Pidjanan languages

The Pidjanan languages are a subgroup of Arawakan languages of northern South America.

Names

The term Pidjanan was coined by Sérgio Meira (2019) from Wapishana pidan ‘people’, as can be seen in the ethnonyms Wa-pishana and Mao-pidian.

They are referred to as Mapidianic in Glottolog 4.3, and as Rio Branco by Nikulin & Carvalho (2019: 270).

Languages

According to Meira (2019), the Pidjanan languages are:

• Pidjanan
• Mawayana (Mapidian, Maopidian), spoken by a dozen elderly people living in ethnic Waiwai and Tiriyó villages in Brazil and Suriname
• Wapishana, spoken by over 6,000 people on both sides of the Guyana-Brazil border
• ? Atorad (Atorai)

Wapishana is more conservative, while Mawayana has innovated more from Proto-Pidjanan.

Ramirez's (2020) classification is:

• Pidjanan
• Mawayana
• Wapishanan
• Wapishana
• Atorai
• Parawana
• Aroaqui

Parawana and Aroaqui are closely related, and may be the same language.

Proto-language

Proto-Pidjanan has been reconstructed by Meira (2019).

Phonology

Proto-Pidjanan consonant phonemes:

Proto-Pidjanan vowel phonemes:

Morphology

Proto-Pidjanan person-marking prefixes:

Proto-Pidjanan person-marking suffixes:

The functions of person markers (verbs in the -ɲɨ ‘realis’/‘present’ form).

Nominal possession possessed and non-possessed forms.

Lexicon

Unless indicated otherwise, the Mawayana and Wapishana data below is from Sérgio Meira's field notes, as cited in Meira (2019).

Meira's Mawayana data is from Marurunau, Guyana, and his Wapishana data is from Mapuera (a village that is mostly ethnic Waiwai), Nhamundá-Mapuera Indigenous Area, Pará State, Brazil. The other sources are:

• Howard (1985-1986)
• Carlin (2006)
• Carlin (no date)
• WLP (2000)
• Silva, Silva & Oliveira (2013)
• WLP (2001)

Vocabulary

100-word Swadesh list for Mawayana and Wapishana:

Bibliography

• Melville, C.; Tracy, F. V.; Williams, O. Wapishana. Intercontinental Dictionary Series. 2007. Accessed on Oct. 30, 2007.
• SB (Surinaams Bijbelgenootschap / Suriname Bible Society). Kaimana’o Tominkaru Paradan (The New Testament). Paramaribo, Georgetown: Suriname Bible Society and Guyana Bible Society, 2012.

References