The Yele language, or Yélî Dnye, is the language of Rossel Island, the easternmost island in the Louisiade Archipelago off the eastern tip of Papua New Guinea. There were some 4,000 speakers in 1998, comprising the entire ethnic population. For now it is best considered unclassified. It has been classified as a tentative language isolate that may turn out to be related to the Anêm and Ata language isolates of New Britain. Typologically it is more similar to the Oceanic languages of southern New Guinea than to the isolates of New Britain. Word order tends to be SOV. Yele has been studied extensively by cognitive linguists. It has an extensive set of spatial postpositions. Yele has eleven postpositions equivalent to English on; using different ones depending factors such as whether the object is on a table, a wall, or atop a peak; whether or not it is attached to the surface; and whether it is solid or granular. Stebbins et al. classifies Yélî Dnye as an isolate. They explain similarities with Austronesian as being due to contact and diffusion.
Phonology
Yele has a uniquely rich set of doubly articulated consonants. In nearly all the languages of the world which have them, these are labial–velar consonants—that is, they are pronounced simultaneously with the lips and the back of the tongue, such as a simultaneous p and k. Only Yele is known to contrast other doubly articulated positions: besides labial–velar, it has two distinct labial–alveolar positions, as illustrated below. The two coronal articulations are laminal/dental and slightly pre-alveolar, sometimes transcribed tʸ, nʸ, etc., and apical and slightly post-alveolar, sometimes transcribed ṭ, ṇ etc., ʈ, ɳ, etc., or simply t, n, etc. There are two other doubly articulated consonants, as in lvámê and. The Yele w is labial–dental. These doubly articulated consonants contrast with labialization. Many articulations may also be palatalized. Stops may be either pre- or post-nasalized. The consonant inventory includes the following: It is not clear how many of the labial–velar and labial–alveolar consonants such as may also be labialized or palatalized. Nor is it clear how many of these articulations occur prenasalized or with nasal release, but besides those noted above, the following are noted in SIL 1992/2004:. The oral stops are voiced between vowels and when prenasalized. The alveolar is further reduced to an flap between vowels. Some of the palatalized alveolar stops are pronounced as fricatives or affricates, such as and , but SIL contradicts itself as to which these are. Yele also has many vowels, a noteworthy number of which occur nasalized: Vowels may occur long or short. SIL interprets other vowel sequences as being separated by rather than as diphthongs. Given that vowels may be long or short, Yele syllables may only be of the form vowel or consonant-vowel, and in the former case, apparently only or.
Orthography
The multigraphs for complex consonants are not always transparent. The labial-velar and labial-alveolar consonants are written with the labial second: kp, dp, tp, ngm, nm, ńm, lv. Prenasalized is written mb, but and are written nt and nk to distinguish them from nd and ng. Prenasalized stops are written with an m when labial, including doubly articulated stops, as with md or mg, and with n otherwise. Nasal release is likewise written n or m, as in dny, kn, dm, km. Labialization is written w, and palatalization y, apart from ch for and nj for . Of the vowels, only a and u occur initially. Long vowels are written doubled, and nasal vowels with a preceding colon, except forshort vowels after a nasal consonant, where vowel nasality is not contrastive.
Pronouns
Yele has two sets of pronouns: free and possessive. They are,
Sample text
Kiye w:ââ u pi Peetuuki, ka kwo, Doongê. Nê kuu. Daa a w:ââ. Nkal u w:ââ. Nkal ngê yinê kaa ngê. W:ââ dono. Pi yilî u te. U nuu u pi da tóó. Pi u lama daa tóó. M:iituwo Yidika, Mépé tp:oo mî kiye ngê. Daanté. Mépé dono ngê pyodo. Apê, W:ââ mbwámê nînê châpwo. Nkal ngê kwo, "Up:o". W:ââ mî mbêpê wo, chii mênê. Mépé ngê w:ââ mbwámê mêdîpê châpwo. Awêde ka kwo, Doongê. Pi maa daa t:a. A danêmbum u dî. "The savage dog is called "Peetuuki", and he lives at Doongê. It's nothing to do with me. It's not my dog. It's Nkal's dog. He raised it. It's a bad dog. It bites everyone. It doesn't like anyone. Recently it bit Mépé's son, Yidika. It really bit him hard. Mépé became very angry, and said, 'I'm going to kill that dog'. The dog ran away into the bush, so Mépé could not kill it. So now it's still there at Doongê, so there's not a safe road through there. That's the end of my story."
