Gimi language


Gimi, also known as Labogai, is a Papuan language spoken in the Eastern Highlands Province in Papua New Guinea. 23,000 speakers speak the Gimi language.

Phonology

Gimi has 5 vowels and 12 consonants. It has voiceless and voiced glottal consonants where related languages have and. The voiceless glottal is simply a glottal stop. The voiced consonant behaves phonologically like a glottal stop, but does not have full closure. Phonetically it is a creaky-voiced glottal approximant.

Allophony

occurs word initially only in loanwords.
can surface as either or in free variation.
becomes before.
and tend to fluctuate with one another word initially.

Syllables

The syllable structure is V, where G is either or.

Tone

The final vowel of a word takes either a level or falling tone. The falling tone is written with an acute accent.

Orthography

Gimi uses the Latin script.
LetterAaBbDdEeGgHhIiKkMmNnOoPpRrSsTtUuZz
IPA