Why Rotuman is a unique Pacific language
The author and Chiefs (members of Council) of Rotuma, 1927.
Rotuman Language Week is celebrated every year, and the focus is on promoting Rotuman language and culture. This year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the celebration was virtual, and activities and programs were launched through the internet to reach as many people as possible. The event culminated in the worldwide Rotuma Day celebrations on May 13.
Rotuman is a unique language with distinctive characteristics that make it difficult to associate with other Pacific islands. It has been a mystery for many linguists, and its origins have been the subject of much debate. Rotuma is an isolated island, located 646 kilometers north of Fiji's capital Suva, and researchers have found that it has no close relatives that could shed some light on its development.
One of the reasons that have made the language complex is the presence of at least two layers of Polynesian "loan words" believed to be from the Samoan and Tongan languages, accounting for about 40 percent of the Rotuman vocabulary. Australian linguist Andrew Pawley found that Rotuman had also borrowed heavily from the Fijian and English languages, especially in areas associated with modern culture.
Another source of confusion is that the "Rotuman language uses metathesis (the inversion of word-final vowels with immediately preceding consonants), which has produced a vowel system that includes umlauting, vowel shortening, and dipthongisation." This has resulted in an original system of five vowels increasing to ten and has increased the rate of change in Rotuman, adding to the problem of its classification. When Polynesian loan words were stripped away, Pawley found "convincing evidence linking Rotuman to western Fijian."
Most Rotuman words have two forms due to metathesis, and according to Australian linguist Niko Besnier, incomplete forms of Rotuman words are derived from the complete forms through a rule of metathesis inverting the order of the last vowel of the word and of the immediately preceding consonant. The language has rules of vocalic assimilation, reduction that changes the first vowel of the other vocalic pairs into a glide, and length reduction that shortens clusters of similar vowels obtained to single vowels.
The complete form of words is used to express definiteness while the incomplete form expresses indefiniteness. Content words had definite and indefinite forms, and Australian Methodist pastor Clerk Maxwell Churchward found that all Rotuman content words had definite and indefinite forms. Churchward spent 16 years in Fiji and 12 of them on Rotuma, where he also translated the New Testament, the Hymn Book, and Catechism into the Rotuman language.
Finally, the language was written in three orthographies: one by the early English Methodist missionaries, another by the French Roman Catholics, and the third by Churchward. The early Methodist orthography was rarely used nowadays, and most Methodists used the Churchward orthography, which was also taught in schools on the island. However, Catholics were taught the French-based orthography, although Besnier found that Churchward's orthography had "gained increased acceptance among the islanders, albeit in a modified form."
In conclusion, Rotuman Language Week celebrates the unique language and culture of the Rotuman people. The language has been a mystery for many linguists due to its distinct characteristics, but its origins are slowly being uncovered. The presence of Polynesian loan words and the use of metathesis has made the language complex, but it has also made it unique. The language has rules of vocalic assimilation, reduction, and length reduction that have added to the complexity of the language. The language has three orthographies, and the Churchward orthography has gained acceptance among the islanders.