Volow

Volow has receded historically in favour of Mwotlap, the now dominant language on the island. Volow and Mwotlap are linguistically very close, to the point of almost being mutually intelligible; yet they form two separate languages, with differences in phonology, morphology, lexicon.

The last fluent speaker of Volow, and last storyteller, was named Wanhan – who passed away in 1986. The language is now only remembered by a single speaker named René Wolman (photo). The youngest son of the late Wanhan, Wolman used to spend time with his father in the gardens, and thus got to hear the language spoken. René says he is not confident enough to speak Volow fluently, but he understands the language perfectly, and still can translate individual sentences. In the terminology of linguists, René Wolman would be described as a “passive” speaker; or (to quote Nicholas Evans) the “last hearer” of Volow. He has now shifted to using Mwotlap as his daily language.

2. The Volow archive

The last fluent speaker of Volow, namely Wanhan, was recorded in 1969 by the French anthropologist Bernard Vienne. Even though Vienne was not a linguist and was unable to understand the language, he knew he was recording its last speaker, and thus understood the value of these archives.

Thirty years later, Vienne handed a copy of his tapes to Alex François, who was doing linguistic fieldwork on the same island, focusing on the main language Mwotlap. In 2003, François repatriated the audio recordings to Wanhan’s family, particularly to his son René Wolman; they were deeply moved to hear again a voice which had long disappeared.

The audio recordings included two stories told in Volow. René Wolman helped François transcribe and understand them, while also answering all necessary questions about the linguistic aspects of the language. He also took the linguist to the bush, to explore the ruins of the ancient village Dagmel that is mentioned in the story – including stone walls and megaliths dating back several generations, when the language was still actively spoken.

3. The two Volow texts

The two audio recordings were recorded by †Bernard Vienne in 1969, and transcribed by Alex François in 2003. The first text is here provided with a transcription and a French translation.

1. 1. The dignitary and the abandoned child

https://doi.org/10.24397/pangloss-0003316

Story told by †Wanhan, in 1969.

• Summary :

An orphan infant is rescued and adopted by a dignitary (a village chief). Many years later, as the orphan has become an adult, his adoptive father dies, and comes back in the shape of a ghost. The dignitary’s ghost provides the orphan with wealth, and also with a woman and a child of his own. Yet the orphan rejects that baby, and asks his new wife to kill him.

Instead, the wife saves the child and hides him in the forest for many years; he will be raised by the mother’s brother, his uncle. Along the years, the uncle provides his nephew with all the honorific grades of a dignitary, and assigns him a high social status. His father (Orphan) finally begs him to be forgiven for having one day requested that he’d be killed.

1. 2. The servant taken away by the sea

https://doi.org/10.24397/pangloss-0003317

Story told by †Wanhan, in 1969.

• Summary :

A chief regularly sends his servant Ēm̄am̄ to draw sea water for cooking, yet forbids him to go to the place where women bathe. Yet one day the servant breaks the ban, and is carried away by the sea; he ends up stranded in a remote place, reserved for women (Wōtes). Finally he is found, and brought back to the village. 

4. Acknowledgments

I would like to express my gratitude to the people of Aplow village, particularly the family of †Wanhan: particularly René Wolman, Henry Nin, Singa, Amstrong.

5. Useful references

For more on the languages of Northern Vanuatu, visit http://alex.francois.online.fr. The following selected publications help understand Volow in its context:

François, Alexandre. 2012. The dynamics of linguistic diversity: Egalitarian multilingualism and power imbalance among northern Vanuatu languages. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 214, 85–110.

François, Alexandre, Michael Franjieh, Sébastien Lacrampe & Stefan Schnell. 2015. The exceptional linguistic density of Vanuatu. In A. François, S. Lacrampe, M. Franjieh & S. Schnell (eds), The Languages of Vanuatu: Unity and Diversity. Studies in the Languages of Island Melanesia, 5. Canberra: Asia Pacific Linguistics Open Access. 1–21.

Vienne, Bernard. 1984. Gens de Motlav. Idéologie et pratique sociale en Mélanésie. Paris: Société des Océanistes.

 

Here is how you can cite the present archive:

François, Alexandre & Bernard Vienne. 2020. Archive of audio recordings in the Volow language. Pangloss collection. Paris: CNRS.