The Makada dialect of Kuanua

Makada is a dialect of Kuanua spoken on the island of Makada, one of the Duke of York Islands, a small group of islands located between the larger islands of New Ireland and New Britain in the Bismarck Archipelago of Papua New Guinea. As a dialect of Kuanua, Makada belongs to the Oceanic subgroup of the Austronesian family. Although some early reports noted Makada’s similarity to the Kuanua varieties spoken on the Gazelle Peninsula of New Britain, the Makada dialect has often mistakenly been assumed to be a dialect of Ramoaaina (also known as “Duke of York”), the language of its closest neighbors, spoken on the other islands of the group. Although influenced by Ramoaaina, Makada is a dialect of Kuanua, which is also spoken on the “mainland” of New Britain and on the islands of Watom and Matupit. This paper is intended to serve as an introduction to Makada, presenting its basic features and showing it to be a dialect of Kuanua.