Tsafiki
Tsafiki language
Barbacoan language spoken in Ecuador
Tsafiki, also known as Tsachila or Colorado, is a Barbacoan language spoken in Ecuador by c. 2000 ethnic Tsáchila people.
Consonants
More information Bilabial, Dental ...
| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stop | voiceless | p | t | k | ʔ | ||
| voiced | b | d | |||||
| Affricate | t͡s | ||||||
| Fricative | ɸ | s | h | ||||
| Nasal | m | n | |||||
| Lateral | l | ||||||
| Flap | ɹ ~ ɾ | ||||||
| Semivowel | j | w | |||||
Close
- /b, d/ are preglottalized [ˀb, ˀd] when occurring intervocalically.
- /k/ can become voiced [ɡ] when intervocally after nasal sounds.
- /ɹ/ is heard as [ɾ] when occurring word-initially, and when following a nasalized vowel, an allophone [n] occurs.
- /s/ is heard as [ʃ] when preceding high vowels /i, u/ and after unaccented high vowels.
- /t͡s/ is heard as [t͡ʃ] when preceding high vowels, but many speakers pronounce it as [t͡ʃ] in all environments.
Vowels
Tsafiki has five vowels Four vowels have nasalized forms.
- Unaccented vowels before voiceless stops are often devoiced [ḁ].[2]
- Tsafiki at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- Dickinson, Connie (2002). Complex Predicates in Tsafiki. Ann Arbor: UMI.
 | This article related to the Indigenous languages of the Americas is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |