Oroshan language

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Oroshan language
Kikŋaʔvəvi, kikŋaʔvəvi kəğači
Pronunciation[kigŋaʔvəˈvi]
Native to Oroshia
EthnicityOroshan people
Native speakers
ca. 2,300,000 (2018)
Gujino-Bintani
  • Gujin
    • Coast Gujin
      • Oroshan language
Early form
Official status
Official language in
Oroshia
Language codes
ISO 639-1or
ISO 639-2oro
ISO 639-3oro
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For a guide to IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Oroshan (kikŋaʔvəvi, pronounced: [kigŋaʔvəˈvi]) is a Gujino-Bintani language spoken in the extreme northeast of Surucia, mostly contained in Oroshia, where nearly 2 million speakers reside. It is a Gujin language, genetically, within the wider Gujino-Bintani family. Specifically, it is a Coast Gujin language, along with the Yvlipkan language, who diverged from their common ancestor an estimated 1,500 years ago. It is still relatively close to languages such as Yvlipkan, and more distant to other Gujin languages, and even Bintan languages, as part of the wider family. It is considerably more conservative than its closest relative, Yvlipkan, which has innovated greatly phonologically and grammatically.

It is accepted that speakers of Gujino-Bintan languages migrated to their present location from the west, though there is some scant evidence that they instead moved in a northwards direction. Originally a nomadic culture of reindeer herders, the original Gujino-Bintan speakers have not left any written evidence of their language behind. Instead, it has been reconstructed with help from extant languages, many of which are threatened by extinction. The Oroshan language first began to be written under Jogin colonial rule, and the Jogin language exerted its influence on the Oroshan language, mainly through loanwords. Under colonial rule, the use of Oroshan was discouraged, and its use banned in schools, up until the early 1900s.

Oroshan is the primary official language in Oroshia, alongside Jogin, where it serves as a lingua franca, especially among the minority Namchogi population, whose language saw even greater stigma than the Oroshan language itself. Oroshan is also spoken to the west of Oroshia, and by a diaspora population of around 200,000.

History

Phonology

The phonology of Oroshan is very conservative compared to its sister language, Yvlipkan. Some dialects of Oroshan have made phonological developments not shown here, particularly the western dialects, which have had considerable superstrate influence from Jogin and Namchogi.

Consonants

Oroshan consonant phonemes
Labial Alveolar Palatal Velar Uvular Glottal
Nasal m n ŋ
Plosive p t k q ʔ
Fricative v s ɣ
Affricate ts
Lateral fricative ɬ
Lateral affricate
Approximant j

The glottal stop does not behave like a regular plosive consonant in Oroshan. It does not follow phonotactic rules, and appears in clusters that would not normally be allowed, were it treated as a normal plosive. Instead, glottalization is though of as a 'quality' of a syllable, wherein the coda consonant (or coda consonant cluster) is glottalized, or not. Glottalization carries important grammatical meaning, and through reconstruction, it was determined that glottalization is the remnant of a glottal affix in an earlier stage of the Proto-Gujino-Bintani language. The Bintani languages still exhibit a productive glottal affix.

There are voiced allophones of the plosive series, which occur before a nasal or /j/ in the onset of the following syllable, such as in qitjak /qitjak/, "house", realized as [qedjak] or [qeɟak]. /v/ and /ɣ/ are frequently devoiced when glottalized in the syllable coda, if not followed by a vowel, as in ŋaʔv /ŋaʔv/, "chiefs", realized as [ŋaʔf]. Western dialects have developed a marginal voiced plosive series under the influence of Namchogi.

Vowels

Oroshan is reputed to follow a 5-vowel system, a pattern which is quite common cross-linguistically. However, Oroshan contains no /e/ phoneme, instead having merged it with /ə/, which arose earlier from unstressed /a/. Vowel length is not contrastive, but stressed syllables have considerably longer vowel duration than unstressed syllables.

