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Malayo-Polynesian languages
 
 
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The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages
Austronesian languages

The Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Maritime Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia....
, with approximately 351 million speakers. These are widely dispersed throughout the island nations of Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia or Southeastern Asia is a subregion of Asia, consisting of the countries that are geographically south of China, east of India and north of Australia....
 and the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. Its name is derived from the Latin name Mare Pacificum, "peaceful sea", bestowed upon it by the Portugal explorer Ferdinand Magellan....
, with a smaller number in continental Asia
Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent. It covers 8.6% of the Earth's total surface area and, with over 4 billion people, it contains more than 60% of the world's current human population....
. Malagasy
Malagasy language

This article is about the Malagasy language. For the Malagasy ethnic group, see Malagasy people. For the residents or citizens of Madagascar, see Demographics of Madagascar...
 is a geographic outlier, spoken in the island of Madagascar
Madagascar

Madagascar, or Republic of Madagascar , is an island nation in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa. The main island, also called Madagascar, is the List of islands by area, and is home to 5% of the world's plant and animal species, of which more than 80% are Endemism to Madagascar....
 in the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering about 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by Asia ; on the west by Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean ....
.

A characteristic of the Malayo-Polynesian languages is a tendency to use reduplication
Reduplication

Reduplication, in linguistics, is a morphology process by which the root or Stem of a word, or part of it, is repeated.Reduplication is used in inflections to convey a grammatical function, such as plurality, intensification, etc., and in lexical Derivation to create new words....
 (repetition of all or part of a word --e.g., wiki-wiki) to express the plural, and like other Austronesian languages they have simple phonologies
Phonology

Phonology is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use. Just as a language has syntax and vocabulary, it also has a phonology in the sense of a sound system....
; thus a text has few but frequent sounds.






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The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages
Austronesian languages

The Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Maritime Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia....
, with approximately 351 million speakers. These are widely dispersed throughout the island nations of Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia or Southeastern Asia is a subregion of Asia, consisting of the countries that are geographically south of China, east of India and north of Australia....
 and the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. Its name is derived from the Latin name Mare Pacificum, "peaceful sea", bestowed upon it by the Portugal explorer Ferdinand Magellan....
, with a smaller number in continental Asia
Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent. It covers 8.6% of the Earth's total surface area and, with over 4 billion people, it contains more than 60% of the world's current human population....
. Malagasy
Malagasy language

This article is about the Malagasy language. For the Malagasy ethnic group, see Malagasy people. For the residents or citizens of Madagascar, see Demographics of Madagascar...
 is a geographic outlier, spoken in the island of Madagascar
Madagascar

Madagascar, or Republic of Madagascar , is an island nation in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa. The main island, also called Madagascar, is the List of islands by area, and is home to 5% of the world's plant and animal species, of which more than 80% are Endemism to Madagascar....
 in the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering about 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by Asia ; on the west by Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean ....
.

A characteristic of the Malayo-Polynesian languages is a tendency to use reduplication
Reduplication

Reduplication, in linguistics, is a morphology process by which the root or Stem of a word, or part of it, is repeated.Reduplication is used in inflections to convey a grammatical function, such as plurality, intensification, etc., and in lexical Derivation to create new words....
 (repetition of all or part of a word --e.g., wiki-wiki) to express the plural, and like other Austronesian languages they have simple phonologies
Phonology

Phonology is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use. Just as a language has syntax and vocabulary, it also has a phonology in the sense of a sound system....
; thus a text has few but frequent sounds. The majority also lack consonant clusters (e.g., [str] or [mpt] in English). Most also have only a small set of spoken vowels, five being a common number.

Classification

The Malayo-Polynesian languages share several phonological and lexical innovations with the Eastern Formosan languages, including the leveling of proto-Austronesian
Proto-Austronesian language

Vocabulary...
 *t, *C to /t/ and *n, *N to /n/, a shift of *S to /h/, and vocabulary such as *lima "five" which are not attested in other Formosan languages.

Malayo-Polynesian is divided into Western
Western Malayo-Polynesian languages

The Western Malayo-Polynesian languages, also known as the Hesperonesian languages, are those Malayo-Polynesian languages which are not in the Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages branch....
 ("Hesperonesian") and Central-Eastern
Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages

The family of Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages is a branch of the Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages. It consists of over 700 languages....
 branches. The Western branch is a geographic grouping of unclear linguistic status; it is defined as those Malayo-Polynesian languages which fall outside of the Central-Eastern branch. In some recent classifications, some of its languages are split off in an "Outer" group as a primary branch of Malayo-Polynesian, and the rest retained in an "Inner" group within a Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian
Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages

The Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages that are thought to have dispersed from a possible homeland in Sulawesi....
 branch. These Inner and Outer groups may also be called the Borneo-Philippines languages
Borneo-Philippines languages

The Borneo-Philippines languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages which includes the languages of the Philippines, much of Borneo, the northern peninsula of Sulawesi, and Madagascar....
 and Sunda-Sulawesi languages
Sunda-Sulawesi languages

The Sunda-Sulawesi languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages posited in Wouk and Ross . They include most of the languages of Sulawesi and the Greater Sunda Islands, as well as a few outliers such as Chamorro language and Palauan language....
, after their geographic spread.

Borneo-Philippines
Borneo-Philippines languages

The Borneo-Philippines languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages which includes the languages of the Philippines, much of Borneo, the northern peninsula of Sulawesi, and Madagascar....
, Outer Western Malayo-Polynesian, or Outer Hesperonesian languages

These languages are spoken by about 130 million speakers and include Tagalog
Tagalog language

Tagalog is one of the major languages used in the Philippines. It is a basis for the Filipino language, which is the principal language of the national television and radio, though broadsheet newspapers are almost completely in English....
, Cebuano
Cebuano language

Cebuano is an Austronesian language language spoken in the Philippines by about 20 million people. It is the largest member of the Visayan languages, and is also referred to as "Visayan"....
, Ilokano
Ilokano language

Ilokano is the third most-spoken language of the Republic of the Philippines.An Austronesian languages, it is related to such languages as Indonesian language, Malay language, Fijian language, Maori language , Hawaiian language, Malagasy language , Samoan language, Tahitian language, Chamorro language , Tetum , and Paiwan language ....
, Hiligaynon
Hiligaynon language

Hiligaynon is an Austronesian language spoken in Western Visayas in the Philippines. Hiligaynon is concentrated in the provinces of Iloilo and Negros Occidental....
, Bikolano
Bikol language

Central Bicolano , is one of the individual languages of the Bikol language , which in is part of the group of Bikol languages. It belongs to Coastal Bikol....
, Kapampangan
Kapampangan language

Kapampangan is one of the major languages of the Philippines. It is the major language spoken by the people in Pampanga. The language is also called Pampango, Capampan?gan, Pampangue?o, and Amanung Sisuan....
, Waray-Waray
Waray-Waray language

W?ray-W?ray or War?y is a language spoken in the provinces of Samar Province, Northern Samar, Eastern Samar, Leyte province , and Biliran in the Philippines....
, and Malagasy
Malagasy language

This article is about the Malagasy language. For the Malagasy ethnic group, see Malagasy people. For the residents or citizens of Madagascar, see Demographics of Madagascar...
.

Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages
Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages

The Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages that are thought to have dispersed from a possible homeland in Sulawesi....


;Sunda-Sulawesi
Sunda-Sulawesi languages

The Sunda-Sulawesi languages are a branch of the Austronesian languages posited in Wouk and Ross . They include most of the languages of Sulawesi and the Greater Sunda Islands, as well as a few outliers such as Chamorro language and Palauan language....
, Inner Western Malayo-Polynesian, or Inner Hesperonesian languages

These languages are spoken by about 230 million speakers and include Indonesian Malay
Indonesian language

Indonesian is the official national language of Indonesia. It is based on a version of Malay language from the Riau islands in western Indonesia, today called Riau Indonesian....
, Malaysian Malay
Malay language

The Malay language is an Austronesian languages spoken by the Malays and people of other ethnic groups who reside in Peninsular Malaysia, southern Thailand, Singapore, central eastern Sumatra, the Riau Islands and parts of the coast of Borneo....
, Sundanese
Sundanese language

Sundanese is the language of about 27 million people from the western third of Java or about 15% of the Indonesian population.It is classified within the Austronesian languages - Malayo-Polynesian languages - Western Malayo-Polynesian languages - Sundic language family and has several dialects based on the locations of the people:...
, Javanese
Javanese language

Javanese is the language of the people in the central and eastern parts of the island of Java, in Indonesia. In addition, there are also some pockets of Javanese speakers in the northern coast of western Java....
, Acehnese
Acehnese language

Acehnese or Aceh is a Malayo-Polynesian languages language spoken in Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia and Bota, Perak, Malaysia....
, Chamorro
Chamorro language

It is an agglutinative language, grammatically allowing root words to be modified by an unlimited number of affixes. For example, masanganen?aihon "talked awhile ", passivizing prefix ma-, root verb sangan, directional suffix i "to" with excrescent consonant n, and suffix ?aihon "a short amount of time"....
, and Palau (Belau)
Palauan language

Palauan is one of the two nationally recognized official languages spoken in the Palau . It is a member of the Austronesian languages, and is considered to be one of two languages in Micronesia belonging to the Western Malayo-Polynesian languages group; all others are considered to be members of either the Micronesian languages or Samoic la...
.

;Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages
Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages

The family of Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages is a branch of the Nuclear Malayo-Polynesian languages. It consists of over 700 languages....
 These include Gilbertese, Nauruan
Nauruan

Nauruan may refer to:* Something of, from, or related to the country of Nauru* Nauruan people, persons from Nauru, or of Nauruan descent. For more information see Demographics of Nauru and Culture of Nauru....
, Romang
Romang language

Roma or Romang is a Malayo-Polynesian languages spoken by about 1,700 people in Jersusu village on Roma Island in Maluku, Indonesia....
, Hawaiian
Hawaiian language

The Hawaiian language is an Austronesian languages that takes its name from Hawaii , the largest island in the tropical North Pacific archipelago where it developed....
, Maori
Maori language

Maori or te reo Maori, also commonly shortened to te reo , functions as one of the official languages of New Zealand. Linguists classify it within the Eastern Polynesian languages as closely related to Cook Islands Maori, Tuamotuan language and Tahitian language; somewhat less closely to Hawaiian language and Marquesan language; a...
, Samoan
Samoan language

The Samoan or Samoan language is the traditional language of Samoa and American Samoa and is an official language—alongside English language—in both jurisdictions....
, Tahitian
Tahitian language

Tahitian, a Tahitic languages, is one of the two official languages of French Polynesia . It is an Eastern Polynesian language closely related to Rarotongan language, Maori language, and Hawaiian language....
, Tongan
Tongan language

Tongan is an Austronesian languages language spoken in Tonga. It has around 100,000 speakers and is a national language of Tonga. It is a Verb Subject Object language....
, and Tuvaluan
Tuvaluan language

Tuvaluan is a Nuclear Polynesian languages of the Ellicean languages spoken in Tuvalu. It is more or less distantly related to all other Polynesian languages, such as Hawaiian language, Maori language, Tahitian language, Samoan language, and Tongan language, and most closely related to the languages spoken on the Polynesian Outliers in Micron...
.

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