Philological evidence for phonemic affricates and diachronic debuccalization in Early Terena (Arawak)

Fernando O De Carvalho

doi:10.1590/1981.81222017000100009

Abstract

Abstract This paper argues that early Terena (‘Guaná’) had a contrast between fricative and affricate consonants that has been lost in modern Terena. Evidence for this claim comes from the examination of late 19th century and early 20th century documents on the language. The existence of the relevant phonemic contrast is revealed not only by an analysis of the transcriptions employed in these early sources but, more importantly, by a demonstration that fricatives and affricates were treated differently in the history of the language. It is proposed that, after the early Terena voiceless fricatives were debuccalized, merging with early Terena h, the affricates started to include fricative realizations in their allophonic range. This scenario is consistent with descriptions of modern Terena that stress the ‘archaic’ character of affricate realizations of /ʃ/.

Highlights

In one of its accepted definitions, philology is concerned with subjecting “records to examination and interpretation in order to gain information about the languages in which these records are cast” (Goddard, 1976, p. 73)1
Perhaps for this reason – and for the emphasis placed on the urgent need to subject living yet rapidly disappearing languages to documentation and description (Goddard, 1976, p. 74-75), a rather self-defeating bias emerged in the study of the indigenous languages of the Americas: the belief that examination of early documentary evidence on these languages, where it exists, can be dismissed as virtually uninformative
This brief paper addresses existing documentary evidence on early Terena, which was either the ancestor, or a dialect closely related to the ancestor of Terena, an Arawak language spoken to this day by more than 5,000 people in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul2

Summary

Introduction

In one of its accepted definitions, philology is concerned with subjecting “records to examination and interpretation in order to gain information about the languages in which these records are cast” (Goddard, 1976, p. 73)1. Following this discussion of the phonology of the modern language is a presentation of the sources on early Terena data, focusing on the representation of fricative and affricate segments.

Results

Conclusion