Chukchi-Kamchadal languages

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Distribution of the Chuktscho-Kamchadal languages ​​in the 17th century (hatched red) and in the 20th century (red)

The Chuktscho-Kamchadal languages (formerly also known as the Luoravetlanic languages ) are a small family of five genetically related languages ​​that  are spoken by around 14,000 people in northeast Siberia  - more precisely on the Russian peninsulas of Chukotka and Kamchatka . All of these languages ​​are threatened with extinction, this also applies to the language of this group with the greatest number of speakers , Chukchi with around 10,000 speakers on the Chukotka peninsula.

The Chuktscho-Kamchadal languages ​​are combined with other Siberian languages ​​to form the group of the Paleo-Siberian languages. The Paleo-Siberian languages ​​do not form a genetic unit , but rather a group of residual Old Siberian languages ​​that were spoken there before the Urals , Turkic and Tungus ethnic groups.

Classification, number of speakers and geographic distribution

The Chukchi-Kamchadal languages ​​are divided into two main groups, Chukchi-Korjak and Kamchadal .

  • Chukchi-Kamchadal
    • Chukchi-Koryak
      • Chukot
        • Chukchi (Chukot) (7,700 speakers, ethnic 15,000)   Chukotka
      • Korjak aliutor
        • Koryak (Nymylan) (3,500 ethnically 7000)   Southern Chukotka, northern Kamchatka
        • Aliutorial (200, ethnic 2,000)   Kamchatka
        • Kerek †   Chukotka (Cape Navarin)
    • Kamchadal
      • Itelmen (Kamchatka) (max. 100 speakers, ethnically 2,500)   South Kamchatka

There are news and records of other languages ​​of the Kamchadal group that have become extinct in the last few centuries.

The language family and its members

The Chuktscho-Kamchadal or Luoravetlanic languages ​​form a small, geographically compact language family with 11,500 to 14,000 speakers. The northern branch includes Chukchi, with 10,000 speakers the most important language of this group (on the Chukotka Peninsula in the Chukchi Autonomous District (AB) and scattered in Yakutia). The Korjak (3,500 speakers, in the AB the Korjaks), the Aliutor (200 speakers, AB Korjak and North Kamchatka) and the now probably extinct Kerek (Chukotka, Cape Navarin) are so closely related that mutual understanding is quite possible and this is why some researchers classify them as dialects of a language. The southern or Kamchatka branch deviates more from this and today only consists of Itelmen (a maximum of 100 speakers from an ethnic group of 2,500 people, in southern Kamchatka and the AB the Koryaks).

Chukchi, Koryak and Itelmen are written languages ​​based on the Cyrillic script , in which newspapers and books appear to a small extent. The other languages ​​of the group have remained scriptless.

The names Chukchi and Chukotka are a Russian adaptation, presumably of the name of a subgroup of the Chukchi; Luorawetlan is the self-designation of the Chukchi tribes as a whole, this name has been used for the entire Chukchi-Kamchadal language family since the 1920s. Itelmen is the self-designation of the Itelmen, who were called Kamchalo by the Koryaks, which was adapted in Russian to designate the people of the Kamchadals and the Kamchatka Peninsula. Today, the somewhat cumbersome general term chuktscho-Kamchadal has established itself for the entire language family.

Relationships with other language families

A particular genetic proximity of the Chukchi-Kamchadal languages ​​to the Eskimo-Aleut languages has been assumed by a number of researchers, but has never really been proven. This thesis was revived in the larger context of the (very controversial) Eurasian macro family by Joseph Greenberg , in which the Chukchi-Kamchadal forms a component.

Speech characteristics

The Chukchi-Kamchadal languages ​​are incorporating languages with split ergativity . (A language is called incorporating if other independent words - e.g. nouns, adjectives, adverbs - can also be firmly integrated into complex verbal or noun forms. In contrast to this, in the case of polysynthetic language the integrated elements can only appear as dependent morphemes .) Examples of incorporation from Chukchi are:

  • m? nn? ke-ure-qepl-uwičwen-m? k
let's-play-long-night-ball
"We want to play ball all night"
  • ga-mor-ik-tor-orw-ima
ga-… -ima preposition "in", mor-ik possessivus 1.pl. "Our", gate "new", orw "sledge"
"In our new sledge"

The case markings are ergative in most languages, the concordance of the verb, on the other hand, has a split ergativity: Prefixes identify the subject, suffixes, on the other hand, intransitive subjects and transitive direct objects (examples from Chukchi):

  • qə-viri-ɣe "may you descend"
  • m-imti-ɣət "I may carry you"

Chukchi has a special form of vocal harmony . The series of dominant vowels / e, a, o / is opposed to a series of recessive vowels / i, e, u /. When a morpheme of a word contains a dominant vowel, all recessive vowels of that word are changed to their dominant version. For example, in the word kupre, because of the dominant / a / suffix / -ma /, the / u / is transformed into / o / and the / e / into / a /:

  • copper "network"
  • ga-kopra-ma "with a net"

A curious peculiarity of some Chuktscho-Kamchadal languages ​​is the gender-specific pronunciation of some phonemes. In Chukchi, for example, the r-sound is often spoken as / ts / in women's language in certain positions. However, this form of pronunciation is more of a gender-specific attitude than a general rule. In the aliutor, male / l / or / s / in female pronunciation corresponds to / ts /, e.g. B. plaku opposite ptsaku (footwear).

literature

  • Bernard Comrie : The Languages ​​of the Soviet Union. Cambridge Language Surveys. University Press, Cambridge et al. 1981, ISBN 0-521-23230-9 .
  • Michael Fortescue: Comparative Chukotko-Kamchatkan Dictionary. Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin et al. 2005, ISBN 3-11-018417-6 , ( Trends in Linguistics - Documentation 23).