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Kanoê or Kapishana is a nearly extinct language isolate of Rondônia, Brazil. The Kapishana people now speak Portuguese or other indigenous languages from intermarriage.

The language names are also spelled Kapixana, Kapixanã, and Canoé, the last shared with Awa-Canoeiro.

The Kanoê people, although disperse in the southeastern part of the state of Rondônia, live mainly along the Guaropé River. The language is nearly extinct, with only 5 speakers in a population of about 319 Kanoê people.

Classification

Although Kanoê is generally considered to be a language isolate, there have been various proposals linking it with other languages and language families.

Van der Voort (2005) observes similarities among Kanoê, Kwaza, and Aikanã, but believes the evidence is not strong enough to definitively link the three languages together as part of a single language family.

Price (1978) proposes a relationship with the Nambikwaran languages, while Kaufman (1994, 2007) suggests that Kunza is related.

Language contact

Jolkesky (2016) notes that there are lexical similarities with Kwaza, Aikanã, and the Nambikwaran languages due to contact.

History

The first contact of the Kanoê people with foreigners brought a lot of death through sickness. Many of the people died of pertussis, measles, and stomach problems. There was also death due to conflicts with the farmers settling in the area.

The Kanoê people can be found in two main areas, the banks of the Guaporé River and the Omerê River. Their traditional territories, particularly Rio Omeré Indigenous Territory, are located in Corumbiara and Chupinguaia municipalities of Rondônia state. The main population, living by Guaporé River, share the land with other indigenous people and have a long history of cohabitation with the "white man". Most of them have been assimilated into mainstream Brazilian society and are married to people belonging to other indigenous groups. Only three of them still speak the Kanoê language today.

By the Omerê River, a single family of Kanoê can be found, with much less influence from the Brazilian society. Having fled into a forest reserve, this group is considered an isolated indigenous people, only allowing outside contact in 1995 after many years of attempts by the Ethno Environmental Protection Front. As of 2003, only four people remained of this Kanoê family, with two of them being monolingual Kanoê speakers. The area by the Omerê River is believed to be the original territory of the Kanoê people by Victor Dequech (1942) and Etta Becker-Donner (1955).

Current status

For a long time Kanoê was too poorly attested to classify. Various proposals were advanced on little evidence; Price (1978) for example thought Kanoê might be one of the Nambikwaran languages. When it was finally described in some detail, by Bacelar (2004), it turned out to be a language isolate.

The first written study of the Kanoê language available today, dates back to 1943 when Stanislav Zach published a vocabulary of the Kanoê tribe, which was later updated in 1963 by Cestmír Loukotka.

A preliminary report of the phonological features of the Kanoê language was published by Laércio Bacelar in 1992, with a second report and an analysis of the phonology published in 1994. Bacelar and Cleiton Pereira wrote a paper on the morphosyntax of the language in 1996. And in 1998 a paper on the negation and litotes of the language was published by Bacelar and Augusto Silva Júnior. Since then, Laércio Bacelar has been the main linguist investigating the language and working alongside the Kanoê people. In 2004 he published a detailed description of its phonology, grammar and syntax.

A project called Etnografia e Documentação da Lingua Kanoé is underway with a lexicographic and ethnographic approach to record auditory and written data of the Kanoê language. The project is currently coordinated by Laércio Nora Bacelar, a Brazilian linguist, and is funded by FUNAI - Museu do Índio and by UNESCO. The project also has the support of the entire Kanoê community from both the Guaropé and the Omorê rivers.

Phonology

Consonants

/x/ is limited to a few verb forms, where it occurs before /ĩ/. /ts/ is highly variable, , with the affricates being the more common, rare, and most common before /i u/. /r/ is between vowels, after and occasionally initially. /ɲ/ varies as . /n/ is before /k/, a pattern which occurs during metathesis. /p/ is very rarely realized as . /w/ /j/ are nasalized after nasal vowels.

Vowels

Vowel qualities are /i e æ ɨ ə a u o/, all oral and nasal; the nasal vowels have slightly different or variable pronunciations: , ~, , , ~, ~, .

