subject preposition for personal proper noun
- wama: father
- Misaholoay ci wina. (The mother is cooking rice.)
- misaholoay: cooking (rice)
- ina/wina: mother
"General" Word Order Sentence II : Verb–subject–object
Example
- Mifaca' ko kaying to riko'. (The young woman is washing clothes.)
- Mifaca' koya kaying to riko'. (That young woman is washing clothes.)
- mifaca': wash (clothes)
- ko: subject preposition for common nouns
- kaying: young woman
- to: object preposition for common nouns
- riko'/fudoy: clothes
Toponyms
Sing ’Olam (2011:300–301) lists the following Amis names for villages and towns in Hualien County and Taitung County of eastern Taiwan.
References
Citations
Sources
External links
- Central Amis Wordlist at the Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database
- Kaipuleohone's Robert Blust's collection includes materials on Central Amis.
- Yuánzhùmínzú yǔyán xiànshàng cídiǎn 原住民族語言線上詞典 (in Chinese) – Amis search page at the "Aboriginal language online dictionary" website of the Indigenous Languages Research and Development Foundation
- Amis teaching and learning materials published by the Council of Indigenous Peoples Archived 2022-03-27 at the Wayback Machine (in Chinese)
- Amis translation of President Tsai Ing-wen's 2016 apology to indigenous people – published on the website of the presidential office
- "amis du Nord / North-Amis". Langues et civilisations à tradition orale (LACITO) (in French and English). Archived from the original on 2021-08-06. Retrieved 2020-05-29.
