Tucano, also Tukano or Tucana, endonym yeʼpâ-masa yee uúku͂sehé, is a Tucanoan language spoken in Amazonas, Brazil and Colombia.

Many Tariana people, speakers of the endangered Tariana language are switching to Tucano.

Phonology

Consonants

BilabialAlveolarPalatalVelarGlottal
Plosiveplainptkʔ
voicedbdɡ
Nasal(m)(n)(ŋ)
Fricativesh
Trillr
Approximantwj

Nasal sounds [m n ŋ] are variants of voiced stops /b d ɡ/ between nasal vowels. Stops may also be heard as prenasalized [ᵐb ⁿd ᵑɡ] after nasal vowels. /w/ can be heard as a nasal bilabial semivowel [β̞̃] in the environment of nasal vowels. Allophones of /ɾ/ can be heard as [ɾ̃], [ɺ].

Vowels

FrontCentralBack
Highi ĩɨ ɨ̃u ũ
Mide o õ
Lowa ã

See also

Spanish

Bibliography

  • A Fala Tukano dos Ye'pâ-Masa: Tomo I: Gramática . Henri Ramirez (1997) · Manaus: Inspetoria Salesiana Missionária da Amazônia, CEDEM.
  • Welch, Betty and West, Birdie (2000). In Lenguas indígenas de Colombia: una visión descriptiva edited by González de Pérez, María Stella and Rodríguez de Montes, María Luisa. Instituto Caro y Cuervo.
  • Bibliografía de la familia lingüística Tukano (antes Betoya) ( pp. 79-104 ). Marcelino de Castellvi (1939). In Proceedings of the second convention of the Inter American Bibliographical and Library Association 2:2 Washington, D.C.
  • Campbell, Lyle. (1997). American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509427-1.
  • Proto Tucanoan ( pp. 119-149 ). Nathan E. Waltz and Alva Wheeler (1972). In Comparative Studies in Amerindian Languages Mouton de Gruyter.

External links

  • 2016-07-01 at the Wayback Machine of Janet Chernela, housed at AILLA, containing audio recordings, transcriptions, translations and field notes from the 1970s and 1980s.