Chipaya language
| Chipaya | |
|---|---|
| Puquina | |
| Region | Bolivian Andes |
Native speakers | (1200 cited 1995) |
Uru–Chipaya
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | cap |
| ELP | Chipaya |
Chipaya is a native South American language of the Uru–Chipaya language family. The only other language in the grouping, Uru, is considered by some to be a divergent dialect of Chipaya. Ethnologue lists the language vitality as "vigorous," with 1200 speakers out of an ethnic population of around 1800. Chipaya has been influenced considerably by Aymara, Quechua, and more recently, Spanish, with a third of its vocabulary having been replaced by those languages.
The Chipayan language is spoken in the area south of Lake Titicaca along the Desaguadero River in the mountains of Bolivia and mainly in the town of Santa Ana de Chipaya located in the Atahuallpa Province of the Bolivian department of Oruro north of Coipasa Salt Flats. Native speakers generally refer to it as Puquina or Uchun Maa Taqu ("our mother language"), but is not the same as the extinct Puquina language. Chipaya is an agglutinating language, but has features uncommon to most language of this type, according to preliminary research by the organization DOBES.
Phonology
Consonants
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Post- alveolar |
Palatal | Velar | Uvular | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | labialized | plain | labialized | ||||||
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n/ | ň /ɲ/ | ŋ /ŋ/ | |||||
| Plosive | plain | p /p/ | t /t/ | č /c/ | k /k/ | kʷ /kʷ/ | q /q/ | ||
| ejective | p' /pʼ/ | t' /tʼ/ | č' /cʼ/ | k' /kʼ/ | q' /qʼ/ | ||||
| Affricate | plain | ¢ /ts/ | ch /tʃ/ | ||||||
| ejective | ¢' /tsʼ/ | ch' /tʃʼ/ | |||||||
| Fricative | s /s/ | sh /ʃ/ | š /ç/ | h /x/ | hʷ /xʷ/ | x /χ/ | xʷ /χʷ/ | ||
| Approximant | l /l/ | lʲ /lʲ/ | y /j/ | w /enwiki/w/ | |||||
Consonant Clusters
Multiple possibilities are separated by slashes, and optional elements are enclosed in parentheses.
Possible syllable onsets are:
- (s/š) + p + (h)
- (s/š/sh) + k/q + (h/hʷ/x/xʷ)
- s/š + p/k/kʷ/q/qʷ/h/hʷ/m/n
- t + h/hʷ/x/xʷ
- ¢/č/ch/l + h
Possible syllable codas are:
- h/x + p/t/k/q/l/lʲ/r + (t)
- hʷ/xʷ + k/q + (t)
- Consonant + t
Vowels
- Vowels have continental values for a, [a], e [e], i [i], o, [o], and u [u]. Each vowel can be short, e.g., a [a], or long, e.g., a• [aː].
References
- Ethnologue: Languages of the World (unknown ed.). SIL International.[This citation is dated, and should be substituted with a specific edition of Ethnologue]