Austronesian

[ aw-stroh-nee-zhuhn, -shuhn ]

noun

1. Also called Malayo-Polynesian. a family of languages spoken in the Malay Peninsula, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Madagascar, and Oceania.

adjective

1. of or relating to Austronesia or the Austronesian family of languages; Malayo-Polynesian.

Austronesian

/ ˌɒstrəʊˈniːʒən; -ʃən /

adjective

1. of or relating to Austronesia, its peoples, or their languages

noun

1. another name for Malayo-Polynesian

Word History and Origins

Origin of Austronesian¹

First recorded in 1900–05; Austronesi(a) + -an

Example Sentences

Taiwan's first known settlers were Austronesian tribal people, believed to have come from modern day southern China.

From BBC

Only about 2.5% of the island’s population is of Austronesian descent, with ancestors preceding Japanese, Chinese and Dutch settlers in the early 1600s.

From Los Angeles Times

The first known settlers in Taiwan were Austronesian tribal people, who are thought to have come from modern day southern China.

From BBC

Such linguistic neutrality persists in a number of modern tongues whose third-person pronouns lack a masculine or feminine inflection, among them Armenian, Bengali, Farsi, Finnish, Hungarian, Yoruba and most Turkic and Austronesian languages.

From New York Times

It was originally populated by Indigenous Austronesians, but Han migration from China increased with the arrival of European traders, including the Dutch East India Company.

From New York Times