Chipaya (endolinguonym ''Chipay taqu'') is a native South American language of the Uru–Chipaya language family. The only other language in the grouping,

Uru Uru or URU may refer to: Language * Uru dialect of Central Kilimanjaro, a Bantu language of Tanzania * Uru language, the extinct language of the Uros, an Amerindian people * Uru of Ch'imu, an extinct language of the Uros, an Amerindian people ...

, is considered by some to be a divergent dialect of Chipaya.

Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensiv ...

lists the language vitality as "vigorous," with 1200 speakers out of an ethnic population of around 1800, although younger generations speak it progressively less. Chipaya has been influenced considerably by

Aymara Aymara may refer to: Languages and people * Aymaran languages, the second most widespread Andean language ** Aymara language, the main language within that family ** Central Aymara, the other surviving branch of the Aymara(n) family, which today ...

, the

Quechuan languages Quechua (, ; ), usually called ("people's language") in Quechuan languages, is an indigenous language family spoken by the Quechua peoples, primarily living in the Peruvian Andes. Derived from a common ancestral language, it is the most widely ...

, and more recently,

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

, with a third of its vocabulary having been replaced by those languages. The Chipayan language is spoken in the area south of

Lake Titicaca Lake Titicaca (; es, Lago Titicaca ; qu, Titiqaqa Qucha) is a large freshwater lake in the Andes mountains on the border of Bolivia and Peru. It is often called the highest navigable lake in the world. By volume of water and by surface area, ...

along the Desaguadero River in the mountains of

Bolivia , image_flag = Bandera de Bolivia (Estado).svg , flag_alt = Horizontal tricolor (red, yellow, and green from top to bottom) with the coat of arms of Bolivia in the center , flag_alt2 = 7 × 7 square p ...

and mainly in the town of Chipaya located in the

Sabaya Province Sabaya (formerly: Atahuallpa) is a province in the central parts of the Bolivian Oruro Department. Its seat is Sabaya. Location Sabaya Province is one of sixteen provinces in the Oruro Department. It is located between 18° 35' and 19° 39' Sou ...

of the Bolivian department of

Oruro Oruro (Hispanicized spelling) or Uru Uru is a city in Bolivia with a population of 264,683 (2012 calculation), about halfway between La Paz and Sucre in the Altiplano, approximately above sea level. It is Bolivia's fifth-largest city by pop ...

north of Coipasa Salt Flats. Native speakers generally refer to it as ''Chipay taqu'' or ''Puquina'' or ''Uchun Maa Taqu'' ("our mother language"), but is not the same as, nor in fact even related to, the extinct

Puquina language Puquina (or Pukina) is a small, putative language family, often portrayed as a language isolate, which consists of the extinct Puquina language and Kallawaya, although it is assumed that the latter is just a remnant of the former mixed with Que ...

. Chipaya is an

agglutinative language An agglutinative language is a type of synthetic language with morphology that primarily uses agglutination. Words may contain different morphemes to determine their meanings, but all of these morphemes (including stems and affixes) tend to remain ...

, though it has features uncommon to most agglutinative languages, according to preliminary research by the organization DOBES.

Phonology

Consonants

Consonant clusters

Multiple possibilities are separated by slashes, and optional elements are enclosed in parentheses. Possible syllable onsets are: *(s/š) + p + (h) *(s/š/sh) + k/q + (h/hʷ/x/xʷ) *s/š + p/k/kʷ/q/qʷ/h/hʷ/m/n *t + h/hʷ/x/xʷ *¢/č/ch/l + h Possible syllable codas are: *h/x + p/t/k/q/l/lʲ/r + (t) *hʷ/xʷ + k/q + (t) *Consonant + t

Vowels

*Vowels have continental values for a, , e , i , o, , and u . Each vowel can be short, e.g., a , or long, e.g., a• .

References

External links

DOBES - Chipaya LanguageDOBES - Uru-Chipaya
* ttps://ids.clld.org/contributions/270 Chipaya(

Intercontinental Dictionary Series The Intercontinental Dictionary Series (commonly abbreviated as IDS) is a large database of topical vocabulary lists in various world languages. The general editor of the database is Bernard Comrie of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary An ...

) {{DEFAULTSORT:Chipaya Language Indigenous languages of the Andes Languages of Bolivia Uru–Chipaya languages