A Sociolinguistic Survey of Bebeli

From 6–9 November 2009 the SIL-PNG survey team conducted a survey of the Bebeli [bek] language, located to the east of Kimbe in West New Britain Province, Papua New Guinea. Bebeli belongs to the East Arawe subgroup of Austronesian languages (Lewis 2009). The goals of the survey were to determine language and dialect boundaries and evaluate language vitality. Data were collected through individual and group interviews, wordlist elicitation and observation of language use in each Bebeli-speaking village. The Bebeli language is spoken in three villages: Morokea, Mosa and Banaule, and residents of each village speak a different dialect of the language. Speakers reported that adults understand the other dialects well. The ethnolinguistic vitality of Bebeli is currently low.