Papers by Thiago C Chacon
International Journal of American Linguists, 2014
This paper presents a reconstruction of Proto-Tukanoan consonants and the classification of the f... more This paper presents a reconstruction of Proto-Tukanoan consonants and the classification of the family based on shared phonological innovations. The proposed reconstruction contrasts with previous comparative studies of the family by proposing a series of laryn-gealized stops (instead of voiced stops) and a different set of sounds for the alveolar and palatal points of articulation. Methodologically, it considers lexicostatistical methods to play a secondary role in the classification of languages in the Tukanoan family. It offers a detailed discussion of contact vs. inherited linguistic traits in the Tukanoan family and in the Vaupes region, well known for its multilingualism and system of linguistic exogamy, and concludes with an interpretation of the evolution of the Tukanoan family in historical terms.
The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact, 2021
This chapter explores how language contact situations in Latin America have been dynamically crea... more This chapter explores how language contact situations in Latin America have been dynamically created and changed by movements of peoples and the concurrent exchanges of commodities and ideas through space and time. I analyze major cases of migration and trade, focusing on three kinds of linguistic outcomes that are contact-based: language spread, the emergence of multilingualism, and the development of contact languages.
The discussion is informed by the internal and external histories of indigenous languages of Latin America, from the initial peopling of the New World up to contemporary situations. The primary kind of information this chapter deals with comes from studies that bring a solid knowledge of language internal histories by the use of traditional methods in historical and contact linguistics. In addition, given that migration and trade are social processes in nature, some information is drawn from findings in archaeology, anthropology, human genetics, and history.
Revista Brasileira de Linguística Antropológica, 2013
This work analyzes the cultural history of the Tukanoan family by attempting the reconstruction o... more This work analyzes the cultural history of the Tukanoan family by attempting the reconstruction of 107 words related to the material culture shared by Amazonian peoples, especially in the Northwest Amazon. The analysis of the terminological system of words that can be reconstructed to Proto-Tukanoan, as well as words that can only be reconstructed to intermediate proto-languages or words that cannot be reconstructed at all allows for a set of cultural inferences regarding the historic evolution of Tukanoan family, which is accomplished along a dialogue with the ethnographic and archeological literature of the Northwest Amazon, as well as following in general terms the proposals for linking Historical Linguistics and Archaeology in different parts of the globe. It is concluded that there was a process of cultural differentiation between the two main branches of the Tukanoan family, as the reflex of distinct integration of each branch in different regional subsystems in the Northwest Amazon.
This paper describes a number of argument selectors for grammatical relations in Kubeo, an Easter... more This paper describes a number of argument selectors for grammatical relations in Kubeo, an Eastern Tukanoan language spoken in the Vaupes River area in Northwestern Amazonia. The main selectors discussed in this paper are: verbal agreement, case marking, constituent ordering, causative, applicative, non-finite clauses, passive, noun incorporation and anaphoric constructions. The overwhelming grammatical pattern selects S, A, and A ditr for similar treatment in contrast to the remaining argument types; some constructions suggest a distinction between two types of S arguments, which we analyze as S a versus S p. The language presents the phenomenon of differential object marking, as well as analytical challenges related to non-canonical passivization and the way that animacy, referentiality and argument hierarchies correlate in the organization of grammatical relations.
Journal of Historical Linguistics, 2018
This article describes the evolution of past/perfective subject-verb agreement morphology in the ... more This article describes the evolution of past/perfective subject-verb agreement morphology in the Tukanoan family, reconstructing relevant aspects of Proto-Tukanoan verbal morphology and delineating the subsequent diachronic development of verbal subject agreement morphology in the Eastern branch of the family. We argue that suffixes that cumulatively expone past/perfective and person, number, and gender (png) subject agreement resulted from the fusion of post-verbal demonstratives/pronouns expressing png information with suffixes expressing past/perfective tam information. We propose that different png agreement categories developed at successive stages in the diversification of the family, with third person masculine singular subject agreement emerging before other png categories, followed by animate plural agreement, then finally by the development of third person feminine agreement. The result in Eastern Tukanoan was a cross-linguistically unusual agreement system that contrasts four agreement categories: (i) first and second person singular and third person inanimate (singular and plural); (ii) third person animate masculine singular; (iii) third person animate feminine singular; and (iv) third animate plural.
