Aruáshi, or Aruá, is a nearly extinct

Tupian language The Tupi or Tupian language family comprises some 70 languages spoken in South America, of which the best known are Tupi proper and Guarani. Homeland and ''urheimat'' Rodrigues (2007) considers the Proto-Tupian urheimat to be somewhere between ...

of the states of

Rondônia Rondônia () is one of the 26 states of Brazil, located in the northern subdivision of the country (central-western part). It is bordered by Acre (state), Acre in the west, Amazonas, Brazil, Amazonas in the north, Mato Grosso in the east, and Bo ...

and

Mato Grosso Mato Grosso ( – ) is one of the states of Brazil, the List of Brazilian states by area, third largest by area, located in the Central-West Region, Brazil, Central-West region. The state has 1.66% of the Brazilian population and is responsible ...

, in the

Amazon region The Amazon basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries. The Amazon drainage basin covers an area of about , or about 35.5 percent of the South American continent. It is located in the countries of Bolivi ...

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

. There were 131 Aruá in 2012 and about 20 people who speak Aruá as a maternal language.

Linguistic features

* Consonants: Aruáshi exhibits a typical Tupian consonant inventory, including stops (/p/, /t/, /k/), nasals (/m/, /n/), and glides (/w/, /j/) * Vowels: A five-vowel system (/a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/) with nasalization contrasts. * Morphology: Agglutinative structure with extensive verb serialization. Example: kõjã-pit ("to walk-while-talking"). * Syntax: Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) word order, common in Tupian languages.

References

Tupian languages Endangered Tupian languages Mamoré–Guaporé linguistic area {{tupian-lang-stub