Volow language
Volow (formerly known as "Valuwa" or "Valuga") is an Oceanic language variety which used to be spoken in the area of Aplow, in the eastern part of the island of Motalava, in Vanuatu. Name. The name "Volow" is originally a placename: it corresponds to the area known as Aplow, but in the local language Volow rather than in Mwotlap. This form, pronounced , is derived from Proto-Torres-Banks *"βaluwa". In neighboring Mwotlap, the same area is called "Aplow" (with locative prefix "a-"), and in Mota, it is called "Valuwa" . Both of these are nowadays used as alternative names  for the area. Sociolinguistics. Volow has receded historically in favour of the now dominant language Mwotlap. It is now only remembered by a single passive speaker, who lives in the village of Aplow — the new name of what was previously known as Volow. The similarity of Volow with Mwotlap is such that the two communalects may be considered dialects of a single language. Phonology. Volow phonemically contrasts 16 consonants and 7 vowels. Consonants. This consonant inventory includes a typologically rare consonant: a rounded, prenasalised voiced labial-velar plosive : e.g. “woman” (spelled "n-leq̄evēn" in the local orthography). Historically, Volow is  the only daughter language to have preserved the voicing of the proto-phonemes "*ᵑg" > /ᵑɡ/ and "*ᵐbʷ" > /ᵑᵐɡ͡bʷ/, which is reconstructed for its ancestor Proto-Torres-Banks. Most of its neighbours (including Mwotlap) devoiced these to /k/ and /k​͡pʷ/ respectively. Vowels. The seven vowels of Volow are all short monophthongs: