Tiriyó language
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| Tiriyó / Trio tarëno ijomi |
||
|---|---|---|
| Pronunciation: | IPA: [ta.ɽəː.no i.joː.mi] | |
| Spoken in: | Brazil, Surinam | |
| Region: | Northern Amazonia, Guianas Plateau | |
| Total speakers: | ~2,000 (in 2005) | |
| Language family: | Cariban Taranoan Tiriyó / Trio |
|
| Official status | ||
| Official language of: | none | |
| Regulated by: | no official regulation | |
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |
| ISO 639-2: | none | |
| ISO 639-3: | tri | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-based pronunciation key. | ||
The Tiriyó language is spoken by the Tiriyó (also known as Trio, autodenomination tarëno), approximately 2,000 people living in several villages on both sides of the Brazil-Surinam border in Northern Amazonia. It is a relatively healthy language, learned by all children as their mother tongue and actively used in all areas of life by its speakers. Most of the Tiriyó (there are no precise numbers, but impressionistic observation would suggest more than half) are monolingual speakers. Of course, the long-term survival of their language, as is the case for almost all native South American languages, remains an open question.
Contents |
[edit] Classification
Tiriyó has been classified as belonging to the Taranoan group of the Guianan sub-branch of Cariban, together with Karihona (Carijona), in Colombia, and Akuriyó, in Suriname, the former with a few, and the latter with apparently no, speakers left.
[edit] Dialects
There seem to be two main dialects in the Tiriyó-speaking area, called by Jones (1972) Eastern or Tapanahoni basin, and Western or Sipaliwini basin dialects, and by Meira (2000, to appear) K-Tiriyó and H-Tiriyó. The main difference thus far reported is phonological: the different realization of what were (historically) clusters involving /h/ and a stop (see Phonology section below). Grammatical and/or lexical differences may also exist, but the examples thus far searched are disputed.
Demographically, H-Tiriyó is the most important dialect (~ 60% of the speakers). It is the dialect spoken in the village of Kwamalasamutu, Suriname, and in the villages along the Western Paru river (Tawainen or Missão Tiriós, Kaikui Tëpu, Santo Antônio) and also along the Marapi river (Kuxare, Yawa, etc.). K-Tiriyó is spoken in the villages along the Eastern Paru river (Mataware, and some people at Bonna) in Brazil, and in the villages of Tepoe and Paloemeu in Suriname.
[edit] Phonology
Tiriyó has 9 vowels and 7 consonants, as shown in the chart below. (Orthographic symbols in bold, IPA values in square brackets.)
[edit] Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i /i/ | ï /ɨ/ | u /u/ |
| Mid | e /e/ | ë /ə/ | o /o/ |
| Open | a /a/ |
- The cardinal vowels (a, e, i, o, u) are very close to their usual values in, e.g., Spanish.
- The central vowel ï is usually [ɨ], but [ɯ] is also heard, especially after a velar consonant;
- The central vowel ë is usually [ə], but [ʌ] or [ɤ] are also common.
[edit] Consonants
| Bilabial | Dental | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n/ | |||
| Plosive | p /p/ | t /t/ | k /k/ | ||
| Fricative | s /s/ | h /h/ | |||
| Tap | r /ɾ/ | ||||
| Approximant | w /β/ | j /j/ | |||
- The fricative /s/ shows a considerable amount of variation. Some speakers have [s], others have [ç] or [s̱], or even [ʃ]. The following vowel also influences the pronunciation of /s/: [ʃ]-like realizations are more frequent before /i/ and /e/.
- The glottal fricative /h/ is the most obvious difference between the two main dialects. In K-Tiriyó, there is no /h/; where H-Tiriyó has an /h/, K-Tiriyó shows a VV sequence (realized as a long vowel): i.e., K-Tiriyó is actually an h-less dialect. In K-Tiriyó, each h-cluster - hp, ht, hk (historically *[hp], *[ht], *[hk]) - has a different realization: [(h)ɸ], [ht], [(h)h] (i.e., with p and k, [h] is weakly realized and spirantizes the following plosive; with t, [h] is stronger and there is no spirantization). Older H-Tiriyó speakers have a fourth cluster hs [(h)s̱], with a weakly realized [h], while younger H-Tiriyó speakers have [ːs̱] ~ [s̱s̱] (K-Tiriyó speakers have only [ːs̱]; all in all, its status is, however, marginal.
The following examples illustrate these differences: - The rhotic r is often retroflex ([ɽ]) and may have some laterality ([ɺ]); simple taps ([ɾ]) are also heard.
- The approximant w has usually no rounding ([β̞]), and sometimes (especially if followed by e or i) some friction [β̝]}
| Underlying form | H-Tiriyó | K-Tiriyó | Gloss |
|---|---|---|---|
| /mahto/ | [mahtɔ] | [maatɔ] | fire |
| /tuhka/ | [tu(h)ha] | [tuuka] | Brazil nut |
| /pihpə/ | [pi(h)ɸə] | [piipə] | skin |
| /wɨhse/ | [ʋɨ(h)s̱e]~[ʋɨːs̱e]~[ʋɨs̱s̱e] | [ʋɨɨs̱e] | anatto |
[edit] Syllable Structure and Phonotactics
The basic syllable template is (C1)V1(V2)(C2) -- i.e., the possible syllable types are:
| V1 | V1V2 | V1C2 | V1V2C2 |
| C1V1 | C1V1V2 | C1V1C2 | C1V1V2C2. |
The following remarks can be made:
- Onsetless syllables (V1, V1V2, V1C2, V1V2C2) occur only word-initially; all vowels except ï are possible in this position.