This paper analyzes several linguistic traits that are eviden-ces for ancient and continuous cont... more This paper analyzes several linguistic traits that are eviden-ces for ancient and continuous contacts between Arawakan, Tukanoan and neighboring languages from the Northwest Amazon. It is shown that Arawakan-Tukanoan contacts have a long-term duration and since ancient times have been shaping the languages from both families in terms of direct and indirect diiusion processes, with an overall tendency for Arawakan dominance in the exchange of linguistic traits. Broader patterns of areal relationships are also explored, showing evidence for large-scale multilingual regional systems in prehistory , as well as suggesting that Arawakan and Tukanoan had the most intense and prolonged contact situation in the region. These results contribute to our overall understanding of the cultural history and the complex regional systems in Amazonia.
This paper explores the realization of stress in Kubeo, a Tukanoan language from the Northwest Am... more This paper explores the realization of stress in Kubeo, a Tukanoan language from the Northwest Amazonia with both stress and tone (H vs. HL). The first H tone of a word docks on the primary stressed syllable, which by default is the second syllable except in words with lexical initial stress. Secondary stress occurs every two syllables to the right of the primary stress. F0, duration, intensity and the first two formants were measured for vowels in a corpus of 150 words ranging from one to six syllables. Results from two speakers indicate that primary stress is associated with the greatest duration and most peripheral vowel qualities. Unstressed pre-tonic syllables are phonetically more prominent than their post-tonic counterparts along all dimensions except F0, which depends on lexical tone. In post-tonic unstressed syllables, duration, intensity and vowel quality are all dependent on lexical tone. Secondary stress is less salient due to interference from lexical tones but appears to be associated with longer duration and more peripheral vowels relative to unstressed syllables. Our results enrich typological knowledge of both the acoustic realization of stress in tone languages and the interplay of tonal and metrical phonology in languages with complex word level prosody.
Improved computational models of sound change shed light on the history of the Tukanoan languages... more Improved computational models of sound change shed light on the history of the Tukanoan languages * There has been much debate regarding the internal history of the Tukanoan languages during the last four decades, with different classification proposals being based on lexical and phonological data. Here, we present a new classification of the Tukanoan language family based on an improved computational approach which infers phylogenetic trees from proposed sound change patterns. In contrast to traditional methods based on the manual identification of shared innovations by experts, our method identifies valid innovations within a parsimony framework. In contrast to existing computational models which are mostly based on binary character states for lexical data, we model sound change patterns as directed weighted transitions between multiple character states. We apply the new approach to a set of 21 extant Tukano languages. Our results confirm the east-west split of the Tukanoan languages which was proposed in the past and suggest a classification which groups Kubeo with Tanimuka on the one hand, and Koreguahe with Maihiki, on the other hand, thus reconciling previous classifications. We use this new classification to propose a consensus phy-logeny of Tukanoan in which all automatically inferred shared innovations were manually checked and uncertainties are explicitly displayed.
ESSAY
... seven years have passed since I first heard the Kubeo creational myth. I was just start... more ESSAY
... seven years have passed since I first heard the Kubeo creational myth. I was just starting my PhD, eager to document, learn and preserve the Kubeo language. As a linguist, who enjoys everything the linguistic code can teach about the Kubeos and their language, I started to think that language conservation should be more of a secondary objective, and that the emphasis should instead be on themes transversal to a number of aspects of community life. Since languages are “incidentally” also transversal to culture and society, it makes sense – at least in sociolinguistic situations like those of Kubeos – that language conservation should focus strategically on promoting community-based experiences of language use.
In our case, the Kubeos chose general traditional culture, sacred landscapes, territory and the environment as transversal themes. This text describes our initiatives related to these topics and considers the broader issues related to language and indigenous groups...