Oroshan vowel phonemes
Front Central Back
Close i u
Mid ə ɔ
Open a

/i/ and /u/ are lowered to /e/ and /o/, respectively, surrounding the uvular plosive /q/. This is also quite common cross-linguistically, but is only allophonic, and /e/ and /o/, while phonologically separate from their higher counterparts, do not constitute separate phonemes. In some eastern dialects, however, /q/ is beginning to merge with /k/ for some younger speakers (assumed to be born after 1980). For these speakers, the contrast is now phonemic after /k/. For example, in standard Oroshan, spoken in Sochvel, qit [qet] "to build", and kit [kit] "you (absolutive)" are phonemically /qit/ and /kit/ respectively. In younger, eastern speech, they are qit [ket] "to build", and kit [kit] "you (absolutive)", which phonemically are analyzed as /ket/ and /kit/, implying that they have become separate phonemes for these speakers.

Phonotactics

The maximum syllable structure in Oroshan is CVjNC, where C is any consonant, V any vowel, and N a nasal /m/, /n/, or /ŋ/. As stated above, glottalization is suprasegmental, and is not considered part of syllable structure, but rather a 'quality' of the syllable wherein the coda consonant or consonant cluster is glottalized. Affricates are considered to have a single consonant value, and are not considered to be clusters of a homorganic plosive and fricative pair. An example of maximum syllable structure is ğajnts /ɣajnts/, "its (inanimate)", with a final consonant cluster of j-n-ts. This syllable can be glottalized, in ğaʔjnts /ɣaʔjnts/, "its (inanimate plural)", normally realized as [ɣajnts'], but which may also be realized as [ɣa.ʔints] in two phonetic syllables, but is considered to be one phonemic syllable. The stress therefore remains on the first phonetic syllable in this realization, in [ˈɣa.ʔints], not *[ɣaˈʔints] as would be expected if it were treated as a phonemically disyllabic word. /ɣaʔjnts/ may also be realized [ɣaʔɲcç] or [ɣaɲc'] through progressive assimilation of /nts/ with /j/. The palatal realizations are not considered independent phonemes, rather, allophones of alveolars arising in a palatal environment.

Stress

Stress in Oroshan is regular and predictable. Primary stress will invariably fall on the final syllable of polysyllabic words, unless the final syllable consists only of /ə/, when it will fall on the penultimate syllable. Secondary stress is more variable, and will generally fall on the second or third syllable in a word. Stressed syllables tend to be, on average, twice as long (in vowel length) as unstressed syllables. The strong stress pattern falling on the final syllable gives Oroshan a 'rhythmic' sound, as first described by Keian scholars in the 16th century. Stress has no grammatical bearing in Oroshan, unlike glottalization.

Morphology

Oroshan is a moderately synthetic language, with a predominantly agglutinative typological structure. Verbs conjugate for tense, and nouns inflect for number and case. It has a productive process of derivational morphology wherein the function of a word changes through the addition of affixes. Exhibiting predominantly head-final ergative-absolutive alignment, nouns may be converted into verbs, verbs into nouns, and both into adverbs freely. Nouns are frequently compounded together to create new meanings, and nouns may be compounded with verbs to give new meanings, though this is less common, and it is linguistically not considered incorporation.

Nouns

Nouns in Oroshan belong to one of two grammatical genders, animate or inanimate. These categories generally follow whether the noun in question is alive or not, and so can generally be easy to predict. However, this is not always the case. Nouns like vəł "river" are animate, presumably because they 'move', though they are abiotic. All abstract nouns formed with the abstract nominalization suffix -či are inherently inanimate, and all agent nouns derived using the agent nominalization suffix -ka are inherently animate.

Oroshan Gloss Translation
isku see to see (v.)
iskuči (i.) see-NMLZ.ABSTR vision (i.e. the act of seeing)
iskuka (a.) see-NMLZ.AGN watcher (i.e. someone who watches)

Nouns decline for four cases, ergative, absolutive, oblique, and genitive. Which declension pattern a noun takes can be known from its gender. Nouns also decline in two numbers, singular and plural. The plural of nouns is marked by the glottalization of the coda.

