Chipaya language

Chipaya is related to the Uru (Uchumataqu) and Uru of Chʼimu languages, both of which are now extinct, in a language family termed Uru-Chipaya. Even though Uru and Chipaya are closely related, they are "probably" not mutually intellligible.

Ethnologue lists the language vitality as "vigorous," with 1,800 speakers out of an ethnic population of around 2,100, although younger generations speak it progressively less.

Documentation

Max Uhle visited the Uru-Chipaya language area in 1894 and collected data on both Uru and Chipaya. Alfred Métraux and Arthur Posnansky also documented both languages. Ronald Olson further documented Chipaya, particularly extensively with respect to lexical material. Liliane Porterie Gutiérrez conducted "substantial" research on Chipaya during the 1980s, though her death prevented the publication of many of her materials. Beginning in 2001, Rodolfo Cerrón-Palomino began a new documentation project on the language.

The Chipaya language is spoken in the area south of Lake Titicaca along the Desaguadero River in the mountains of Bolivia and mainly in the town of Chipaya located in the Sabaya Province of the Bolivian department of Oruro 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.

Consonants

Consonant clusters

Multiple possibilities are separated by slashes, and optional elements are enclosed in parentheses.

Possible syllable onsets are:

• (s/ŝ) + p + (h)
• (s/ŝ/sh) + k/q + (h/hʷ/x/xʷ)
• s/ŝ + p/k/kʷ/q/qʷ/h/hʷ/m/n
• t + h/hʷ/x/xʷ
• ¢/ĉ/č/l + h

Possible syllable codas are:

• h/x + p/t/k/q/l/ll/r + (t)
• hʷ/xʷ + k/q + (t)
• Consonant + t

Vowels

• Each vowel can be short, e.g., a [a], or long, e.g., a• [aː].

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