Documentation and Maintenance of the Languages of the Sepik Province of PNG

Group of people sitting and standing outdoors under trees

About the Research Project

The Sepik region of Papua New Guinea is the locus of unprecedented linguistic diversity within the New Guinea context. Documenting and creating theoretically informed grammars and comparative studies for the languages of the Sepik is instrumental for enhancing the knowledge base of linguistics, understanding of people’s cultures, beliefs, and behaviours, and ensuring brighter future for the speakers, including work and education opportunities. 

Partners

  • Aikhenvald A. Y 2025. ‘Hidden landscapes and the images of the “unseen”: from north-west Amazonia to the Middle Sepik region of New Guina, pp. 75-130 of Language in strange and familiar places, edited by Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, Anne Storch, and Viveka Vellupilai. Berlin: DeGruyter/Mouton.
  • 2025. Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald and R. M. W. Dixon. ‘Anthropological linguistics and language documentation’, to appear in ‘The International Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics’, 3rd Edition, edited by Nico Nassenstein and Svenja Völkel. Berlin: DeGruyter.
  • Aikhenvald A. Y. 2025 ‘Name taboo’, to appear in ‘The International Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics’, 3rd Edition, edited by Nico Nassenstein and Svenja Völkel. Berlin: DeGruyter.
  • 2024. Trade, mines, and language: the Chinese in Papua New Guinea in Hayes, Anna, Henry, Rosita & Wood, Michael (eds), pp. 179-205, The Chinese in Papua New Guinea: Past, Present and Future, ANU Press, Canberra.
  • forthcoming. ‘Clitics in Yalaku’, The Oxford Handbook of Clitics, edited by Diego Pescarini and Eulàlia Bonet. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Aikhenvald, A. Y. Forthcoming. The Yalaku language of New Guinea (c. 1000 p, submitted).
  • Forthcoming. 2026. ‘Dare to be different: linguistic diversity and language change in the Sepik region of New Guinea and beyond’. Cambridge Elements in Linguistic Diversity.

Project Lead

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