Kunza language

Kunza
Atacameño
Native to Atacama
Ethnicity Atacama
Extinct ca. 1950s
Isolate
Language codes
ISO 639-3 kuz
Glottolog kunz1244[1]

Kunza AKA Cunza, also known as Likanantaí, Lipe, Ulipe, or Atacameño, is an extinct language isolate once spoken in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile and southern Perú (specifically in Peine, Socaire (Salar de Atacama), and Caspana) by the Lickan-antay people, who have since shifted to Spanish.

The last Kunza speaker was found in 1949, although some have been found since according to anthropologists. There are 2,000 Atacameños (W. Adelaar). A dictionary was made for Kunza.

Kaufman (1990) found a proposed connection between Kunza and the likewise unclassified Kapixaná to be plausible; however, when that language was more fully described in 2004, it turned out to be an isolate.

See also

References

  1. Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Kunza". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, April 18, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.