Nama Dictionary

Nama is a Papuan language spoken in Southern New Guinea. It is a member of the Nambu subgroup of the Yam family of languages (formerly called the Morehead-Upper Maro family). Detailed documentation of Yam languages began only in 2011. This is the first dictionary of a language in this family to appear in print. It contains more than 4800 entries of Nama words with English definitions and over 1000 illustrations. An introductory section presents information about the language use and culture of Nama speakers, and about the general characteristics of of the Nama language. An English to Nama section is included to help readers find Nama words in the main dictionary.

The making of the dictionary was enthusiastically supported by members of the Nama-speaking community, who are keen on preserving linguistic and cultural knowledge for future generations. So the dictionary is encyclopaedic in scope, with information and photographs of local birds, mammals, reptiles and fish, and hundreds of plants and trees. As the dictionary is aimed at Nama speakers, it has been made as non-technical as possible, and contains explanations of necessary linguistic terms.

The dictionary will also complement a more technical publication describing the language: A Grammar of Nama: A Papuan Language of Southern New Guinea by Jeff Siegel (De Gruyter Mouton, 2023).