Singular Plural
jak ("fire", animate) vək ("land", inanimate) jak ("fire", animate) vək ("land", inanimate)
Absolutive jak vək jaʔk vəʔk
Ergative jakək vəkəŋ jakəʔk vəkəʔŋ
Oblique jakəł vəkən jakəʔł vəkəʔn
Dative jakəs vəkənts jakəʔs vəkəʔnts

Compounding of nouns is frequent, and is used in forming new senses. The Oroshan word for "legislature", sisavŋaʔvqitjak, is composed of the words sisavŋaʔv, "government", and qitjak, "house", giving it the literal meaning of "government house". The word sisavŋaʔv, "government", for its part, is a verb-noun compound, made up of the verb sisav, "to be fair, equal", and ŋaʔv, "ruler (pl.)", giving the literal meaning of "fair rulers". Qitjak is another verb-noun compound, from qit, "to build", and jak, "fire", approximating the meaning of "where a fire is built".

sisav ŋa<ʔ>v qit jak
fair ruler<PL> build fire
government house
legislature

Verbs

Verbs in Oroshan inflect only for a non-past tense (uninflected), and a past tense (glottalized). Other elements of tense, aspect, and mood are expressed through the use of adverbs, which immediately precede a verb, and are also uninflected. Verbs inflect for the agent of the clause, taking suffixes for both the absolutive and ergative agents, derived from the set of personal pronouns. Plural verb clitics also carry the glottalization characteristic of plural number in Oroshan, as well as the verbal past tense. Verbs carry the typological category of adjectives observed in many other languages. In Oroshan, characteristics are described through a verb with a meaning such as "to be red", which inflects as a normal verb would. Words of other lexical categories can be verbalized through the verbalization suffix -no.

Tense inflection in Oroshan
to be small to gather, pick to speak
Non-past ajp iqat kəğa
Past aʔjp iqaʔt kəʔğa

The agent suffixed inflection of verbs is shown below. The agent suffix encodes information about person, number, and case.

Agent inflection in Oroshan
kəvkəv "to be sick"
Absolutive Ergative
Singular Plural Singular Plural
1SG kəvkəvən I am sick. kəvkəvəʔn We are sick. kəvkəvənk I (erg.) am sick. kəvkəvəʔnk We (erg.) are sick.
2SG kəvkəvət You are sick. kəvkəvəʔt You (pl.) are sick. kəvkəvtək You (erg.) are sick. kəvkəvtəʔk You (pl. erg.) are sick.
3SG.ANIM kəvkəvənt He/she/they (sing.) are sick. kəvkəvəʔts They (pl.) are sick. kəvkəvnək He/she/they (sing. erg.) are sick. kəvkəvnəʔk They (pl. erg.) are sick.
3SG.INAN kəvkəvəč It is sick. kəvkəvəʔč They (inan. pl.) are sick. kəvkəvčəŋ It (erg.) is sick. kəvkəvčəʔŋ They (inan. pl. erg.) are sick.

There are also 5 copula verbs, which behave differently than other verbs in the sense that the syntactical subject and object of the copulas agree in case with each other, forming a predicate. The affirmative copula is used for possession, in a metaphorical construction using the bare oblique case, implying an indirect object. For example, kik ninł ahant translates to "I have a reindeer" but literally means "it is a reindeer to me".

Oroshan verb Copula type Example Translation
aha affirmative Vəł ahant. It is a river.
ŋit negative Vəł ŋitənt. It is not a river.
səjn locative Vəł vək səjnənt. The river is on/in the land.
tata interrogative Vəł tatant? Is it a river?
tisəjn locative interrogative Vəł tisəjnənt? Where is a river?

Adverbs and adpositions

Adverbs are the most varied lexical class in Oroshan grammar. They are often a single morpheme, though they can be formed from other lexical categories through the use of the adverbialization suffix -vi. Adverbs modify verbs, directly preceding them in word order, adding information such as tense, aspect, mood, and voice, and more general adverbial information such as method, degree, and negation. Interestingly, adverbs can modify a verb that has since been moved to a different lexical category through the use of derivational morphology. For instance, the verb kəğa, "to speak", can be modified with the adverb kisvi, "badly" (itself from the verb kis, "to be bad"), giving kisvi kəğa, "to speak badly". When the verb is nominalized, the adverb can remain, technically modifying the internal verb. kisvi kəğači is "bad speech", or more literally, "the act of speaking badly". There is no limit to how many adverbs can stack in front of a verb, modifying it.

Selection of adverbs modifying ğał "to eat"
Oroshan Translation
łoč ğał will eat
ŋił ğał to not eat
sič ğał to begin to eat
kəvkəvəvi ğał to eat in a poorly manner
nivnav ğał to barely eat
qaʔłvəŋočəčivi ğał to eat like a Namchogi person

Adpositions are also uninflected, though they force nouns (which immediately follow the adposition) into the oblique case. Nouns in the oblique case without an adposition are treated as an indirect object. An example of a common adposition is jusi, which translates to "over, on" and is used quite frequently when talking "about" something. The preposition jusi is used in this case, to speak "on" something.