Oral vowels are optionally nasalized next to nasal stops, with the variation of phonemically nasal vowels. /e/ varies as ~ after /ts/ and next to an approximant. /ɨ/ varies as ~ after voiceless consonants. /o/ varies as ~ after /p, m/. Vowels may have a voiceless offglide (effectively ) when not followed by a voiced sound.

Vowels are long when they constitute a morpheme of their own. Stress is on the last syllable of a word. Maximally complex syllable is CGVG, where G is a glide /j w/, or, due to epenthesis in certain morphological situations or to elision, the final consonant may be /m n/. One of the more syllabically complex words is /kwivejkaw/ 'to shave'. Vowel sequences occur, as in /eaere/ 'chief'.

Morphology

Kanoê is a polysynthetic language, where the more complex words are the verbs (Payne 1997). It is also primarily an agglutinative language, and many words are formed by simple roots, juxtaposition and suffixation. The gender can be expressed by suffixation or by a hyperonym, and while Kanoê does not make a distinction of number, it does make a distinction between uncountable and countable nouns, where the suffix {-te} is added . The syntax order of Kanoê follows SOV = subject + object + verb.

In the Kanoê language, the process of morphological reduplication is used to form frequentative verbs. For example, manamana 'kneading', or mañumañu 'chewing'. Although some names show reduplication, it can have an onomatopoeic motivation instead of a morphologic one - most names with reduplication are names for animals and birds, in which the phonetic sequence of the reduplication do seem to imitate the sounds characteristic of said animals, for example kurakura 'chicken' or tsõjtsõj 'hummingbird'.

Pronouns

Personal pronouns

Personal pronouns in the Kanoê language follow a monomorphic free form in the singular and bimorphic in the plural. These pronouns can occur in the subject or object position. The formation of the plural pronouns follow the formula PRO.PL → PRO.SG + COL, where PRO is the singular form of the pronoun and -COL is the plural morpheme {-te}.

For example:

aj

1SG

ore õ-ry

tire-1-REFL

e-re

DECL-AUX

aj {ore õ-ry} e-re

1SG tire-1-REFL DECL-AUX

"I am tired."

ajte

1PL

ore õ-ry

tire-1-REFL

e-re

DECL-AUX

ajte {ore õ-ry} e-re

1PL tire-1-REFL DECL-AUX

"We are tired."

aj

1SG

mi

2SG

vara-õ-ro-pe-to

speak-1-CLV-2-TR

õ-ke-re

1-NEG-DECL-AUX

aj mi vara-õ-ro-pe-to õ-ke-re

1SG 2SG speak-1-CLV-2-TR 1-NEG-DECL-AUX

"I don't speak with you."

Possessive pronouns

The form for possessive pronouns are monomorphic in the POSS.1SG ña and POSS.2SG pjs but bimorphic for POSS.3SG oho which is formed by 3SG oj plus the possessive {-o}. The plural form for the possessive pronouns are formed by adding the suffix {-to} which in itself is the result of the suffixes {-te} plus {-o}.

For example:

ña

POSS.1SG

i-kɨ̃j

RN-eye

vaj-õ-kɨ̃j

sting-1-eye

e-re

DECL-AUX

ña i-kɨ̃j vaj-õ-kɨ̃j e-re

POSS.1SG RN-eye sting-1-eye DECL-AUX

"My eye stings." Unknown glossing abbreviation(s) (help);

pjato

POSS.2PL

kan-te

child-COL

iriri-ø-ro

run-2-CLV

n-e-re

3-DECL-AUX

pjato kan-te iriri-ø-ro n-e-re

POSS.2PL child-COL run-2-CLV 3-DECL-AUX

"Your children are running."

Demonstrative pronouns

There are only two demonstrative pronouns in the Kanoê language, jũ, "this" for objects in close proximity and ũko, "that" for objects at a distance. The demonstrative pronouns do not make a distinction between number or gender.

For example:

jũ

DEM.prox

ævo

man

ereã

big

k-e-re

NEG-DECL-AUX

jũ ævo ereã k-e-re

DEM.prox man big NEG-DECL-AUX

"This man is short (lit. This man is not tall)."

mi

2SG

ũko

DEM.dist

itevæ

people

pi-patenũ-ø-to

2-know-3-TR

k-e-re

NEG-DECL-AUX

mi ũko itevæ pi-patenũ-ø-to k-e-re

2SG DEM.dist people 2-know-3-TR NEG-DECL-AUX

"You don't know that man."

