Tehit language


Tehit is a Papuan language of the Bird's Head Peninsula of New Guinea. Other spellings are Tahit, Tehid, and other names Kaibus, Teminabuan. The dialects are Fkar, Imyan, Mbol Fle, Saifi, Sawiat Salmeit, Sfa Riere, and Tehit Jit.

Subdivisions

Subgroups

Major Tehit ethnic subgroups:
Locations of some Tehit subgroups:
  • Tehit Mlafle and Tehit Mlakya, in Teminabuan District: Kaibus, Werisar, Keyen, Boldon, Seribau, Srer, and Sria villages.
  • Tehit Konda, in Konda District: Konda, Mnaelek, and Mbariat villages.
  • Tehit Nakya, in Saifi District: Malaswat, Manggroholo, Sira, Kwowok, Komanggaret, Sayal, Kayabo, Botaen, Sisir, and Knaya villages.
  • Tehit Imian, in Seremuk District: Gamaro, Tofot, Haha, Woloin, and Kakas villages.
  • Tehit Nasfa, in Sawiyat District: Wenslolo, Wensnahan, Wensi villages.

    Clans

Tehit clans:

Phonology

Consonants

  • Glide sounds mainly occur as a result of vowels /o, i/ in different syllable positions.
  • /q/ can be heard as a fricative when in intervocalic positions, and as a velar when in coda position within the onset of /i/.
  • /d/ can also be heard as an affricate when preceding /i/ in word segments.
  • Sounds /t, q/ are mainly unreleased in when in word-final positions.
  • Fricatives /ɸ, s/ can optionally be voiced as when within the environment of /i/, among speech.

    Vowels

  • A schwa vowel sound is said to occur only in pretonic positions, which means in syllables preceding the stressed syllable. It is always heard as unstressed, and always in between consonant sounds.
  • /i/ can be heard as when preceding a word-final /ɾ/, and as when preceding vowel sounds /a, o/ within the onset of a labial consonant.
  • /e/ can be heard as when in closed syllables.
  • /o/ may also have an allophone of when in closed syllables within a labial consonantal onset with a back coda consonant.

    Morphology

Tehit has four grammatical genders, which are masculine, feminine, plural, and neuter. Examples:
Gender prefixes in Tehit can not only be used to denote gender, but also size, wholeness, and the stability of appearances. Masculine gender is associated with small size, parts of wholes, and changing appearances, while feminine gender is associated with large size, wholeness, and stable appearances. Examples :
femininemasculine
wet ‘child’
e’ren ‘fish’
mbol ‘house’
sika ‘cat’