Fore language

Fore or Foré /ˈfɔːreɪ/ FOR-ay^[2] is a Kainantu-Goroka language spoken in the Goroka District of Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea.

Fore
Native to	Papua New Guinea
Region	Goroka District, Eastern Highlands Province
Ethnicity	Fore
Native speakers	(30,000 cited 2000)[1]
Language family	Trans–New Guinea Kainantu–Goroka Goroka Fore
Dialects	Pamusa
Language codes
ISO 639-3	for
Glottolog	fore1270

Phonology

The consonants of Fore are as follows:^[3]

		Bilabial	Dental/Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Stops	Plain	p	t̪		k	ʔ
	Prenasalized	ᵐp	ⁿ̪t̪~ⁿt		ᵑk
Nasals		m	n̪~n
Fricative			s̪~s
Approximants		w		j

All the dental consonants can vary to alveolar, except /t̪/ which is always dental. /p/, /t̪/, and /k/ are pronounced as /b/, /ɾ/, and /g/ between vowels. Velar consonants are labialized after rounded vowels. /j/ is often pronounced as a fricative /ʝ/.

Fore has six vowels:

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	eː	ʌ	oː
Open		aː

It also has four diphthongs: ae, ao, ai, and au.

Fore has a pitch accent system. Each syllable is either accented or unaccented. Multiple accented syllables can occur in the same word, but they cannot be adjacent to each other.

External links

• Paradisec includes collections with Fore language materials

References

1. Fore at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
2. Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
3. Graham Scott. 1977. The Fore Language of Papua New Guinea. (Doctoral dissertation, Australian National University; xvi+244pp.)