Picuris language

Picuris
Native to United States
Region Picuris Pueblo, New Mexico
Ethnicity 230 (1990)[1]
Native speakers
 70 (2007)[1]
Tanoan

  • Tiwa

    • Northern Tiwa
      • Picuris
Language codes
ISO 639-3 twf (Northern Tiwa)
Glottolog picu1248[2]
Linguasphere 64-CAA-ab

The endangered Picuris (also Picurís) language of the Northern Tiwa branch of Tanoan is spoken in Picuris Pueblo, New Mexico.

Genealogical relations

Picuris is partially mutually intelligible with Taos dialect, spoken at Taos Pueblo.[3] It is slightly more distantly related to Southern Tiwa (spoken at Isleta Pueblo and Sandia Pueblo).

Sound system

Bilabial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
central lateral
Plosive voiced (b) (d) (ɡ)
voiceless p t tʃ k ʔ
Fricative ɬ s x h
Nasal m n
Approximant w l j
Flap (ɾ)

Picuris has three degrees of stress: primary, secondary, and unstressed. Stress affects the phonetic length of syllable rimes (lengthening the vowel or the syllable-final sonorant consonant).

Additionally, there are three tones: high, mid, and low — the mid tone being the most frequent.

Text

Two sentences with interlinear glosses:

Picuris: ˌʔìˈʔīˌnẽ́ ˌpāˈʔāˌnẽ́ ˌtāˈʔāˌnẽ́ ʔã̄nnã̄ˈpīaˌtʃí ˈmẽˌwíathā-ˌpʔīnˈwēlthā-ʔīˈkʔòˌthʌ̀
English gloss: corn pumpkins beans we.two.will.make at.going.being-at.Picuris-we.good.dwell
Free translation: "Corn, pumpkins, beans, we live happily at Picuris by raising an abundant crop."
Picuris: ˈʔẽ́ kãˈxwẽ́ˌkì
English gloss: you you.have.the.tail
Free translation: "It's your turn."[7]

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 Picuris at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
  2. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Picuris Northern Tiwa". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  3. ↑ Sources on mutual intelligibility report conflicting information. Mithun (1999): "they [Taos and Picuris] are close but generally considered mutually unintelligible". But, G. Trager (1969): "The facts that there are considerable phonological differences between the two languages [Taos and Picuris], but that the grammatical systems are very much alike and that mutual intelligibility still persists...". G. Trager (1946): "The two Tiwa groups [Northern Tiwa and Southern Tiwa] are fairly homogeneous: Sandía and Isleta [of the Southern Tiwa group] differ very little and are mutually completely intelligible; Taos and Picurís [of the Northern Tiwa group] diverge more from each other. Further, the group as a whole is very similar: Taos and Picurís are each intelligible to the other three, and Sandía and Isleta are understood in the north, though with difficulty". G. Trager (1943): "Taos and Picurís are much alike, and mutually understandable. Sandía and Isleta are almost identical. A speaker of the southern languages can manage to understand the northern two, but the reverse is not true." F. Trager (1971): "[Picuris] is most closely related to Taos; these two languages are in part mutually intelligible."
  4. ↑ The consonant cluster analysis is similar to G. Trager's later reanalysis of Taos. (See: Taos phonology: Consonants).
  5. ↑ This is unlike the weak frication of Taos /x/.
  6. ↑ F. Trager does not give further details about whether the forward articulation is dental or alveolar. If Picuris is like Taos, then the most forward articulation would be alveolar. G. Trager states that the articulation is consistently post-alveolar (and does not mention free variation).
  7. ↑ Picuris storytellers hold fox tails when speaking. At the end of a story, the storyteller passes the fox tail on to the next speaker indicating that it is now that other person's turn to speak.

Bibliography

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