North_Highland_Mixe
Totontepec Mixe
Mixe language spoken in Mexico
Totontepec Mixe, called North Highland Mixe in Wichmann (1995), is a Mixe language spoken in Mexico, in the town of Totontepec Villa de Morelos, Oaxaca.
| Totontepec Mixe | |
|---|---|
| North Highland Mixe | |
| Native to | Mexico |
| Region | Northeastern Oaxaca |
Native speakers | 5,500 (2000)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | mto |
| Glottolog | toto1305 |
| ELP | Totontepec Mixe |
Mixe has phonology is remarkable due to its complex system of vowel duration contrasts in addition to glottalization. There is a palatalized series of all consonant phonemes (as in Russian, or Irish) and possibly a fortis/lenis distinction in the plosive series, the recognition of which however is obscured by a tendency towards allophonic voicing of consonants in voiced environments.
Consonants
| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | pal. | plain | pal. | plain | pal. | plain | pal. | plain | pal. | plain | pal. | ||
| Plosive | p /p/ | py /pʲ/ | t /t̪/ | ty /t̪ʲ/ | k /k/ | ky /kʲ/ | |||||||
| Affricate | ts /ts/ | tsy /tsʲ/ | |||||||||||
| Fricative | w /β/ | wy /βʲ/ | s /s/ | x /ʂ/ | xy /ʂʲ/ | j /h/ | jy /hʲ/ | ||||||
| Nasal | m /m/ | my /mʲ/ | n /n/ | ny /nʲ/ | |||||||||
| Rhotic | r /r/ | ||||||||||||
| Lateral | l /l/ | ||||||||||||
| Approximant | (w) | (wʲ) | y /j/ | ||||||||||
/β, βʲ/ are heard as glides [w, wʲ] in other dialects.
Palatalized sounds /tsʲ, nʲ/ can also have allophones as [tʃ, ɲ] in free variation.
Sounds /p, t̪, k/ are heard as [β, d̪, ɡ] in intervocalic positions.
Vowels
Syllable nuclei vary in length and phonation. Most descriptions report three contrastive vowel lengths.[2] The other types of phonation have been variously termed checked vowels, creaky voice vowels and breathy voice vowels.
The table below illustrates the vowel phonemes for Ayöök, orthographic symbols on the left.
| Short | Long | Overlong | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Front | Central | Back | Front | Central | Back | Front | Central | Back | ||
| Close (high) | Modal | i /i/ | ï /ɨ/ | u /u/ | ii /iː/ | ïï /ɨ/ | uu /uː/ | |||
| Glottalized | i’ /ḭ/ | ï’ /ɨ̰/ | u’ /ṵ/ | ii’ /ḭː/ | ïï’ /ɨ̰ː/ | uu’ /ṵː/ | i’i | ï’ï | u’u | |
| Close-mid | Modal | e /e/ | ë /ə/ | o /o/ | ee /eː/ | ëë /əː/ | oo /oː/ | |||
| Glottalized | e’ /ḛ/ | ë’ /ə̰/ | o’ /o̰/ | ee’ /ḛː/ | ëë’ /ə̰ː/ | oo’ /o̰ː/ | e’e | ë’ë | o’o | |
| Open-mid | Modal | ä /æ/ | ää /æː/ | |||||||
| Glottalized | ä’ /æ̰/ | ää’ /æ̰ː/ | ä’ä | |||||||
| Open (low) | Modal | a /a/ | aa /aː/ | |||||||
| Glottalized | a’ /a̰/ | aa’ /a̰ː/ | a’a | |||||||
- Totontepec Mixe at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- Ladefoged; Maddieson (1996). The sounds of the world's languages. Blackwell. p. 320. ISBN 978-0631198154.
- Schoenhals, Alvin & Louise Schoenhals, 1965, Vocabulario Mixe de Totontepec, Serie de Vocabularios Indigénas "Mariano Silva y Aceves" Num. 14. SIL, Mexico, D.F. Available online
- Wichman, Søren, 1995, The Relationship among the Mixe–Zoquean Languages of Mexico. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
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