A Sociolinguistic Survey of Amara

This survey was undertaken to assess the vitality of the Amara [aie] language, which is found on the north coast of West New Britain Province (WNB), Papua New Guinea. Amara is spoken in three villages that are each surrounded by villages of neighbouring languages. In order to assess vitality, the team used observation, participatory methods, and conducted interviews guided by the SIL-PNG sociolinguistic questionnaires. The survey team found the language vital in one village and endangered in the other two. It appears that the people, including those in the village of higher vitality, are steadily shifting to Bariai [bch] and Maleu-Kilenge [mgl], two neighbouring languages.i>[In the interest of making this work available without further delay, we are posting it as it was written. It has not been subjected to further review.]