Indefinite pronouns

There are a total of four indefinite pronouns, which are used based on the object. The nuvi and tsyke pronouns can be used with the gender suffix {-kɨ̃j} for masculine and {-nake} for feminine.

For Example:

tsyke

Someone

-kɨ̃j

else-M

tũ-o

die-INTR

e-re

DECL-AUX

tsyke -kɨ̃j tũ-o e-re

Someone else-M die-INTR DECL-AUX

"Someone else died."

oj

3SG

naj

something

topi-e

rotten-NMLZ

u-ro

eat-CLV

e-re

DECL-AUX

oj naj topi-e u-ro e-re

3SG something rotten-NMLZ eat-CLV DECL-AUX

"He ate something bad."

Syntax

The Kanoê language is a nominative-accusative language, given that the subjects of both transitive and intransitive verbal actions are marked the same way, while the object is marked differently. For subjects of either intransitive or transitive verbal actions, the suffix {-ro} 'CLV' is added to the verb, and for direct objects of transitive sentences, the suffix {-to} 'TR' is added to the verb.

For example:

kani

child

iriri-ø-ro

run-3-CLV

e-re

DECL-AUX

kani iriri-ø-ro e-re

child run-3-CLV DECL-AUX

"The child ran."

pja

POSS.2SG

e

woman

ña

POSS.1SG

kani

child

vara-ø-ro-ø-to

speak-3-CLV-3-TR

n-e-re

3-DECL-AUX

pja e ña kani vara-ø-ro-ø-to n-e-re

POSS.2SG woman POSS.1SG child speak-3-CLV-3-TR 3-DECL-AUX

"Your woman is speaking with my child."

In example a. it can be seen that the intransitive verb {iriri-} "run" takes one subject kani "child", and the morpheme {-ro} which attaches the subject as the agent of the verbal action. In example b. the transitive verb {vara-} "speak" takes a subject, pja e "your woman", which the morpheme {-ro} attaches as the subject of the verbal action; and an object, ña kani "my child", which the morpheme {-to} attaches as the object of the verbal action. Examples a. and b. show that the morphemes for subjects of transitive or intransitive verbal actions are the same.

jato

POSS.1PL

atiti

corn

epæ-ro

born-3-CLV

n-e-re

3-DECL-AUX

jato atiti epæ-ro n-e-re

POSS.1PL corn born-3-CLV 3-DECL-AUX

lit. "Our corn is being born."

ævo

man

atiti

corn

paj-ø-ro

break-3-TR

e-re

DECL-AUX

ævo atiti paj-ø-ro e-re

man corn break-3-TR DECL-AUX

"The man harvested the corn." (lit. "The man broke the corn")

Comparing examples c. and d. it can be seen that the morpheme {-ro} is used when atiti "corn" is the subject of the verbal action, and {-to} is used when atiti "corn" is the object of the verbal action. It shows that morphemes for subjects and objects of verbal actions are different.

Semantics

A field study by Bacelar (2004), shows that there are no inflections for number in the language. even though the Kanoê language uses the pluralizer {-te} to interpret nouns as a collective derived by the suffixation. Mass nouns cannot be pluralized.

Quantifier

The most used method to express quantity in the Kanoê language is the anteposition of the quantifier arakere "many". It is presumed that the quantifier arakere is formed by a litotes mechanism and that its internal structure follows {ara-} "few" + {-k} 'NEG' + {-e} 'DECL' + {-re} 'AUX'.

aj

1SG

ara k-e-re

few-NEG-DECL-AUX

kani

child

õ-tsi

1-have

mo-e-re

APL-DECL-AUX

aj {ara k-e-re} kani õ-tsi mo-e-re

1SG few-NEG-DECL-AUX child 1-have APL-DECL-AUX

"I have many children."

oj

3PL

tu-kwæ̃

brother-MASC

ara-tũ-kwæ̃

few-brother-MASC

k-e-re

NEG-DECL-AUX

oj tu-kwæ̃ ara-tũ-kwæ̃ k-e-re

3PL brother-MASC few-brother-MASC NEG-DECL-AUX

"He has many brothers." (lit. "He has not few brothers")

The quantifier arakere can also be used together with numerals to change its meaning to "few":

mini

today

aj

1SG

arrow

õ-tsi

1-have

mo-e-re

APL-DECL-AUX

mini aj õ-tsi mo-e-re

today 1SG two-two few-NEG-NMZ arrow 1-have APL-DECL-AUX

"Today I have only four arrows."

aj

1SG

re

kill

õ-e-re

1-DECL-AUX

alligator

aj re õ-e-re

1SG kill 1-DECL-AUX one few-NEG-NMZ alligator

"I killed only one alligator."

