Niuafo'ou language
Encyclopedia
Niuafoouan is the language spoken on Tonga
Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...

's northernmost island, Niuafoou
Niuafo'ou
Niuafoou is the most northerly island in the kingdom of Tonga. It is a volcanic rim island of 15 km² and with a population of 650 in 2006.-Geography:...

.

Niuafoouan has traditionally been classified as closest to Uvean
Fakauvea
Wallisian or Uvean is the Polynesian language spoken on Wallis Island . The language is also known as East Uvean to distinguish it from the related West Uvean spoken on the outlier island of Ouvéa...

 and Tokelauan
Tokelauan language
Tokelauan is a Polynesian language closely related to Tuvaluan.-Speakers:It is spoken by about 1,500 people on the atolls of Tokelau, and by the few inhabitants of Swains Island in neighbouring American Samoa. It is a member of the Samoic family of Polynesian languages. It is, alongside English,...

, in an East Uvean–Niuafo'ou branch. Others suggest that it is closest to its neighbor, Tongan
Tongan language
Tongan is an Austronesian language spoken in Tonga. It has around 200,000 speakers and is a national language of Tonga. It is a VSO language.-Related languages:...

, as one of the Tongic languages
Tongic languages
The family of Tongic languages is a small group of the Polynesian languages. It consists of at least two languages, Tongan and Niuean, and possibly a third, Niuafoʻouan.-External links:*...

. However, both groupings have been abandoned in the most recent classification, which did not include Niuafoouan.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK