Cuicatec language

Last updated
Cuicatec
Native to Mexico
Region Oaxaca
Ethnicity Cuicatec
Native speakers
13,000 (2020 census) [1]
Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3 Either:
cux   Tepeuxila
cut   Teutila
Glottolog cuic1234
ELP Cuicatec
Cuicatec map.svg
Extent of the Cuicatec language: prior to contact (olive green) and current (red)
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Cuicatec is an Oto-Manguean language spoken in Oaxaca, Mexico. It belongs to the Mixtecan branch together with the Mixtec languages and the Trique language. [2] The Ethnologue lists two major dialects of Cuicatec: Tepeuxila Cuicatec and Teutila Cuicatec. Like other Oto-Manguean languages, Cuicatec is tonal.

Contents

The Cuicatecs are closely related to the Mixtecs. They inhabit two towns: Teutila and Tepeuxila in western Oaxaca. According to the 2000 census, they number around 23,000, of whom an estimated 65% are speakers of the language. [3] The name Cuicatec is a Nahuatl exonym, from [ˈkʷika] 'song' [ˈteka] 'inhabitant of place of'. [4]

Cuicatec-language programming is carried by the CDI's radio station XEOJN, based in San Lucas Ojitlán, Oaxaca.

Phonology

Vowels

The Santa Maria Papalo dialect contains six vowel sounds both oral and nasal:

Front Back
Close i ĩ u ũ
Mid e o õ
ɔ ɔ̃
Open a ã

Consonants

Bilabial Dental Palatal Velar Glottal
plain lab.
Plosive p t k ʔ
Affricate
Fricative voiceless s
voiced β ð ɣ ɣʷ
Nasal m n
Rhotic ɾ , r
Approximant l j w

Allophones of the following sounds /β ð ɣ n j t tʃ/ include [b d ɡ~x ŋ j̈ θ ʃ], respectively.

Notes

  1. Lenguas indígenas y hablantes de 3 años y más, 2020 INEGI. Censo de Población y Vivienda 2020.
  2. The proposal to group Mixtec, Trique and Cuicatec into a single family (none more closely related to one than to the other) was made by Longacre (1957) with convincing evidence.
  3. Website of the Comisión Nacional para el Desarrollo de los Pueblos Indígenas, http://www.cdi.gob.mx/index.php?id_seccion=660 Archived 2019-09-15 at the Wayback Machine , accessed 28 July 2008.
  4. Campbell 1997:402)

Bibliography

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