Neste trabalho, revisamos a noção de exogamia linguística entre grupos indígenas que habitam ... more Neste trabalho, revisamos a noção de exogamia linguística entre grupos indígenas que habitam o Noroeste Amazônico e falam línguas pertencentes às famílias linguísticas Tukáno, Arúak e Nadahup. Comparamos dois tipos de visões sobre a exogamia linguística: a visão canônica, que reforça a associação “língua-povo”, e a visão que propomos, que reconsidera o papel das línguas como um elemento condicionante e condicionado por padrões de organização social e cultural mais amplos. Concluímos que a noção de exogamia linguística é, em geral, sobrevalorizada ou mal definida em parte da literatura etnográfica e linguística da Região, devendo ser reconsiderada com base nos processos históricos socioculturais por que passaram os grupos étnicos na Região
A partir de um olhar interdisciplinar que cruza, principalmente, conhecimentos da arqueologia, da... more A partir de um olhar interdisciplinar que cruza, principalmente, conhecimentos da arqueologia, da etnologia e da linguís- tica histórica, este texto dá os primeiros passos para construir uma história plau- sível da formação do sistema regional do Alto Rio Negro e, assim, localizá-lo na história geral da Amazônia. Para a reconstrução da história deste sistema regional, composto principalmente por povos falantes de línguas tukáno orien- tais e aruaques, se dá destaque ao conhe- cimento indígena associado aos lugares mencionados nas narrativas de origem que não apenas evidencia as memórias do processo de formação histórica e cul- tural da região, mas formas específicas de manejo ambiental que têm sido muito bem sucedidas durante séculos.
Este trabalho discute os sistemas de indexação de sujeitos nos verbos em línguas da família T... more Este trabalho discute os sistemas de indexação de sujeitos nos verbos em línguas da família Tukáno. Problematizamos como se dão as relações entre as categorias de classificação nominal, pessoa e número nestes sistemas, além de analisar o estatuto dos morfemas indexadores na sintaxe de cada língua como marcas de concordância, correferência e/ ou argumentos verbais. Línguas da família Tukáno possuem uma rica morfologia verbal, que também marca diversas categorias modais, evidenciais, temporais, aspectuais, além de tipos de orações (declarativas, interrogativas e imperativas). Oferecemos uma análise com atenção à tipologia dos sistemas de classificação nominal, pessoa e número, além de discussões sobre questões pragmático-funcionais que estão subjacentes aos sistemas analisados. Palavras-chave: Classificação nominal. Número. Pessoa. Indexação. Língua Tukáno.
Resumo -Nas línguas da família Tukáno, duas categorias do discurso têm sido identificadas com bas... more Resumo -Nas línguas da família Tukáno, duas categorias do discurso têm sido identificadas com base em critérios semânticos e gramaticais: nomes e verbos. Neste estudo focalizo uma das categorias gramaticais que distinguem nomes de verbos em Tukáno, a categoria de gênero, assim como os meios formais pelos quais essa categoria é expressa na língua. Gênero nesta língua divide os nomes em duas classes nominais com base no traço [+Animado]. Os referentes nominais de cada classe são passíveis de subclassificações também pautadas em critérios semânticos: masculino e feminino, em relação aos nomes com referentes animados; e contável/incontável, em relação aos nomes inanimados. Também discuto um subsistema de classificação menos gramaticalizado que consiste na classificação da forma física dos referentes de nomes inanimados.
RESUMO: Este artigo trata do acento em Kubêo, suas propriedades fonéticas, fonológicas, tipológic... more RESUMO: Este artigo trata do acento em Kubêo, suas propriedades fonéticas, fonológicas, tipológicas, funcionais e rítmicas. O ponto principal é demonstrar que Kubêo é um língua acentual, apesar da coexistência de tons e acento. Tons e acento são sistemas independentes na estrutura lexical subjacente, mas relacionam durante a derivação fonológica e na forma superficial das palavras. A língua possui um sistema de contraste tonal atípico, restrito a sílabas não-acentuadas. Sua estrutura métrica é baseada em pés jâmbicos insensíveis à quantidade silábica, que dividem a palavra iterativamente da esquerda pra a direita, um outro fato incomum tipologicamente.
Este trabalho realiza um estudo comparativo dos segmentos fonológicos das línguas Tukáno (TUK) e ... more Este trabalho realiza um estudo comparativo dos segmentos fonológicos das línguas Tukáno (TUK) e Desáno (DES), ambas da Família Linguística Tukáno Oriental (TO). Os dados para este estudo foram coletados em viagem a campo para o Alto Rio Negro durante os meses de janeiro e fevereiro de 2007. O estudo procura estabelcer as correspondências fonológicas entre as línguas, bem como analisar e procurar as motivações históricas e sincrônicas para cada fenômeno encontrado. Para isso, quando for relevante para nossa análise, lançamos mão de dados de outras línguas TO e estudos de outros lingüistas.
