Malayo-Polynesian languages

The Malayo-Polynesian languages are a subgroup of the Austronesian languages and comprise at least 351 million speakers. They are widely dispersed throughout the island nations of Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean, with a few members spoken on continental Asia. Malagasy is a geographic outlier spoken on the island of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. The Malayo-Polynesian (MP) languages are divided into two major subgroups: Western Malayo-Polynesian (WMP), and Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (CEMP).

The Malayo-Polynesian languages tend to use reduplication (repetition of all or part of a word) to express the plural, and like other Austronesian languages have simple phonologies; thus a text has few but frequent sounds. The majority also lack consonant clusters (e.g., or [mpt in English). Most also have only a small set of spoken vowels, five being a common number.

Classification

Traditional classifications divided Malayo-Polynesian into Western and Central-Eastern branches. However, Western MP does not appear to be a valid node, and has been split into inner and outer clades. For a more recent classification, see Austronesian languages.

Western Malayo-Polynesian (WMP)

Western Malayo-Polynesian has about 350 million speakers and includes Indonesian Malay, Malaysian Malay, and Sundanese, Javanese, Acehnese, Tagalog, Cebuano, Ilokano, Hiligaynon, Bikol, Kapampangan, and Waray-Waray, Buginese, Malagasy, Chamorro and many others.

Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (CEMP)

Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages fall in two subgroups: Central and Eastern. Eastern MP is dominated by the Oceanic subgroup, with about one million speakers in all. Two well known Oceanic subgroups are Polynesian and Micronesian. Micronesian includes the languages spoken by the native peoples of Micronesia such as Gilbertese or Nauruan. Polynesian languages include Hawaiian, Maori, Samoan, Tahitian, Tongan and Tuvaluan. All of the said languages have official status in the countries and territories of the Pacific Ocean where they are spoken.