Uripiv language

For Wala of the Solomon Islands, see Langalanga language.

Uripiv
Uripiv-Wala-Rano-Atchin
Native to	Vanuatu
Region	Malakula
Native speakers	9,000 (2001)
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Southern Oceanic North Vanuatu Northeast–Banks Islands Malekula Coastal Uripiv
Language codes
ISO 639-3	upv
Glottolog	urip1239

Uripiv is a dialect of the language spoken on the north-east coast of Malakula. The language is referred to as Northeast Malakula, or Uripiv-Wala-Rano-Atchin, and is spoken on the islands of Uripiv, Wala, Rano and Atchin and on the mainland opposite to these islands. Uripiv-Wala-Rano-Atchin is spoken today by about 9,000 people. Literacy rate of its speakers in their own language is 10–30%.

Uripiv-Wala-Rano-Atchin forms a dialect chain. The Uripiv dialect is the most southerly of these, and has 85% of its words in common with Atchin, the most northerly dialect.

The Uripiv dialect is one of the few documented languages that use the rare bilabial trill, a feature that is not found in the Atchin dialect.

Further Reading

• Duhamel, Marie (2015) Ethnolinguistic vitality of the language of Atchin, central Vanuatu: A survey of the language's status, institutional support and demography. Fourth International Workshop on the Sociolinguistics of Language Endangerment. Payap University.