Torres–Banks languages

The Torres–Banks languages form a linkage of Southern Oceanic languages spoken in the Torres Islands and Banks Islands of northern Vanuatu.

Languages

François recognizes 17 languages spoken by 9,400 people in 50 villages, including 16 living and one extinct language.
The 17 languages, ranked from northwest to southeast, are:

Comparative studies

A. François has published several studies comparing various features of the Torres–Banks languages:

François (2005): Inventories of vowel systems, and their historical development;
François (2007): Systems of noun articles, and their historical development;
François (2009): How several languages grammaticalized a set of light personal pronouns into markers for “aorist” aspect;
François (2011): How Torres–Banks languages tend to show structural isomorphism, yet lexical diversity;
François (2013): Etymological reconstruction of spiritual terms in Torres–Banks languages;
François (2015): Systems of geocentric space directionals, and their historical development;
François (2016): Historical morphology of personal pronouns.

François (2012) is a sociolinguistic study of the area.

Genealogical structure of the Torres–Banks linkage

The internal structure of the Torres–Banks linkage was assessed based on the Comparative method, and presented in the framework of historical glottometry.
Kalyan & François (2018: 81) identified the following best-supported subgroups :

Mwotlap – Volow
Hiw – Lo-Toga
Vurës – Mwesen
Lemerig – Vera'a
Koro – Olrat – Lakon
Dorig – Koro – Olrat – Lakon
Olrat – Lakon
Lehali – Löyöp – Mwotlap – Volow
15 Banks languages together

It is possible that the strict common ancestor of any two members of the Torres–Banks linkage is Proto-Oceanic itself. Evidence of this is found in the irregular preservation of final consonants in Lakon in some words, consonants which were lost in most other languages.

Proto-language

The common ancestor of all Torres-Banks languages is called Proto-Torres–Banks, viewed here as a mutually-intelligible chain of dialects within the Torres and Banks islands.