Aikanã language explained
| Aikanã |
| Nativename: | Tubarão, Huari |
| States: | Brazil |
| Region: | Rondônia |
| Speakers: | 150 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| Ref: | e25 |
| Familycolor: | American |
| Family: | Language isolate |
| Dia1: | Masaká |
| Iso3: | tba |
| Glotto: | aika1237 |
| Glottorefname: | Aikanã |
| Notice: | IPA |
| Ethnicity: | Aikanã people |
Aikanã (sometimes called Tubarão,[1] Corumbiara/Kolumbiara, or Huari/Uari/Wari) is an endangered language isolate[2] spoken by about 200 Aikanã people in Rondônia, Brazil. It is morphologically complex and has SOV word order.[3] Aikanã uses the Latin script. The people live with speakers of Koaia (Kwaza).
Demographics
Aikanã is traditionally spoken in the Terra Indígena Tubarão-Latundê, where it is still the dominant language. It is also spoken in the Terra Indígena Kwazá do Rio São Pedro, where Kwazá is traditionally spoken. A few Aikanã families in also reside in the Terra Indígena Rio Guaporé, but they do not speak the language there. There are nearly 100 ethnic Aikanã (locally known as Kassupá) people, in the Comunidade Indígena Cassupá e Salamãi, although the final Aikanã speaker there died in 2018.[4]
Classification
Van der Voort (2005) observes similarities among Aikanã, Kanoê, and Kwaza, and believes that it is strong enough to definitively link the three languages together as part of a single language family.[5] An automated computational analysis (ASJP 4) by Müller et al. (2013)[6] also found lexical similarities between Aikanã and Kwaza. However, since the analysis was automatically generated, the grouping could be either due to mutual lexical borrowing or genetic inheritance.
Jolkesky (2016) also notes that there are lexical similarities with Kanoe, Kwaza, and Nambikwara due to contact.[7]
Varieties
Varieties listed by Loukotka (1968):[8]
- Huari (Corumbiara) - spoken between the Corumbiara River and Guarajú River, Rondônia
- Masaca (Aicana) - spoken on the left bank of the Corumbiara River
- Aboba - extinct language once spoken on the Guarajú River
- Maba - extinct language once spoken on the Guajejú River (unattested)
- Puxacaze - once spoken on the Guajejú River, Brazil (unattested)
- Guajejú - once spoken at the sources of the Jamarí River and Candeia River (unattested)
Phonology
Vowels
Front! Central! Back| Close | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/
~ pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /link/) | pronounced as /ink/ |
|---|
| Mid | pronounced as /ink/ | | |
|---|
| Open | | pronounced as /ink/ | | |
|---|
Front! Central! Back| Close | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /link/
~ pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /link/) | pronounced as /ink/ |
|---|
| Mid | pronounced as /ink/ | | |
|---|
| Open | | pronounced as /ink/ | | |
|---|
- /y, ỹ/ can also be heard as close-mid [ø, ø̃].
- /a, ã/ are heard as [ɨ, ɨ̃] before /i, ĩ/.
Consonants
!Labial!Dental!Alveolar!Palatal!Velar!GlottalStop/
Affricate | voiceless | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /ink/) |
|---|
| voiced | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /ink/ | pronounced as /link/ | | |
|---|
| Fricative | | (pronounced as /ink/) | | | |
|---|
| Nasal | [{{IPAlink|m}}] | [{{IPA link|ⁿ̪ð}}] | [{{IPAlink|n}}] | [{{IPA link|ɲ}}] | | |
|---|
| Sonorant | pronounced as /ink/ | | pronounced as /ink/ | (pronounced as /ink/) | | pronounced as /ink/ | |
|---|
- Within the position of nasal vowels, sounds /b, d, d͡ð/ become [m, n, ⁿ̪ð] and /w, ɾ, h/ become [w̃, ɾ̃, h̃].
- /t̪͡s, d͡ð/ are only heard as affricates [t̪͡s, d͡ð] in word-initial position. Elsewhere, they are heard as a fricatives [s] and [ð].
- /w/ can be heard as a fricative [β] when before /i/.
- /ɾ/ can also be heard as [l] between vowels.
