Chuj () is a Mayan language spoken by around 40,000 members of the Chuj people in

Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...

and around 3,000 members in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. Chuj is a member of the Qʼanjobʼalan branch along with the languages of Tojolabʼal, Qʼanjobʼal, Akateko, Poptiʼ, and Mochoʼ which, together with the Chʼolan branch, Chuj forms the Western branch of the Mayan family. The Chujean branch emerged approximately 2,000 years ago. In Guatemala, Chuj speakers mainly reside in the municipalities of San Mateo Ixtatán, San Sebastián Coatán and Nentón in the Huehuetenango Department. Some communities in Barillas and Ixcán also speak Chuj. The two main dialects of Chuj are the San Mateo Ixtatán dialect and the San Sebastián Coatán dialect. The Chuj language has been influenced by Spanish, and Chuj speakers have a tendency to borrow Spanish words or code-mix. It is estimated that 70% of the Chuj language is purely Chuj. There are language conservation and revitalization efforts taking place in San Mateo Ixtatán, through groups like the

Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala The Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala, or ALMG (English: ''Guatemalan Academy of Mayan Languages'') is a Guatemalan organisation that regulates the use of the 22 Mayan languages spoken within the borders of the republic. It has expended partic ...

Phonology

Phonemic inventory

Orthography

The letter 'h' is conventionally used in words with initial vowels to distinguish them from words that begin with a glottal stop.

Grammar

Verb stem morphology

Below is a template for the verbal stem in Chuj. Verbal predicates in Chuj appear with a status suffix: -a with transitive verbs and –i with intransitive verbs. Finite clauses inflect for Tense- Aspect,

person A person (: people or persons, depending on context) is a being who has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations suc ...

, and

number A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The most basic examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words. More universally, individual numbers can ...

Non-verbal predicates

Non-verbal predicates are non-verbal words like adjectives, nouns, positionals, or directionals that act as the main predicate and are semantically stative. These constructions do not inflect for Tense-Aspect, but do inflect for person and number. There is no overt copula in Chuj and copula constructions are expressed through non-verbal predicates.

Person-markers

Chuj is an ergative-absolutive language. The subject of an intransitive verb and the object of a transitive verb are both cross-referenced with an absolutive marker, which appears in the verbal stem. The subject of a transitive verb is cross-referenced with an ergative marker in the verbal stem.

Tense-Aspect

Chuj has four attested Tense- Aspect markers. Finite clauses inflect obligatorily for Tense-Aspect.

Nominal classifiers

Chuj nominal classifiers represent a closed class of approximately a dozen words. They specify gender for humans, and the base material for objects, such as wood (teʼ) for houses and metal (kʼen) for knives. Chuj nominal classifiers have two main functions: they act as articles for referential nouns, and as

pronoun In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (Interlinear gloss, glossed ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the part of speech, parts of speech, but so ...

s. They have a lexical origin, but have undergone semantic bleaching and may therefore refer to a larger semantic field than the nominals that they are derived from. ; Articles for referential nouns ; Pronouns

Numbers 1 through 10 in Chuj

A tongue twister in Chuj from San Sebastián Coatán

Source:Yumal Skuychaj Tiʼ Chuj, ALMG, 2006, p.197

Sample Text

Notes

References

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External links

Chuj Talking Dictionary, 2014. Chuj Talking Dictionary. K’ulb’il Yol Twitz Paxil / The Academy of Mayan Languages, Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages.Academia de las Lenguas Mayas
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chuj Language Mayan languages Agglutinative languages Indigenous languages of Central America Indigenous languages of Mexico Languages of Guatemala Huehuetenango Department Mesoamerican languages Verb–object–subject languages Chuj