Kirikiri language

Kirikiri
Faia
Native to	Indonesia
Region	Doufo District, Puncak Regency, Papua
Native speakers	(250 cited 1982)
Language family	Lakes Plain Tariku Kirikiri
Language codes
ISO 639-3	kiy
Glottolog	kiri1256
ELP

Kirikiri (Kirira), or Faia (after its two dialects), is a Lakes Plain language of Irian Jaya, Indonesia. It is spoken in Dofu Wahuka and Paniai villages.

Phonology

Kirikiri does not have many consonant phonemes, but there are many consonant allophones:

		Labial	Coronal	Velar
Stop/Fricative	voiceless		t [t ~ d]	k [k ~ g ~ x ~ ɣ]
	voiced	b [b ~ m ~ ᵐb ~ β]	d [d ~ n ~ ⁿd ~ l ~ ɾ]
Obstruent		ɸ [ɸ ~ p ~ β ~ h] <f>	s [s ~ ʃ ~ z ~ ʒ]

Kirikiri, like Doutai, has the fricativized high vowels iʼ and uʼ. There are 7 vowels:

	Front	Back
Fricated	iʼ <i>	uʼ <y>
Close	i <ɨ>	u
Mid	e	o
Open	a

Other sources analyse the vowel phonemes differently. One analysis published by SIL Global describes the fricativized high vowels as /i/ and /u/, analyze the close vowels as /e/ and /o/, and transcribes the mid vowels as /ɛ/ and /ɔ/.

A set of two vowels at the same tone will diphthonize, but a set of two vowels with different tones will not. Instances of /u/ between vowels or between /k/ and a vowel are realized as [w].

Kirikiri has four tones: low, high, falling, and rising. The low tone is marked V̀, the high tone is marked V́, the falling tone is marked V́V̀, and the rising tone is marked V̀V́. The syllable structure is (C)(C)V, but some speakers pronounce CCV syllables as CəCV.

Orthography

Kirikiri does not have a universally accepted orthography, but SIL Global has created one.

Letter-to-sound correspondances (consonants)

Letter	Context	IPA
f	word initially and word medially between vowels	freely fluctuates between [ɸ], [h], and [f]
	intervocalically	fluctuates between [β] and [ħ]
t	word initially	[t]
	before a phonetic flap and intervocalically	[d]
k	word initially and word medially between vowels	[k]
	between voiced segments	fluctuates between [g] and [ɣ]
	between vowels	[x]
b	word initially before other phonemes and word medially between vowels	[b]
	intervocalically	fluctuates between [β] and [w]
	before [a]	fluctuates between [m] and [ᵐb]
d	word initially	fluctuates between [d], [n], and [ⁿd]
	word medially	fluctuates between [l] and [ɾ]
s	word initially and word medially between vowels	[s]
	intervocalically before other vowels	fluctuates between [s] and [z]
	intervocalically before [iʼ]	fluctuates between [ʃ] and [ʒ]