| Iatmul | |
|---|---|
| gepmakudi | |
| Native to | Papua New Guinea |
| Region | Sepik River basin |
| Ethnicity | Iatmul people |
Native speakers | 8,400 (2003)[1] |
Sepik
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | ian |
| Glottolog | iatm1242 |
| ELP | Iatmul |
Iatmul is the language of the Iatmul people, spoken around the Sepik River in the East Sepik Province, northern Papua New Guinea.[2] The Iatmul, however, do not refer to their language by the term Iatmul, but call it gepmakudi ("village language", from gepma = "village" and kudi "speech"; pronounced as [ŋɡɛpmaɡundi]).
There are about 8,400 Iatmul traditionally organized in villages, whereas a total amount of 46,000 speakers is estimated.[3] The inhabitants of the villages are trilingual, being fluent with Tok Pisin, good with Iatmul and having some knowledge of English. Tok Pisin is also the first language of the youngest children, despite efforts to reverse this trend.[4]
An extensive grammar of Iatmul has been recently written by Gerd Jendraschek as a postdoctoral thesis.[2]
- ^ Iatmul at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ^ a b Jendraschek 2012, p. 1.
- ^ Jendraschek 2012, p. 3.
- ^ Jendraschek 2012, pp. 8f.