Malay, North Moluccan

Print

Primary tabs

A language of Indonesia

ISO 639-3
max
Alternate Names
Melayu Maluku Utara, Ternate Malay
Autonym
Bahasa Pasar
User Population

1,000,000, all users. L1 users: 700,000 (2001 SIL). L2 users: 300,000 (2001 R. Whisler). 100,000 monolinguals.

Location

North Maluku province: Halmahera Selatan regency, Damar, northwest Jaronga, and south Halmahera islands.

Language Maps
Language Status

3 (Wider communication). Lingua franca in Tidore in 1512, widespread medium of communication, trade language. Used mainly in bird business, forest products and more.

Classification
Creole, Malay based
Dialects

None known. Different meaning of particles from Manado Malay [xmm]. Reportedly more similar to Manado Malay than to Ambonese Malay [abs]. A member of macrolanguage Malay [msa].

Language Use

A few communities use it as L1. Used orally between speakers of different languages. Most also use Indonesian [ind]. Used as L2 by Bacanese Malay [btj], Ibu [ibu], Sawai [szw], Tabaru [tby], Tidore [tvo], Tobelo [tlb].

Language Development

Literacy rate in L1: 1%–5%. Literacy rate in L2: 50%–75%. NT: 2020.

Language Resources
OLAC resources in and about Malay, North Moluccan
Writing

Latin script [Latn].

Other Comments

Muslim, Christian.