Information AboutQuechua |
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|name=Quechua |nativename=Runa Simi |pronunciation= 'si.mi |states= Argentina , Brazil , Bolivia , Chile , Colombia , Ecuador , Peru |region= Andes |speakers=10,000,000 |rank=83 |familycolor=American |family= Quechuan |nation= Bolivia and Peru |agency= Academia Mayor De La Lengua Quechua |iso1=qu|iso2=que |lc1=que|ld1=Quechua (generic) many Varieties Of Quechua have their own codes.|ll1=none}} Quechua (''Runa Simi'') is a Native American Language of South America . It was the language of the Inca Empire , and is today spoken in various dialects by some 10 million people throughout South America, including modern southern Colombia and Ecuador , throughout Peru and Bolivia , north-western Argentina and northern Chile . It is the most widely spoken of all American Indian languages. Quechua is a very regular language, but a large number of infixes and suffixes change both the overall significance of words and their subtle shades of meaning, allowing great expressiveness. It includes grammatical features such as Bipersonal Conjugation and conjugation dependent on mental state and veracity of knowledge, spatial and temporal relationships, and many cultural factors. History Today's theories about Quechua's origin put its initial territorial domain in modern Peru's Central Coast, possibly in the ancient city of Caral , around 2600 BC . Inca kings of Cuzco made Quechua their official language and, with Inca conquest in the 14th Century , the Empire's language became Ancient Peru's ''lingua franca''. By the time of the Spanish Conquest , in the 16th Century , the language had already spread throughout the Andean region. Quechua has often been grouped with , which chose it to preach to Indians in the Andes area. Today, it has the status of an official language in both Peru and Bolivia, along with Spanish and Aymara. Before the arrival of the Spaniards and the introduction of the Latin Alphabet , Quechua had no written alphabet. The Incas kept track of numerical data through a system of Khipu -strings. Currently, the major obstacle to the diffusion of the usage and teaching of Quechua is the lack of written material in the Quechua language, namely books, newspapers, software, magazines, etc. Significantly, most of the native speakers of Quechua are illiterate. Thus, Quechua, along with Aymara and the minor indigenous languages, remains essentially an oral language. Geographic distribution There are two main dialect groups. Quechua I or ''Waywash'' is spoken in Peru's central highlands. It is the most archaic and diverse branch of Quechua, such that its dialects have been often considered a different tongue. is spoken sporadically in Peru's occidental highlands; Northern Quechua (also known as ''Quichua'' or ''Runashimi'') is mainly spoken in Colombia and Ecuador; Southern Quechua , spoken in Peru's southern highlands, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile, is today's most important branch because it has the largest number of speakers and because of its cultural and literary legacy. Vocabulary A number of Quechua Loanword s have entered English via Spanish , including '' Coca '', '' Condor '', '' Guano '', '' Jerky '', '' Llama '', '' Pampa '', '' Puma '', '' Quinine '', '' Quinoa '', '' Vicuña '' and possibly '' Gaucho ''. The word '' Lagniappe '' comes from the Quechua word ''yapay'' ("to increase; to add") with the article ''la'' in front of it, ''la yapa'', in Spanish. Sounds The description below applies to Cusco dialect; there are significant differences in other varieties of Quechua. Vowels Quechua uses only three vowels: /a/, '''/i/''', and '''/u/''', similar to Classical Arabic . Monolingual speakers pronounce these as respectively, though the Spanish vowels ['''a i u''' may also be used. When the vowels appear adjacent to the uvular consonants '''/q/''', '''/q'/''', and '''/qh/''', they are rendered more like ['''''' and [''''''] respectively. Consonants
The language is spelled as the IPA apart from the palatal consonants // which are spelled <ch ñ ll y> respectively. None of the plosives or fricatives are voiced; voicing is not , and Aspirated , a feature that is considered to be of Aymara origin. For example: simple ejective aspirated p p′ ph t t′ th h k k′ kh q q′ qh About 30% of the modern Quechua vocabulary is borrowed from Spanish, and some Spanish sounds (e.g. f, b, d, g) may have become phonemic, even among monolingual Quechua speakers. Writing system Quechua has been written using the Roman alphabet since the Spanish Conquest Of Peru . However, written Quechua is not utilized by the Quechua-speaking people at large, either because they are part of the illiterate majority, or because Spanish is more useful, due to the lack of printed referential material in Quechua. Until the 20th century, Quechua was written with a Spanish-based orthography. Examples: ''Inca, Huayna Cápac, Collasuyo, Mama Ocllo, Viracocha, quipu, tambo, condor''. This orthography is the most familiar to Spanish speakers, and as a corollary, has been used for most borrowings into English. In 1975, the Peruvian government of Juan Velasco adopted a new orthography for Quechua. This is the writing system preferred by the ''Academia Mayor de la Lengua Quechua''. Examples: ''Inka, Wayna Qapaq, Qollasuyu, Mama Oqllo, Wiraqocha, khipu, tampu, kuntur''. This orthography
In 1985, a variation of this system was adopted by the Peruvian government; it uses the Quechua three-vowel system. Examples: ''Inka, Wayna Qapaq, Qullasuyu, Mama Uqllu, Wiraqucha, khipu, tampu, kuntur''. The different orthographies are still highly controversial in Peru. Advocates of the traditional system believe that the new orthographies look too foreign, and suggest that it makes Quechua harder to learn for people who have first been exposed to written Spanish. Those who prefer the new system maintain that it better matches the phonology of Quechua, and point to studies showing that teaching the five-vowel system to children causes reading difficulties in Spanish later on. Writers differ in the treatment of Spanish loanwords. Sometimes these are adapted to the modern orthography, sometimes they are left in Spanish. For instance, "I am Robert" could be written ''Robertom kani'' or ''Ruwirtum kani''. (The ''-m'' is not part of the name; it is an evidential suffix.) Peruvian linguist and Cusco Quechua (which is also used in Bolivia and Argentina). For instance: Grammar
In Quechua, there are seven pronouns. Quechua also has two first person plural pronouns ("we", in English). One is called the Inclusive , which is used when the speaker wishes to include in "we" the person to whom he or she is speaking ("we and you"). The other form is called the Exclusive , which is used when the Addressee is excluded. ("we without you"). Quechua also adds the suffix ''-kuna'' to the second and third person singular pronouns ''qam'' and ''pay'' to create the plural forms ''qam-kuna'' and ''pay-kuna''. Adjectives in Quechua are always placed before nouns. They lack gender and number, and are not declined to agree with substantives.
The infinitive forms (unconjugated) have the suffix ''-y'' (''much'a''= "kiss"; ''much'a-y'' = "to kiss"). The endings for the indicative voice are: To these are added various interfixes and suffixes to change the meaning. For example, ''-ku-'', is added to make the actor the recipient of the action (example: ''wañuy'' = "to die"; ''wañukuy'' = "to commit suicide"); ''-naku-'', when the action is mutual (example: ''marq'ay''= "to hug"; ''marq'anakuy''= "to hug each other"), and ''-chka-'', when the condition is continuing (e.g., ''mikhuy'' = "to eat"; ''mikhuchkay'' = "to be eating").
These are indeclinable words, that is, they do not accept suffixes. They are relatively rare. The most common are ''arí'' ("yes") and ''mana'' ("no"), although ''mana'' can take the suffix ''-n'' (''manan'') to intensify the meaning. Also used are ''yaw'' ("hey", "hi"), and certain loan words from Spanish, such as ''piru'' (from Spanish ''pero'' "but") and ''sinuqa'' (from ''sino'' "rather"). Nearly every Quechua sentence is marked by an evidential suffix, indicating how certain the speaker is about a statement. ''-mi'' expresses personal knowledge (''Tayta Wayllaqawaqa chufirmi'', "Mr. Huayllacahua is a driver-- I know it for a fact"); ''-si'' expresses hearsay knowledge (''Tayta Wayllaqawaqa chufirsi'', "Mr. Huayllacahua is a driver, or so I've heard"); ''-cha'' expresses probability (''Tayta Wayllaqawaqa chufircha'', "Mr. Huayllacahua is a driver, most likely"). These become ''-m, -s, -ch'' after a vowel. Trivia The fictional Huttese language in the ''Star Wars'' Movies is largely based upon Quechua. The commonly used word for hangover in Ecuador is Quechua: chuchaqui. The commonly used word for altitude sickness in Bolivia is Quechua: sorojchi. See also
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