Chukotko-Kamchatkan languages
The tschuktscho - Kamchadal languages ( formerly called luorawetlanische languages) are a small family of five genetically related languages spoken in northeastern Siberia - are spoken of together about 14,000 people - more precisely on the Russian Chukotka and Kamchatka peninsulas. All these languages are threatened with extinction, which also applies to the speaker by far richest language of this group, the Tschuktschische with around 10,000 speakers on the Chukotka Peninsula.
The tschuktscho - Kamchadal languages are combined with other Siberian languages to the group of Paleo-Siberian languages. The Paleo-Siberian languages do not form a genetic unit, but a group altsibirischer residual languages , which were spoken before the penetration Uralic, Turkic and Tungus ethnic groups there.
Classification, number of speakers and geographical distribution
The tschuktscho - Kamchadal languages fall into two main groups, the Tschuktscho - Koryak and the Kamtschadalische.
- Tschuktscho - Kamtschadalisch Tschuktscho - Koryak Tschukot Chukchi ( Tschukot ) ( 7,700 speakers, ethnic 15,000 ) Chukotka
- Koryak ( Nymylan ) ( 3,500, 7,000 ethnic ) South Chukotka, northern Kamchatka
- Aliutorisch (200, ethnic 2.000 ) Kamchatka
- Kerek † Chukotka (Cape Navarin )
- Itelmenisch ( Kamtschadalisch ) (Max 100 speakers, ethnically 2,500 ) South Kamchatka
There are messages and recordings of other extinct in the last centuries of the languages Kamchadal group.
The language family and its members
The tschuktscho - Kamchadal or luorawetlanischen languages still form a small language family in the far north- eastern Siberia. The northern branch includes the Tschuktschische, with 10,000 speakers of the most important language of this group (on the Chukotka Peninsula in Autonomous County ( AB) of the Chukchi and scattered in Yakutia ). The Koryak ( 3,500 speakers in AB Koryak ), the Aliutor (still 200 speakers, AB Koryak and North Kamchatka ) and now probably extinct Kerek ( Chukotka, Cape Navarin ) are so closely related that a mutual understanding is quite possible and some researchers therefore classify them as dialects of a language. The southern branch kamtschadalische or deviates from it stronger and is now only of the Itelmenischen ( a maximum of 100 speakers from an ethnic group of 2,500, in the South Kamchatka and the Koryak AB ).
Chukchi, Koryak and Itelmenisch are written languages based on the Cyrillic alphabet, in which appear on a small scale newspapers and books. The other language of the group have remained schriftlos.
The name and Chukchi Chukotka are a Russian adaptation of the name of a subgroup of the Chukchi; Luorawetlan is the total self-designation of Chukch tribes, this name was occasionally used since the 1920s for the entire language family tschuktscho - kamtschadalische. Itelmes is the self-designation of Itelmens that were called by the Koryak Kamtschalo, which adapted the Russians to designate the people of Kamchadals and the Kamchatka Peninsula. Today, the somewhat cumbersome term has total tschuktscho - kamtschadalisch enforced for the entire family of languages.
Relations to other language families
A special genetic closeness of tschuktscho - Kamchadal languages Eskimo- Aleut languages to was adopted by a number of investigators, it was never really proven. This thesis has been revived in the wider context of the Eurasian macro family of Joseph Greenberg, in which the Tschuktscho - Kamtschadalische forms a component.
Speech characteristic
The tschuktscho - Kamchadal languages are Incorporating languages with split ergativity. ( This is called a language inkorporierend if other otherwise independent words in complex verbal or nominal forms - for example, nouns, adjectives, adverbs - can be compiled In contrast, the integrated elements in the polysynthetic language structure occur only as the dependent morphemes. . ) Examples the incorporation of the Chukch are:
- M? n -n? ke- acid qepl - uwičwen - m? k
- Ga - mor - ik- tor- orw - ima
The case marking in most languages ergativisch, the concordance of the verb, however, has a split- ergativity on: Prefixes indicate the subject, suffixes, however, intransitive subjects and transitive direct objects ( examples from the Chukch ):
- Qə - viri - ɣe " may you descend "
- M- IMTI - ɣət " I may carry you "
The Tschuktschische has a special type of vowel harmony. The number of dominant vowels / e, a, o / is a series of recessive vowels / i, e, u / against. If a morpheme of a word contains a dominant vowel, all recessive vowels of this word are changed in their dominant version. For example, kupre due to the dominant / a / of the suffix / -ma /, the / u /, the / e / in / a / transformed into a / o / and the word:
- Kupre " network "
- Ga - copra - ma " with a network "
A curious feature of some tschuktscho - kamtschadalischer languages, the gender-specific pronunciation of some phonemes. Thus, in women's language of r- sound in certain positions like spoken as / ts / in Chukch. However, this debate is rather a form of gender-based attitude as a continuous rule. In Aliutor corresponding male / l /, or / s / in the pronunciation of female / ts /, eg Plaku against ptsaku ( footwear).
A similar peculiarity of the more recently reported local According to researchers even in today's slang Beijing ( capital of China ), which stood in its history since the mid- 17th to early 20th century under the rule of origin ( South) Siberian Tungus ( Manchu ):
Here (especially young) women prefer to talk - how to emphasize her femininity - the series of shallow anterior tongue sounds
from.
Confusion thus are excluded because both Mitlautreihen to invariably separate follow- vowels distribute ( feature " ± anterior tongue vowel " ), which is why this issue was not noticed until late;
so is in Beijing, Men language '