This paper analyzes the process involved in establishing a center dedicated to the investigation,... more This paper analyzes the process involved in establishing a center dedicated to the investigation, documentation and conservation of indigenous languages and cultures in the town of São Gabriel da Cachoeira, in the Northwest Brazilian Amazon. Our analysis will focus on how the sociolinguistic situation in the area of São Gabriel da Cachoeira, the complexity of local demands from community members and indigenous organizations, and the institutional context in the region are related to the center's strategic plan and initial activities. The goals of this paper are to identify and discuss potential directions for this pioneering initiative in Brazil, and to call attention to the complex practical and theoretical questions that it raises about collaboration, institutional and community involvement, and academic and traditional knowledge. We will contextualize our discussion of the center within the field of Language Documentation and Conservation (LD&C) and suggest practical directions for its future activities. Ultimately, this paper is intended to go beyond the analysis of a case study and function as a lens for current issues in LD&C theory, such as community involvement, collaboration, and empowerment.
This paper explores the correlation of linguistic and sociocultural features in the historical pr... more This paper explores the correlation of linguistic and sociocultural features in the historical processes that led to the formation of Kubeo, an East Tukano language spoken in the Northwest Amazon. The study shows that the Kubeo -despite sharing many traits associated with the Vaupés linguistic and cultural area -owe many of their unique cultural and linguistic characteristics to a complex set of historical circumstances that led to the relative marginalization of the Kubeo language from related languages and exacerbated in uence from languages from the Arawak family.
ii © Thiago Costa Chacon iii yo pamiene bueitukubore, himakɨ Caetanore, ɨĩ bohe, toiwawɨ yɨ iv AC... more ii © Thiago Costa Chacon iii yo pamiene bueitukubore, himakɨ Caetanore, ɨĩ bohe, toiwawɨ yɨ iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First I need to thank a woman who conquered the first place in my heart: Rhaiana, my wife. Without her, I would probably still be wandering in the midst of heaven knows where… Second I thank to my mother, Alba, who taught me the humility of love and inspires me with her care for the universe.
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Papers by Thiago C Chacon
The discussion is informed by the internal and external histories of indigenous languages of Latin America, from the initial peopling of the New World up to contemporary situations. The primary kind of information this chapter deals with comes from studies that bring a solid knowledge of language internal histories by the use of traditional methods in historical and contact linguistics. In addition, given that migration and trade are social processes in nature, some information is drawn from findings in archaeology, anthropology, human genetics, and history.
... seven years have passed since I first heard the Kubeo creational myth. I was just starting my PhD, eager to document, learn and preserve the Kubeo language. As a linguist, who enjoys everything the linguistic code can teach about the Kubeos and their language, I started to think that language conservation should be more of a secondary objective, and that the emphasis should instead be on themes transversal to a number of aspects of community life. Since languages are “incidentally” also transversal to culture and society, it makes sense – at least in sociolinguistic situations like those of Kubeos – that language conservation should focus strategically on promoting community-based experiences of language use.
In our case, the Kubeos chose general traditional culture, sacred landscapes, territory and the environment as transversal themes. This text describes our initiatives related to these topics and considers the broader issues related to language and indigenous groups...
The discussion is informed by the internal and external histories of indigenous languages of Latin America, from the initial peopling of the New World up to contemporary situations. The primary kind of information this chapter deals with comes from studies that bring a solid knowledge of language internal histories by the use of traditional methods in historical and contact linguistics. In addition, given that migration and trade are social processes in nature, some information is drawn from findings in archaeology, anthropology, human genetics, and history.
... seven years have passed since I first heard the Kubeo creational myth. I was just starting my PhD, eager to document, learn and preserve the Kubeo language. As a linguist, who enjoys everything the linguistic code can teach about the Kubeos and their language, I started to think that language conservation should be more of a secondary objective, and that the emphasis should instead be on themes transversal to a number of aspects of community life. Since languages are “incidentally” also transversal to culture and society, it makes sense – at least in sociolinguistic situations like those of Kubeos – that language conservation should focus strategically on promoting community-based experiences of language use.