Jusi ğajn kəğan.
jusi ğaj -n kəğa -n
on 3SG.INAN -OBL speak -1SG.ABS
I speak on (about) it.

Pronouns

Pronouns in Oroshan are found for two numbers, singular and plural, and two genders, animate and inanimate, though gender is only distinguished in the third person. Below is a table of lone pronoun forms in Oroshan. Notice the glottalization in the plural. Contrary to many Gujino-Bintani languages, Oroshan does not distinguish clusivity in the first person plural.

Absolutive Ergative Oblique Genitive
1SG nin nink ninł nins
2SG kit kitək kitł kits
3SG.ANIM not notək notł nots
3SG.INAN ğaj ğajŋ ğajn ğajnts
1PL niʔn niʔnk niʔnł niʔns
2PL kiʔt kitəʔk kiʔtł kiʔts
3SG.ANIM noʔt notəʔk noʔtł noʔts
3SG.INAN ğaʔj ğaʔjŋ ğaʔjn ğaʔjnts

Syntax

Oroshan is a head-final language, with the verb taking the final spot in the sentence, almost invariably. Therefore, the main word order is SOV, though the subject is frequently expressed as a suffix on the verb. Interrogation and negation are expressed through adverbs or a copula verb, and do not cause a change in word order. Adpositions and adverbs directly precede the noun or verb they modify, demonstrating sub-sentence level head-finality. A relatively simple ditransitive sentence with the subject expressed through the verb suffix and, optionally, alone, is shown below.

(Notək) sikaʔv ninł kiʔtsninək.
(not -k) sika<ʔ>v nin ki<ʔ>tsni -nək
(3SG.ANIM -ERG) berry<PL> 1SG -OBL throw<PST> -3SG.ANIM.ERG
He/she/they threw me berries.

Orthography

Jogin script

Text Sample

The Mountain in Labour: A translation of Aesop's fable.
Oroshan text Ğin ołokəč
Ğin kisvi vaŋaʔŋč ə ołoʔkəč. Qaʔł iʔskuʔts ə łopəčəči łoč viʔtanəʔk, ŋə qapəł nivnav iʔskunəʔk. Ğink qapəł ołoʔkčəŋ.
Ŋił tiłvi kəğat jusi niłčin!
IPA broad transcription /ɣin ɔɬɔkətʃ/
/ɣin kisvi vaŋaʔŋtʃ ə ɔɬɔʔkətʃ qaʔɬ iʔskuʔts ə ɬɔpətʃətʃi ɬɔtʃ viʔtanəʔk ŋə qapəɬ nivnav iʔskunəʔk ɣiŋk qapəɬ ɔɬɔʔktʃəŋ ŋiɬ tiɬvi kəɣat jusi niɬtʃin/
Translation The Mountain Gives Birth
A mountain was groaning badly and giving birth. People watched and next anticipated the event, but they barely saw a mouse. The mountain gave birth to a mouse.
Do not talk tall about nothing!
Gloss
ğin ołok
mountain birth -3SG.INAN.ABS
ğin kis -vi vaŋa<ʔ>ŋ ə oło<ʔ>k
mountain bad -ADV groan<PST> -3SG.INAN.ABS CONJ birth<PST> -3SG.INAN.ABS
qa<ʔ>ł i<ʔ>sku -<ʔ>ts ə łopəč -či łoč vi<ʔ>ta -nə<ʔ>k
person<PL> look<PST> -3SG.ANIM.ABS<PL> CONJ happen -NMLZ next expect<PST> -3SG.ANIM.ERG<PL>
ŋə qapəł nivnav i<ʔ>sku -nə<ʔ>k
CONJ.NEG mouse barely see<PST> -3SG.ANIM.ERG<PL>
ğin -k qapəł oło<ʔ>k -čəŋ
mountain -ERG mouse birth<PST> -3SG.INAN.ERG
ŋił tił -vi kəğa -t jusi niłči -n
NEG tall -ADV talk -2SG.ABS over nothing -OBL.INAN