- /d͡ʒ/ is heard as [d͡ʒ] before a front-vowel, [j] before a non-front vowel, and as [ɲ] or [j̃] before a nasal vowel.[9]
Grammar
In Aikanã, the verb phrase or predicate morphological template is:[10]
| verb | subject | classifier
directional | aspect
modality | valency | object | tense | object | subject | negation | mood | |
Vocabulary
Loukotka (1968) lists the following basic vocabulary items for Huari and Masaca, as well as Capixana.[8]
| gloss | Huari | Masaca | Capixana |
|---|
| one | amemeeː | amäme | pátairä |
|---|
| two | arukai | atuka | kãerá |
|---|
| three | | ümaitü | piakaúkä |
|---|
| head | chimé | tinupá | i-kutá |
|---|
| ear | ka-niyú | ka-nĩgó | i-tẽyõ |
|---|
| tooth | múi | mõiː | i-pé |
|---|
| hand | iné | iné | i-so |
|---|
| woman | chikichíki | dätiá | míaʔä |
|---|
| water | hané | hánä | kuni |
|---|
| fire | íne | íné | iní |
|---|
| stone | huahuá | urorä | akí |
|---|
| maize | atití | ákí | atití |
|---|
| tapir | arimé | alümä | itsá | |
|---|
Aikanã plant and animal names from Silva (2012)[11] are listed in the corresponding Portuguese article.
Further reading
- Vasconcelos, I. P. (2004). Aspectos da fonologia e morfologia da língua Aikanã. Maceió: Universidade Federal de Alagoas. (Masters dissertation).
References
Notes and References
- Book: A Grammar of Kwaza. Hein van der Voort. 2004. 9 . Walter de Gruyter . 3-11-017869-9.
- Web site: Theoretical and social implications of language documentation and description on the eve of destruction in Rondônia. 2007. 2009-05-10. Hein van der Voort. 2008-08-30. https://web.archive.org/web/20080830002733/http://www.hrelp.org/events/conference2007/abstracts/27.pdf. dead.
- Web site: Aikana Language and the Aikanã Indian Tribe . 2008. 2009-05-10. Native Languages of the Americas website. https://web.archive.org/web/20090510004733/http://www.native-languages.org/aikana.htm. 10 May 2009 . live.
- Book: Epps . Patience . Michael . Lev . Amazonian Languages: Language Isolates. Volume I: Aikanã to Kandozi-Chapra . Walter de Gruyter . Berlin . 2023 . 978-3-11-041940-5.
- Van der Voort, Hein. 2005. Kwaza in a comparative perspective. International Journal of American Linguistics 71: 365–412.
- Müller, André, Viveka Velupillai, Søren Wichmann, Cecil H. Brown, Eric W. Holman, Sebastian Sauppe, Pamela Brown, Harald Hammarström, Oleg Belyaev, Johann-Mattis List, Dik Bakker, Dmitri Egorov, Matthias Urban, Robert Mailhammer, Matthew S. Dryer, Evgenia Korovina, David Beck, Helen Geyer, Pattie Epps, Anthony Grant, and Pilar Valenzuela. 2013. ASJP World Language Trees of Lexical Similarity: Version 4 (October 2013).
- Jolkesky . Marcelo Pinho de Valhery . 2016 . Estudo arqueo-ecolinguístico das terras tropicais sul-americanas . Ph.D. dissertation . Brasília . University of Brasília . 2.
- Book: Loukotka, Čestmír . Čestmír Loukotka . Classification of South American Indian languages . registration . UCLA Latin American Center . 1968 . Los Angeles.
- Book: da Silva, Maria de Fátima dos Santos . Dicionário de raízes da língua aikanã . Guajará-Mirim: Universidade Federal de Rondônia . 2012.
- Book: Epps . Patience . Michael . Lev . Amazonian Languages: Language Isolates. Volume II: Kanoé to Yurakaré . Walter de Gruyter . Berlin . 2023 . 978-3-11-043273-2.
- dos Santos da Silva . Maria de Fátima . 2012 . Dicionário de raízes da língua aikanã . MA . . Guajará-Mirim. (PDF)
