Wallisian language

This article is about the language of Wallis Island, "Wallisian", also known as "Fakauvea" or "East Uvean". For the similarly named language of Ouvéa, see West Uvean language. For the official language of Wales, sometimes spelled "Walesian", see Welsh language.
Wallisian
Fakaʻuvea
Native toWallis and Futuna
Native speakers
10,400 (2000)[1]
Language codes
ISO 639-3wls
Glottologwall1257
Wallisian is not endangered according to the classification system of the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger
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Wallisian, or ʻUvean (Wallisian: Fakaʻuvea), is the Polynesian language spoken on Wallis Island (also known as ʻUvea). The language is also known as East Uvean to distinguish it from the related West Uvean language spoken on the outlier island of Ouvéa near New Caledonia. The latter island was colonised from Wallis Island in the 18th century.

Indigenous to Wallis island, the language is also spoken in New Caledonia since the 1950s due to a migration of many Wallisians (especially in Nouméa, Dumbéa, La Foa, and Mont Dore).[2] According to the CIA World Factbook, it had 7,660 speakers in 2015.[3] However, Livingston (2016) states that the actual number of speakers is much higher (around 20,000), albeit difficult to count precisely.[4]

The closest language to Wallisian is Niuafoʻou.[5] It is also closely related to Tongan, though part of the Samoic branch, and has borrowed extensively from Tongan due to the Tongan invasion of the island in the 15th and 16th centuries. Uvea was settled about 3,000 years ago.[6]

  1. ^ Wallisian at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. ^ Livingston 2016, p. 1
  3. ^ "Wallisian". Ethnologue. Retrieved 2018-12-09.
  4. ^ Livingston 2016, p. 4
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference :4 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Pollock, Nancy J. Rethinking Western Polynesia, ʻUvea in the Early Tongan Empire. 1996