Guajiboan (also Guahiban, Wahívoan, Guahiboan) is a

language family A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family. The term ''family'' is a metaphor borrowed from biology, with the tree model used in historical linguistics ...

spoken in the

Orinoco The Orinoco () is one of the longest rivers in South America at . Its drainage basin, sometimes known as the Orinoquia, covers approximately 1 million km2, with 65% of it in Venezuela and 35% in Colombia. It is the List of rivers by discharge, f ...

River region in eastern

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

and southwestern

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

, a

savanna A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) biome and ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach th ...

region known as the

Llanos The Llanos ( Spanish ''Los Llanos'', "The Plains"; ) is a vast tropical grassland plain situated to the east of the Andes in Colombia and Venezuela, in northwestern South America. It is an ecoregion of the tropical and subtropical grasslands, ...

Family division

Guajiboan consists of 5 languages: * Guajiboan ** Macaguane (also known as Hitnü, Macaguán, Makawane, Agualinda, Agualinda Guahibo, Támude) ** Southwest Guajiboan *** Guayabero (also known as Cunimía, Mítiwa, Mitúa, Mitu, Hiw, Jiw, Wayavero, Guaviare) *** Churuya (also known as Bisanigua, Guaigua) ''(†)'' ** Central Guajiboan *** Guajibo (also known as Guahibo, Sikuani, Sicuani, Chiricoa, Hiwi, Jiwi, Jivi, Wahivo, Wahibo, Guaybo, Goahibo, Guaigua, Guayba, Goahiva) **** Waü (west) **** Newütjü (also known as Tigrero) **** Parawá (east) **** Hamorúa (also known as Amorúa, Jamorúa) **** Dome (also known as Playero, Cajaro) *** Cuiva (also known as Wamonae, Cuiba, Kuiba, Deja, Cuiba-Wámonae) **** Pimenepiwi (Meta river) **** Aitopiwi (Ariporo river) **** Yaraüraxi (Capanaparo river) **** Waüpiwi (also known as Wipiwi, Yomati) **** Siripuxi (also known as Tsiripu, Siripu) **** Mayaraxi (also known as Mariposo, Mayalero) Churuya is now

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

. It was formerly spoken in Meta, Colombia. Macaguane is listed as a

dialect A dialect is a Variety (linguistics), variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standard language, standardized varieties as well as Vernacular language, vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardize ...

of Guajibo in Kaufman (1994) and Campbell (1997). Gordon (2005) lists Playero (also Rio Arauca Guahibo), a dialect of Guajibo, as a separate language with a "low intelligibility of other Guahibo". Guajibo and Cuiva form a

dialect continuum A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of Variety (linguistics), language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulat ...

. Guajibo has the most speakers (over 23,000) and is the largest indigenous group in eastern Colombia. Approximately 9,000 in Venezuela. Guayabero is the most divergent language of the family.

Genetic relations

Guajiboan has often been grouped together with

Arawakan Arawakan (''Arahuacan, Maipuran Arawakan, "mainstream" Arawakan, Arawakan proper''), also known as Maipurean (also ''Maipuran, Maipureano, Maipúre''), is a language family that developed among ancient Indigenous peoples in South America. Branch ...

, Arauan, and Candoshi by many classifiers. However, this now seems unlikely as the similarity between Guajiboan and Arawakan has been attributed to

language contact Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact with and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. Language contact can occur at language borders, between adstratum ...

Language contact

Jolkesky (2016) notes that there are lexical similarities with the

Yanomami The Yanomami, also spelled Yąnomamö or Yanomama, are a group of approximately 35,000 indigenous people of the Americas, indigenous people who live in some 200–250 villages in the Amazon rainforest on the border between Venezuela and Brazil. ...

Arawak The Arawak are a group of Indigenous peoples of northern South America and of the Caribbean. The term "Arawak" has been applied at various times to different Indigenous groups, from the Lokono of South America to the Taíno (Island Arawaks), w ...

, Nadahup, Puinave-Kak, Bora-Muinane, and Choko language families due to contact. Meléndez-Lozano (2014) has also noted that Guahiban has borrowed from

Arawakan languages Arawakan (''Arahuacan, Maipuran Arawakan, "mainstream" Arawakan, Arawakan proper''), also known as Maipurean (also ''Maipuran, Maipureano, Maipúre''), is a language family that developed among ancient Indigenous peoples in South America. Branc ...

, especially the Achagua and Piapoco languages. An automated computational analysis ( ASJP 4) by Müller et al. (2013)Müller, André, Viveka Velupillai, Søren Wichmann, Cecil H. Brown, Eric W. Holman, Sebastian Sauppe, Pamela Brown, Harald Hammarström, Oleg Belyaev, Johann-Mattis List, Dik Bakker, Dmitri Egorov, Matthias Urban, Robert Mailhammer, Matthew S. Dryer, Evgenia Korovina, David Beck, Helen Geyer, Pattie Epps, Anthony Grant, and Pilar Valenzuela. 2013.
ASJP World Language Trees of Lexical Similarity: Version 4 (October 2013)
'. found that there are apparent lexical similarities with

and Ticuna-Yuri. However, since the analysis was automatically generated, the similarities could be either due to mutual lexical borrowing, genetic inheritance, or chance resemblances.

Proto-language

Below are Proto-Guahiban reconstructions by Christian and Matteson (1972):Christian, Diana R., and Esther Matteson. 1972. Proto-Guahiban. In Esther Matteson (ed.),
Comparative Studies in Amerindian Languages
', 150-159. The Hague: Mouton.

References

Bibliography

* Adelaar, Willem F. H.; & Muysken, Pieter C. (2004). ''The languages of the Andes''. Cambridge language surveys. Cambridge University Press. *Berg, Marie L. and Isabel J. Kerr. (1973) ''The Cuiva language: Grammar''. Language Data, Amerindian Series, 1. Santa Ana, CA: Summer Institute of Linguistics. * Campbell, Lyle. (1997). ''American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America''. New York: Oxford University Press. . * Greenberg, Joseph H. (1987). ''Language in the Americas''. Stanford: Stanford University Press. * Kaufman, Terrence. (1990). Language history in South America: What we know and how to know more. In D. L. Payne (Ed.), ''Amazonian linguistics: Studies in lowland South American languages'' (pp. 13–67). Austin: University of Texas Press. . * Kaufman, Terrence. (1994). The native languages of South America. In C. Mosley & R. E. Asher (Eds.), ''Atlas of the world's languages'' (pp. 46–76). London: Routledge. * Keels, Jack. (1985). "Guayabero: Phonology and morphophonemics." In Ruth M. Brend (ed.), ''From phonology to discourse: Studies in six Colombian languages'': 57-87. Language Data, Amerindian Series, 9. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics. * Queixalós, Francisco. (1988). "Presentación"; ''Diccionario sikuani–español'': i-xiii. Bogotá: CCELA Universidad de los Andes. ISN 0121-0963. * Rivet, Paul (1948) "La famille linguistique Guahibo"; ''Journal de la Société des Américanistes'' XXXVII: 191-240. Paris.

External links

* Proel
Sub-Familia Guajiboana
{{South American languages Language families Indigenous languages of the South American Northeast Macro-Arawakan languages