Highland Chatino

Last updated
Highland Chatino
Sierra Chatino
Native to Mexico
Region Oaxaca
Native speakers
17,800 (2000) [1]
Oto-Manguean
Language codes
ISO 639-3 Variously:
ctp   Western Highland
cly   Eastern Highland (Lachao-Yolotepec)
cya   Nopala
Glottolog east2736   = Zacatepec–Highlands
ELP Western Highland Chatino

Highland Chatino is an indigenous Mesoamerican language, one of the Chatino family of the Oto-Manguean languages. Dialects are rather diverse; Ethnologue 16 counts them as three languages as follows:

Contents

Neighboring dialects between the three groups are about 80% mutually intelligible; diversity among the three Western dialects is almost as great.

For phonological and grammatical details, see Chatino languages, which includes examples from Yaitepec dialect.

Phonology

Yaitepec Chatino

Yaitepec Chatino has the following phonemic consonants (Rasch 2002):

Consonants
Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
plain pal. plain lab. plain lab. pal.
Plosive voiceless ptckʔ
voiced dɟɡɡʷ
Affricate voiceless t͡st͡ʃ
voiced d͡z
Fricative voiceless sʃh
voiced zʒ
Nasal plainmn
preglottal ʔnʔnʲ
Lateral l
Rhotic ɾ
Approximant plainjw
preglottal ʔjʔw
Vowels
Front Central Back
oralnasaloralnasal
Close iɪ̃uũ
Mid eɛ̃(ə)oɔ̃
Open a

Rasch (2002) reports ten distinct tones for Yaitepec Chatino: the four level tones of high /˥/, mid /˦/, low-mid /˨/, and low /˩/; the two rising tones /˦˥/ and /˨˦/; and the three falling tones /˥˦/, /˦˨/, /˨˩/, as well as a more limited falling tone /˦˩/, found in a few lexical items and in a few completive forms of verbs.

Orthography

There are a variety of practical orthographies for Chatino, most based on Spanish orthography. Typically, x = /ʃ/, ch = /tʃ/, and /k/ is spelled c before back vowels and qu before front vowels.

In Quiahije Chatino, and perhaps more broadly across Highland Chatino, superscript capitals AL are used as lexical tone letters: ᴬ ᴮ ꟲ ᴰ ᴱ ꟳ ᴳ ᴴ ᴵ ᴶ ᴷ ᴸ, [2] with additional letters (superscript M and S) for tone sandhi.[ citation needed ] Not all of these are distinct in all dialects; rather, they mark pan-dialect tone-cognate sets.

In Yaitepec dialect, the pronunciations are: [3]

[˧] (3)
[˦˨] (24)
[˦˧] (23)
ᴰ = ᴷ [˥˨] (14)
[˥] (1)
ꟳ = ᴸ [˧˦] (32)
[˥˦] (12)
[˨˧] (43)
[˦] (2)
[˧˥] (31)

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