Tilquiapan Zapotec (''Zapoteco de San Miguel Tilquiápam'') is an
Oto-Manguean
The Oto-Manguean or Otomanguean languages are a large family comprising several subfamilies of indigenous languages of the Americas. All of the Oto-Manguean languages that are now spoken are indigenous to Mexico, but the Manguean branch of the ...
language of the
Zapotecan branch, spoken in southern
Oaxaca
Oaxaca ( , also , , from nci, Huāxyacac ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Oaxaca ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Oaxaca), is one of the 32 states that compose the political divisions of Mexico, Federative Entities of Mexico. It is ...
,
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
.
Santa Inés Yatzechi Zapotec is close enough to be considered a dialect, and
Ocotlán Zapotec
Ocotlán Zapotec (San Antonio Ocotlán Zapotec, ''Ocotlán Oeste Zapotec,''That is, Western Ocotlan Zapotec. Eastern Ocotlan Zapotec is Chichicapan Zapotec. ''Zapoteco del Poniente de Ocotlán)'' is a Zapotec language of Oaxaca, Mexico
Me ...
is also close. They were measured at 87% and 59% intelligibility, respectively, in recorded text testing.
Sounds
Vowels
Each vowel can also be
glottalized
Glottalization is the complete or partial closure of the glottis during the articulation of another sound. Glottalization of vowels and other sonorants is most often realized as creaky voice (partial closure). Glottalization of obstruent consona ...
, a phenomenon manifested as either
creaky voice
In linguistics, creaky voice (sometimes called laryngealisation, pulse phonation, vocal fry, or glottal fry) refers to a low, scratchy sound that occupies the vocal range below the common vocal register. It is a special kind of phonation in which ...
throughout the vowel or, more commonly, as a sequence of a vowel and a
glottal stop optionally followed by an echo of the vowel.
Consonants
As with other Zapotec languages, the primary distinction between consonant pairs like and is not of
voicing but between
fortis and lenis (measured in length
[See ]), respectively, with voicing being a phonetic correlate. There are two exceptions to this in Tilquiapan:
* The contrast between fortis and lenis
* The contrast between fortis and lenis
Neither is voiceless, but is pronounced a little longer and replaces in certain causative verbs in ways similar to other fortis/lenis consonantal changes (e.g. 'get loose' vs. 'let loose').
Notes
References
*
*
*
Zapotec languages
{{Oto-Manguean-lang-stub