Gedaged
| Gedaged (Bel) | ||
|---|---|---|
| speaker | approx. 7,000 | |
| Linguistic classification |
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| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639 -2 |
map (other Malayo-Polynesian languages) |
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| ISO 639-3 | ||
Gedaged (also Graged / Krangket , Ragetta, Star, Mitebog, Bel ) is an Austronesian language spoken in Papua New Guinea in Astrolabe Bay and in coastal villages around Madang from 6,954 (2003, SIL ) . In 1975, SIL specified 2,764 speakers. In the country itself, predominantly referred to as Bel, it has significance as the church language of today's Evangelical Lutheran Church of Papua New Guinea beyond the circle of native speakers. The generic term Bel is also used to describe various related languages in the region, among others. a. also Takia and Marik .
grammar
Possibly due to the close contact with neighboring speakers of Papua languages , the sentence structure of the Bel languages has changed from the subject-verb-object to the subject-object-verb sequence that is common for other languages of the language family .
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Gedaged has had a written form for a long time. Between 1925 and 1935 the first parts of the Bible were translated. A full edition of the New Testament followed in 1960 . Approx. 25 to 50 percent of the speakers can also read and write the language.