The Kanoê language also has an interrogative quantifier nẽtoe "how many" which is used at the beginning of the sentence:

nẽtoe

how many

kani

child

tuvo

sick

ni-tsi

3-INT

nẽtoe kani tuvo ni-tsi

{how many} child sick 3-INT

"How many children are sick?"

nẽtoe

how many

kani

child

mi

2SG

pe-tsi

2-have

mi-tsi

2-INT

nẽtoe kani mi pe-tsi mi-tsi

{how many} child 2SG 2-have 2-INT

"How many children do you have?"

See also

• Macro-Paesan languages

References

1. Kanoé at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
2. ^ Laércio Nora Bacelar. "Povo". Povos Indígenas No Brasil. Instituto Socioambiental.
3. Campbell, Lyle (2012). "Classification of the indigenous languages of South America". In Grondona, Verónica; Campbell, Lyle (eds.). The Indigenous Languages of South America. The World of Linguistics. Vol. 2. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 59–166. ISBN 978-3-11-025513-3.
4. Van der Voort, Hein. 2005. Kwaza in a comparative perspective. International Journal of American Linguistics 71: 365–412.
5. Price, David P. 1978. The Nambiquara linguistic family. Anthropological Linguistics 20 (1): 14–37.
6. Kaufman, Terrence. 1994. The native languages of South America. In: Christopher Moseley and R. E. Asher (eds.), Atlas of the World’s Languages, 59–93. London: Routledge.
7. Kaufman, Terrence. 2007. South America. In: R. E. Asher and Christopher Moseley (eds.), Atlas of the World’s Languages (2nd edition), 59–94. London: Routledge.
8. Jolkesky, Marcelo Pinho de Valhery (2016). Estudo arqueo-ecolinguístico das terras tropicais sul-americanas (Ph.D. dissertation) (2 ed.). Brasília: University of Brasília.
9. Epps, Patience; Michael, Lev, eds. (2023). Amazonian Languages: Language Isolates. Volume II: Kanoé to Yurakaré. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-043273-2.
10. ^ "Kanoê". Projeto de Documentação de Línguas Indígenas. Museu do Indio.
11. Stanislav, Zach (1943). Vocabulário das tribos Massacá, Salamãi, Coiá e Canoê (in Portuguese). Rio de Janeiro.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
12. Bacelar, Laércio (1992). Fonologia preliminar da língua Kanoê (in Portuguese). Brasília: Universidade de Brasília.
13. Bacelar, Laércio (1994). "Fonologia segmental da língua Kanoê: uma análise preliminar". Signótica: Revista do Mestrado em Letras e Linguística (in Portuguese) (6). Goiânia: UFGO: 59–72.
14. Bacelar, Laércio; Pereira, Cleiton (1996). "Aspectos Morfossintáticos da Língua Kanoê". Signótica: Revista do Mestrado em Letras e Linguística (in Portuguese) (8). Goiânia: UFGO: 45–55.
15. Bacelar, Laércio; Silva Júnior, Augusto (1998). "A negação e a litotes na língua Kanoê". Signótica: Revista do Mestrado em Letras e Linguística (in Portuguese) (9). Goiânia: UFGO.
16. ^ Bacelar, Laércio Nora (2004). Gramática da língua Kanoê (PDF) (in Portuguese). Nijmegen: Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen. hdl:2066/19429. ISBN 9789090179582. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-07-28. Retrieved 2011-04-19.

CLV:verbal classifier

• Language isolates of South America
• Indigenous languages of Western Amazonia
• Endangered language isolates
• Endangered indigenous languages of the Americas
• Mamoré–Guaporé linguistic area