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Oceanic languages
 
 
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The Oceanic 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....
, containing approximately 450 languages. The area occupied by speakers of these languages includes Polynesia
Polynesia

Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising a large grouping of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean....
 as well as much of Melanesia
Melanesia

Melanesia literally means "islands of the black-skinned people". It is a subregion of Oceania extending from the western side of the West Pacific to the Arafura Sea, north and northeast of Australia....
 and Micronesia
Micronesia

Micronesia , from the Greek language mikros and nesos , is a subregion of Oceania, comprising hundreds of small islands in the Pacific Ocean....
.

Covering a vast area, Oceanic languages are spoken by over two million people. The largest individual Oceanic languages are 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....
, with over 800,000 speakers, and Eastern Fijian
Fijian language

Fijian is an Austronesian languages language of the Malayo-Polynesian languages spoken in Fiji. It has 350,000 first-language speakers, which is less than half the population of Fiji, but another 200,000 speak it as a second language....
 with over 500,000 speakers. Kiribati (Gilbertese), 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....
, 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....
, 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...
 and Kuanua
Kuanua language

Kuanua is spoken by the Tolai people of Papua New Guinea, who live on the Gazelle Peninsula in East New Britain Province. Unlike many languages in Papua New Guinea, Kuanua is a healthy language and not in danger of dying out to Tok Pisin, although even Kuanua suffers from a surfeit of loanwords from Tok Pisin, e.g....
 (Tolai) each have over 100,000 speakers.

The common ancestor which is reconstructed for this group of languages is called Proto Oceanic (abbr.






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The Oceanic 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....
, containing approximately 450 languages. The area occupied by speakers of these languages includes Polynesia
Polynesia

Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising a large grouping of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean....
 as well as much of Melanesia
Melanesia

Melanesia literally means "islands of the black-skinned people". It is a subregion of Oceania extending from the western side of the West Pacific to the Arafura Sea, north and northeast of Australia....
 and Micronesia
Micronesia

Micronesia , from the Greek language mikros and nesos , is a subregion of Oceania, comprising hundreds of small islands in the Pacific Ocean....
.

Covering a vast area, Oceanic languages are spoken by over two million people. The largest individual Oceanic languages are 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....
, with over 800,000 speakers, and Eastern Fijian
Fijian language

Fijian is an Austronesian languages language of the Malayo-Polynesian languages spoken in Fiji. It has 350,000 first-language speakers, which is less than half the population of Fiji, but another 200,000 speak it as a second language....
 with over 500,000 speakers. Kiribati (Gilbertese), 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....
, 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....
, 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...
 and Kuanua
Kuanua language

Kuanua is spoken by the Tolai people of Papua New Guinea, who live on the Gazelle Peninsula in East New Britain Province. Unlike many languages in Papua New Guinea, Kuanua is a healthy language and not in danger of dying out to Tok Pisin, although even Kuanua suffers from a surfeit of loanwords from Tok Pisin, e.g....
 (Tolai) each have over 100,000 speakers.

The common ancestor which is reconstructed for this group of languages is called Proto Oceanic (abbr. POc). The Oceanic languages were first shown to be a language family
Language family

A language family is a group of languages related Genetic from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with Alpha taxonomy, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics....
 by Sidney Herbert Ray
Sidney Herbert Ray

Sidney Herbert Ray was a comparative linguistics and descriptive linguistics linguist specialized in Melanesian languages. In 1892 he read an important paper The languages of British New Guinea to the Ninth International Congress of Orientalists in which he established for the first time the distinction between the Austronesian languag...
 in 1896.

Classification


  • St Matthias
    St. Matthias languages

    The family of St. Matthias languages is a subgroup of the Oceanic languages spoken in the St. Matthias Islands. It consists of 2 languages, Mussau-Emira language and Tenis language....
  • Yapese
    Yapese language

    Yapese is a language spoken by 6,600 people on the island of Yap .It belongs to the Austronesian languages, more specifically to the Oceanic languages....
     