In our case, the Kubeos chose general traditional culture, sacred landscapes, territory and the environment as transversal themes. This text describes our initiatives related to these topics and considers the broader issues related to language and indigenous groups...
Companion volume to Alto Xingu, uma Sociedade Multilíngue (Franchetto, 2011), both available for download on the Museunacional link.
За последние сорок лет внутренняя история языков тукано была в центре множества дискуссий; предлагались самые разные классификации, основанные на лексических и фонологических данных. Данная статья представляет новую классификацию языковой семьи тукано, основанную на улучшенном компьютеризированном подходе, который реконструирует филогенетическое дерево исходя из предлагаемых звуковых изменений. В отличие от традиционного метода, который основан на ручной идентификации общих инноваций лингвистами, новый метод определяет инновации по принципу бережливости (parsimony). В отличие от моделей с бинарными признаками, пользующихся большой популярностью при анализе лексики, звуковые изменения описываются авторами как направленные взвешенные переходы между несколькими состояниями признака. Авторы применяют свой алгоритм к выборке из 21 современного языка семьи тукано. Результаты подтверждают бинарное разделение языков тукано на западную и восточную ветви, которое уже было ранее предложено, а также указывают на генетическую близость между, с одной стороны, языками кубео и танимука, с другой — корегуахе и маихики, таким образом, примиряя друг с другом предыдущие классификации. Авторы используют полученную классификацию для реконструкции консенсусного филогенетического дерева, в котором все общие инновации проверены вручную и для всех неточностей предлагаются детальные объяснения.
Our first point concerns the social context: YUK and TAN are in fact still in close contact. They participate in an ethnic exogamic system, resulting in extensive bilingualism. Moreover, YUK is recently gaining prestige over TAN. This context does not differ as much as previously thought from the Vaupés context.
Second, we consider the YUK-TAN contact within a broader areal perspective. Several similarities between these languages are present in other Arawak and Tukanoan languages, as cases of Pan-Arawak-Tukanoan homologies. On another level, other YUK-TAN similarities are shared with other languages in the Northwest Amazon, including non-Tukanoan or non-Arawak languages, as part of broad Northwestern Amazonian homologies.
Last but not least, we identify bilateral homologies between Yukuna and Tanimuka, in addition to Aikhenvald’s (2002) original features, in three different domains.
1) Lexicon. A few words from basic and cultural vocabulary are uniquely shared by TAN and YUK, such as ‘parrot’ TAN pakoroka & YUK pakoro. Several words shared by TAN and YUK are also present in many Arawakan languages, indicating borrowings in TAN from YUK, such as ‘fog’ YUK isamani ~ ihamani & TAN ihamarãka & Piapoco and Achagua (Arawak) samana. Yet borrowing in YUK from TAN is also attested as in ‘paddle’ YUK weʔetʃi & TAN wẽaripãia.
2) Grammatical morphemes. Three grammatical morphemes have likely been borrowed in TAN from YUK. TAN has a case marker rika ‘genitive’ not shared by other Tukanoan languages. In YUK rika is a free 3rd person non-feminine pronoun, which might have evolved in TAN as a genitive from a juxtapositive construction. A second case of borrowing is the causative suffix -ta in YUK and the homologue causative in TAN -ta; cognate morphemes are found in other Arawak languages, but not in Tukanoan languages. The third case is the TAN ĩmã copula verb used in attributive constructions. YUK has an existential verb iʔima ~ iʔimi and in Baniwa (Arawak) a copula verb is eema.
3) Prosody. Comparison of word-level prosody in YUK and TAN is made difficult by the lack of a clear prosodic profile of the Arawak family. Nevertheless, we suggest that there has been some convergence between the two prosodic systems. Despite their disparities (two-tone system in TAN, phonemic stress in YUK), both languages show a systematic stress/tone polarity between root and affixes, which is not found in other related languages.
To conclude, we provide additional elements and new perspectives regarding Aikhenvald’s (2002) original analysis of the YUK-TAN contact situation. Direct borrowings of lexical and grammatical morphemes not only suggest that YUK is dominant in the contact scenario, but also that language contact sustained by exogamy in the region is not immune to the direct transfer of morphemes (pace the situation of Kubeo and Baniwa (Chacon 2013)).