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We examine the role of referential properties and lexical stipulation in three closely related languages of eastern Indonesia, the Alor-Pantar languages Abui, Kamang, and Teiwa. Our focus is on the continuum along which event properties (e.g. volitionality, affectedness) are highly important at one extreme or play virtually no role at the other. These languages occupy different points along this continuum. In Abui, event semantics play the greatest role, while in Teiwa they play the smallest role (the lexical property animacy being dominant in the formation of verb classes). Kamang occupies an intermediate position. Teiwa has conventionalised the relation between a verb and its class along the lines of animacy so that classes become associated with the animacy value of the objects with which the verbs in a given class typically occur. Paying attention to a lexical property like animacy, in contrast with event properties, has meant greater potential for arbitrary classes to emerge. 

Western Pantar (ISO 639-3 code lev) is spoken by an estimated 10,804 people on the southwestern portion of Pantar, west of the Sirung volcanic massif. The dry region of western Pantar is separated from the northern peninsula of the island by a physical barrier consisting of a number of steep-walled canyons. No road yet connects the northern peninsula with the western part of the island. In most of the academic literature the language is referred to as Lamma, though that name more properly refers to only a single dialect of the language. This description is based on first-hand field work by the author between 2004 and 2010. 

The wider genealogical affiliations of the Timor-Alor-Pantar languages have been the subject of much speculation. These languages are surrounded by unrelated Austronesian languages, and attempts to locate related languages have focused on Papuan languages 800 km or more distant. This chapter draws on typological, pronominal, and especially lexical evidence to examine three hypotheses regarding the higher-level affiliations of the Timor-Alor-Pantar languages: (1) the languages are related to the North Halmaheran (West Papuan) languages; (2) the languages are part of the Trans New Guinea family; and (3) the languages are related to the West Bomberai family, with no link to Trans New-Guinea more broadly. We rely in particular on recent reconstructions of proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar vocabulary (chapter 3). Of the hypotheses evaluated here, we find the most striking similarities between TAP and the West Bomberai family. However, we conclude that the evidence currently available is insufficient to confirm a genealogical relationship with West Bomberai or any other family, and hence, TAP must be considered a family-level isolate. 

This chapter compares kinship terminologies and kinship practices in eight Alor-Pantar languages forming a broad geographic and typological sample of the family. In spite of the close genealogical relationship between the languages, there is surprisingly little evidence of shared (cognate) kinship vocabulary, and the kinship systems exhibit great variation. The westernmost languages distinguish both maternal and paternal cross-cousins (children of opposite-sex siblings) as ideal marriage partners, while at the opposite extreme in the highlands of Alor are found languages which expressly forbid cross-cousin marriage. Even among languages whose kinship systems are roughly similar, the terms themselves are often not cognate. Likewise, cognate terms often have varying semantics across the languages. The current distribution of kinship terminologies suggests a recent drift toward symmetric exchange systems which distinguish both maternal and paternal cross-cousins, perhaps under the influence of neighboring Austronesian languages.