Ex.: aware 'caiman'; enu 'his/her eye'; ëmë 'you (sg.)'; irakë 'giant ant'; okomo 'wasp'; uru 'bread-like food'. - The most frequent syllable type is C1V1, in which all vowels and all consonants (except h) are possible.
Ex.: pakoro 'house', kurija 'gourd', mïnepu 'brige', tëpu 'stone', jako 'friend!', nërë 's/he', wewe 'wood, tree, plant' - Vowel sequences (V1V2) can be made of identical vowels (V1 = V2), in which case they are realized as long vowels. In this case, no coda consonants are possible (i.e., no *(C1)VVC2).
Exs.:aapë 'your arm', eeke 'how?', mëërë 'that one (animate)', piito 'brother-in-law', tïïnë 'quiet', ooto (tree sp.), muunu 'fish bait'.
[edit] Stress
Tiriyó stress follows a rhythmic pattern of the kind Hayes (1995) calls iambic. Phonetically:
- In (C)V-only words, every second syllable from the beginning of the word is stressed, except the final syllable, which is never stressed (extrametric).
- A non-(C)V syllable anywhere in the word attracts stress (except in the always unstressed final position) and disturbs the pattern, forcing it to restart as if a new word had begun.
- Bisyllabic words do not have obvious stress.
Examples (acute accents mark stress, and colons length):
| Syllable type | Underlying form | Phonetic | Gloss |
|---|---|---|---|
| (C)V-only | /amatakana/ | [a.ˈmaː.ta.ˈkaː.na] | 'toucan sp.' |
| /kɨtapotomapone/ | [kɨ.ˈtaː.po.ˈtoː.ma.ˈpoː.ne] | 'you all helped him/her/it' | |
| non-(C)V-only | /mempakane/ | [ˈmem.pa.ˈkaː.ne] | 'you woke him/her up' |
| /kehtəne/ | [ˈkeh.tə.ne] | 'we (I+you) were' | |
| /meekane/ | [ˈmeː.ka.ne] | 'you bit him/her/it' |
Note that some words apparently follow the opposite - trochaic - pattern (e.g., /meekane/ above). For these words, an underlying sequence of identical vowels is proposed. Cognate words from related languages provide evidence for this analysis: compare the Tiriyó stem /eeka/ 'bite' with e.g. Waiwai, Katxuyana, Hixkaryana /eska/, Panare /ehka/, Karihona /eseka/, suggesting a historical process of syllable reduction with subsequent compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel.
Since stress depends only on the type and number of syllables, morphological processes that involve syllabic prefixes or suffixes affect stress:
- /pakoro/ [pa.ˈkoː.ɽo] 'house' → /ji-pakoro/ 'my house' [ji.ˈpaː.ko.ɽo]
In Hayes' framework, one could argue that stress placement is based on pairs of syllables (feet) consisting of either two (C)V (light) or one non-(C)V (heavy) syllables, except for the last syllable, which is extrametric, i.e. never forms a foot. This would explain the lack of stress in bisyllabic words: an initial light syllable, left alone by the extrametricity of the final syllable, cannot form a foot by itself and remains unstressed.
[edit] Reduplication
Reduplication in Tiriyó affects verbs (regularly) and also nouns and adverbials (irregularly: not all of them). On verbs, it usually marks iteration or repetition (e.g.: wïtëe 'I go, I am going', wïtë-wïtëe 'I keep going, I always go, I go again and again'); on nouns and adverbials, several examples of an entity, or several instances of a phenomenon (e.g.: kutuma 'painful', kuu-kuutuma 'painful all over, feeling pain all over one's body').
Formally, there are two reduplicative patterns, termed internal and external reduplication. External reduplication is a regular process that copies the first two moras of a complete word (i.e., the first two syllables if they are light, or the first syllable if it is heavy). Coda consonants are not reduplicated: the preceding vowel is copied as long (i.e. as a VV sequence). If a syllable contains two vowels, some (older?) speakers copy both vowels, while other (younger?) speakers copy only the first vowel and lengthen it (i.e. turn it into a VV sequence).
| Base | Gloss | Reduplication | Gloss |
|---|---|---|---|
| wekarama | 'I gave it' | weka-wekarama | 'I kept giving it' |
| mempaka | 'you woke him/her up' | mee-mempaka | 'you kept waking him/her up' |
| waitëne | 'I pushed it' | waa-waitëne, or: wai-waitëne |
'I pushed it again and again' |
Internal reduplication affects the interior of a word. In most cases, it can be seen as affecting the stem prior to the addition of person- or voice-marking prefixes; in some cases, however, it affects some pre-stem material as well.
Finally, some cases are idiosyncratic and probably need to be listed independently (e.g., tëëkae 'bitten', 'bit', tëëkaakae 'bitten all over').
[edit] References
- Hayes, Bruce (1995). Metrical stress theory. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
- Meira, Sérgio (1998). "Rhythmic stress in Tiriyó (Cariban)". International Journal of American Linguistics 64: 352-378.
- Meira, Sérgio (2000). A reconstruction of Proto-Taranoan: Phonology and Morphology. Munich: LINCOM Europa.
- Carlin, Eithne (2004). A Grammar of Trio: A Cariban Language of Suriname. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang (Europäischer Verlag der Wissenschaften).
- Meira, Sérgio (to appear). A Grammar of Tiriyó. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Mouton de Gruyter.