  • Admiralties
    Admiralty Island languages

    The family of Admiralty Island languages is a subgroup of the Oceanic languages. It consists of 31 languages....
    • Western Admiralties
      Western Admiralty Island languages

      The family of Western Admiralty Island languages is a subgroup of the Admiralty Island languages. It consists of 3 languages, Kaniet language, Seimat language and Wuvulu-Aua language....
    • Eastern Admiralties
      Eastern Admiralty Island languages

      The family of Eastern Admiralty Island languages is a subgroup of the Admiralty Island languages. It consists of 28 languages.Components...
  • Western Oceanic linkage
    Western Oceanic languages

    The family of Western Oceanic languages is a subgroup of the Oceanic languages. It consists of over 200 languages....
     (languages of the north coast of New Guinea, from Jayapura
    Jayapura

    Jayapura City is the capital of Papua province, Indonesia, on the island of New Guinea. It is situated on Yos Sudarso Bay . Its approximate population in 2002 was 200,000....
     to the Solomon Islands
    Solomon Islands

    For the group of islands rather than the nation, see Solomon Islands .The Solomon Islands is a country in Melanesia, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands....
    )
    • Sarmi-Jayapura Bay
      Sarmi-Jayapura Bay languages

      The family of Sarmi-Jayapura Bay languages is a branch of the North New Guinea languages. It consists of 13 languages spoken in Papua province of Indonesia....
    • North New Guinea cluster
      North New Guinea languages

      The family of North New Guinea languages of Papua New Guinea and Indonesia is a branch of the Western Oceanic languages. It consists of over 100 languages....
    • Papuan Tip cluster
      Papuan Tip languages

      The family of Papuan Tip languages is a branch of the Western Oceanic languages. It consists of over 60 languages....
    • Meso-Melanesian cluster
      Meso-Melanesian languages

      The family of Meso Melanesian languages is a subgroup of the Western Oceanic languages. It consists of over 60 languages....
       (languages of the Bismarck Archipelago
      Bismarck Archipelago

      The Bismarck Archipelago is a group of islands off the northeastern coast of New Guinea in the western Pacific Ocean and part of Papua New Guinea....
       and Solomon Islands
      Solomon Islands

      For the group of islands rather than the nation, see Solomon Islands .The Solomon Islands is a country in Melanesia, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands....
      )
  • Temotu
    Temotu languages

    The Temoto languages, named after Temotu Province of the Solomon Islands, are a branch of Oceanic languages proposed in Ross & N?ss 2007 for the Reef Islands-Santa Cruz languages....
     
    • Reef Islands-Santa Cruz
      Reef Islands-Santa Cruz languages

      The Reef Islands-Santa Cruz languages are a small language family comprising the Santa Cruz language and Nanggu language languages of the Santa Cruz Islands and the ?iwoo language of the Reef Islands....
       
    • Utupua-Vanikoro
      Utupua-Vanikoro languages

      The Utupua-Vanikoro languages are a hypothetical branch of the recently established Temotu languages branch of Oceanic languages. No known shared innovations unite the two component families, which therefore may be independent branches of Temotu or Oceanic....
       
  • Central-Eastern Oceanic
    Central-Eastern Oceanic languages

    The over 200 Central-Eastern Oceanic languages form a branch of the Oceanic languages language family within the Austronesian languages....
     (languages of the open Pacific
    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....
    )
    • Southeast Solomons
      Southeast Solomonic languages

      The family of Southeast Solomonic languages is a branch of the Central-Eastern Oceanic languages. It consists of some 26 languages covering the South East Solomon Islands, from the tip of Santa Isabel Island to Makira....
    • Southern Oceanic linkage
      Southern Oceanic languages

      The Southern Oceanic languages, or Southern Oceanic linkage , is a branch of Oceanic languages proposed by Lynch, Ross, and Crowley ....
       (languages of New Caledonia
      New Caledonia

      New Caledonia , is a "sui generis collectivity" of France located in the subregion of Melanesia in the Oceania. It comprises a main island , the Loyalty Islands, and several smaller islands....
       and Vanuatu
      Vanuatu

      Vanuatu , officially the Republic of Vanuatu , is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some east of northern Australia, north-east of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and south of the Solomon Islands, near New Zealand....
      )
    • Central Pacific linkage
      Central Pacific languages

      The family of Central Pacific or Fijian-Polynesian languages is a branch of the Central-Eastern Oceanic languages. It has 45 languages....
       (Polynesian
      Polynesian languages

      The Polynesian languages are a language family spoken in the region known as Polynesia. They are classified as part of the Austronesian languages, belonging to the Eastern Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages branch of that family....
       and the languages of Fiji
      Fiji

      Fiji , officially the Republic of the Fiji Islands , is an island nation in the South Pacific Ocean east of Vanuatu, west of Tonga and south of Tuvalu....
      )
    • Micronesian
      Micronesian languages

      The family of Micronesian languages is a branch of the Central-Eastern Oceanic languages. It consists of 20 languages, the 19 Micronesian Proper languages and Nauruan language....