Archive:Ame language

Language family	Chasumic? Hux Kham-Ame? Ame languages East Ame languages '
CWS code	–

Ame language is a language spoken by the human ethnic group Ya Amo people, it is the official language of Kema Mi Amo.

The only known relative to the Ame language is the Aves language spoken in Ceza and Delyzan of Faźulavaz.

The word "Ame" means "Ame diver" or "Mermaid" in the Ame language.

Classification

The Ame language doesn't appear to be related to any other known languages in Sahar, therefore, most linguists classify it as an language isolate.

However, some linguists argue that the Ame language is distantly related to the Hux Kham language spoken by the Hux Kham people in Southwestern Miraria, however, this claim is highly controversial, as there are few possible cognates between the Hux Kham language and the Ame language, although recent researches have shown that the Hux Kham people are most similar to the Ya Amo people genetically.

Phonology

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio-dental	Dental	Alveolar	Post-alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyngeal	Epiglottal	Glottal
Nasal	m			n				ŋ
Plosive	b			t d				k
Fricative				s z								h
Affricate
Approximant							j	w
Trill
Flap or tap
Lateral fric.
Lateral app.
Lateral flap				ɺ

Vowels

	Front	Near-front	Central	Near-back	Back
Close	i
Near-close
Close-mid
Mid	e				o
Open-mid
Near-open
Open			a

Vowels can be either long or short.

Grammar

Morphology

Nouns

Nouns inflects for definiteness and plurality, however, the use of nominal inflections is largely literal, in colloquial speech, the plural form and inflected article have become obsolete, the colloquial speech doesn't have distinct plural forms and uses a separate definite article.

one adds the suffix -da to form the definite singular form of a noun; one lengthens the final vowel to form the indefinite plural form of a noun, and adds the suffix -sada to form the definite plural form of a noun.

Besides the definite suffix -da, there's also a separate definite article da, the separate article da is invariable, it is used no matter the number of the noun it modifies.

The word e can be used as an indefinite article, when it is used as an indefinite article, it precedes the noun it modifies.

When there is a quantifier, including numerals and other words that indicate the quantity, the plural forms are not used.

The Ame language has no grammatical gender, it uses natural gender, and unlike many languages where there are suffixes indicating the female counterpart of a noun, in the Ame language, there is a suffix for the male counterpart of a noun instead, the females are usually less marked than their male counterparts.

In the Ame language, the suffix -to can be used to indicate the male counterpart of a noun indicating a person:

• hei - girl
  • heito - boy

• he - child
  • heto - boy

• ha - mother
  • hato - father

• ame - ame diver, mermaid
  • ameto - male diver who makes a living by collecting resources underwater, merman

• yanona - farmer
  • uanonato - male farmer

• teimari - queen
  • teimarito - king

Verbs

Verbs inflects for tense and aspect, there are two tenses: the past tense and the non-past tense; also, there are two aspects: perfective and imperfective.

Like the nominal inflections, the use of verbal inflections is primary literal, however, compared to the nominal inflections, the verbal inflections are slightly more productive, but there is also a tendency to apply the imperfective non-past form for all situations in colloquial speech.

The non-past tense is used to indicate a present or future activity; the past tense is used to indicate an activity occured in the past.

The imperfective aspect is used for a continuous, progressing, habitual, non-resultative or iterative activity or states; the perfective aspect is used to indicate an activity that has ended or will end in the future; also, the perfective aspect indicates an activity occured in the past or a future activity, it never indicates an ongoing activity.

The imperfective non-past form is roughly similar to the present or present continuous tense of English; the perfective non-past form is roughly similar to the future tense of English; the imperfective past form is roughly similar to the past progressive tense of English; the perfective past form is roughly similar to the simple past tense of English.

One adds the prefix ya- to the verb stem to form the past tense; one adds the suffix -ta to the verb stem to form the perfective aspect, and in case the verb ends with a short -o, the -o is replaced with -a and is then followed by the perfective suffix -ta

Adjectives

Adjectives are basically intransitive stative verbs.

Attributive adjectives are formed in the same way of relative clauses for intransitive verb, that is, the adjective can optionally be introduced by the relativizer da, and when the noun modified by the adjective is definite, the separate article da is used instead of the definite suffixes -da and -sada. For example:

• e hei aki - a smart girl
• e hei da aki - a smart girl
• da hei aki - the smart girl
• da hei da aki - the smart girl
• e neme hami - a long way
• e neme da hami - a long way
• da neme hami - the long way
• da neme da hami - the long way

Syntax

• Sentential word order: Subject-Verb-Object(SVO)
• Adpositions are prepositions
• Adjectives, demonstratives, numerals, possessors and relative clauses follow the noun they modify, non-affix articles precede the noun they modify.
• The negation word ne precedes the word or phrase it negates.