Baliem Valley languages

The Dani or Baliem Valley languages are a family of clearly related Trans–New Guinea languages spoken by the Dani and related peoples in the Baliem Valley in the Highland Papua, Indonesia. Foley (2003) considers their Trans–New Guinea language group status to be established. They may be most closely related to the languages of Paniai Lakes, but this is not yet clear. Capell (1962) posited that their closest relatives were the Kwerba languages, which Ross (2005) rejects.

Languages
Larson (1977) divided the family into three branches based on lexicostatistics, and Nggem was later added as a fourth. The Ngalik languages are very poorly attested.


 * Dani family
 * Wano
 * Nggem
 * Central Dani:
 * Grand Valley Dani (upper, lower, and mid dialects)
 * Hupla
 * Western Dani–Walak
 * Ngalik:
 * Nduga
 * Silimo
 * Yali (dialect cluster)

Phonemes
Usher (2020) reconstructs the consonant inventory as follows. This is identical to the reconstruction of Bromley (1966-1967) apart from adding the rare consonants *pw, *mbw, and the possible additional vowel *ɐ.

And the diphthongs *ei, *ou, *ai, *au.

Pronouns
Ross (1995) reconstructs the independent pronouns and possessive/object prefixes of Central Dani as:


 * {| class="wikitable"

! !!singular!!plural !1 !2 !3
 * an, *n[a]||*ni-t, *nin[a]-
 * ka-t, *k[a]||*ki-t, *kin[a]-
 * a-t, *∅/w-||*i-t, *in[a]-
 * }

Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from Bromley (1967) and Voorhoeve (1975), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:

Evolution
Dani reflexes of proto-Trans-New Guinea (pTNG) etyma are:

Grand Valley Dani language:
 * ap 'man' < *ambi
 * meli 'tongue' < *me(l,n)e
 * n-esi 'hair' < *iti[C] (n- is 1sg possessor)
 * me(m) 'come' < *me-
 * ket 'new' < *kVndak

Western Dani language:
 * ap 'man' < *ambi
 * (n)iti < *iti[C]
 * meli 'tongue' < *me(l,n)e
 * get 'new' < *kVndak
 * okut 'leg' < *k(a,o)ndok[V]
 * kat(lo) 'skin' < *(ŋg,k)a(nd,t)apu
 * idu 'tree' < *inda

Ngalik language:
 * idu(k)etu 'tree' < *inda
 * (nak) amu 'breast' < *amu
 * tokon 'full' < *tVkV[ti]
 * kopu 'smoke' < *kambu