Mono-Alu, also known as Mono, is an Austronesian language spoken by approximately 6,600 people on the islands of Mono, Alu, and Fauro in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands. It is the primary language of Mono Island in the Treasury Islands as well as Alu Island and Fauro Island in the Shortland Islands.
The language area is located near the northwest border of the Solomon Islands, south and southeast of Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea. The communities are often collectively referred to by the acronym FAMOA, representing Fauro, Mono, and Alu Islands.
While the 1999 census reported 2,944 speakers, research informed by community reports suggests a significantly higher population. The total number of speakers was estimated to exceed 5,000 in 2020, with approximately 3,000 speakers on Alu Island, 1,500 on Fauro Island, and 800 on Mono Island, as well as diaspora communities in Honiara and other islands in the Western Province. The language is the primary language spoken on the islands along with Pijin.
The alphabet has 19 letters: A, B, D, E, F, G, H, I, K, L, M, N, O, P, R, S, T, U, and V.
R was traditionally used more than D, but D is used more often in loanwords or in names that have been introduced into the language. It is also used to represent the allophonic variant [d] of the phoneme /þ/.
The letter V is used to represent the allophonic variant [v] of the phoneme /b/.
The letter H is sometimes replaced by F.
The length distinctions of vowels and nasals are not represented in the current orthography.
Although not in the alphabet, the letters J and Z can be used to represent the marginal phonemes /dáÃÂ/ and /z/ respectively, which only occur in loanwords.
There are 13 phonemic consonants in Mono-Alu.
The Mono-Alu vowel system consists of five phonemic monophthongs and three long vowels.
The syllable structure can be either (C)V<sub>1</sub>(V<sub>2</sub>)(N) or (ÃÂ)N, where C can be any consonant (including nasals), V can be any vowel, and N can be either /n/ or /à Â/. The sequence V<sub>1</sub>V<sub>2</sub> represents a long vowel if both Vs are the same phoneme, or a diphthong if they are different. In the syllable pattern (ÃÂ)N, N is a nasal syllabic nucleus (e.g. [à ÂÃÂ.kÃÂ] âÂÂmotherâÂÂ, [à ÂÃÂ.kÃÂ.tÃÂ] âÂÂtake, holdâÂÂ).
In both the coda and nucleic positions, N is always realized as velar [Ã Â] before /k/, /g/ /ÃÂ/, and /h/.
The number system of Mono-Alu is similar to other Austronesian languages. For example, Mono-Alu shares the words for the numbers 'two' () and 'five' () with the Hawaiian language. A word for 'zero' (menna) exists in the language and also holds the meaning of 'nothing.' In 1986, researcher Joel Fagan at the Australian National University identified the numbers from one to ten thousand in Mono-Alu.
Mono-Alu also makes use of ordinal numbers. However, only 'first' () is a unique word, and the rest are constructed through affixations.
Mono-Alu, like many other Austronesian languages, uses two separate pronouns for the first-person plural to express clusivity; that is, one first-person plural pronoun is inclusive (including the listener), and the other is exclusive (not including the listener). Mono-Alu does not have third-person pronouns. Below is a translated list of pronouns and their possessives.
Mono-Alu is very specific regarding adverbs and other verb affixes. Verbs can be altered with a prefix, infix, and suffix.
There are two ways of indicating differences of grammatical gender:
In other cases, there is no distinction between masculine, feminine, and neuter.
Some exceptions within the rules of Mono-Alu have been discovered.
Two adverbs of place, instead of being written with a double consonant, are written with only one accented consonant.
Instead of the aspirate h, the letter f can be used:
There are no definite articles in Mono-Alu. The number ('one') is used as an indefinite article.