Sierra Otomi a.k.a. Highland Otomi (Otomi de la Sierra) is a dialect cluster of the Otomi language spoken in Mexico by ca. 70,000 people in the highlands of Eastern Hidalgo, Western Veracruz and Northern Puebla. The speakers themselves call the language Yųhų (Eastern Highland) or Ñųhų (Texcatepec and Tenango).[2] Lastra 2001 classifies it as an Eastern Otomi language together with Ixtenco Otomi, Tilapa Otomi, and Acazulco Otomi. The three varieties of Sierra Otomi—Eastern Highland, Texcatepec, and Tenango—are above 70% lexically similar; the Eastern Highland dialects are above 80%, and will be considered here.
| Sierra Otomi | |
|---|---|
| Highland Otomi | |
| Yųhų (otm) Ñųhų (otx, otn) | |
| Native to | Mexico |
| Region | Puebla, Veracruz, Hidalgo |
Native speakers | (72,000 cited 1990–2007)[1] |
Oto-Manguean
| |
| Official status | |
| Regulated by | Secretaría de Educación Pública |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Variously:otm – Eastern Highlandotx – Texcatepecotn – Tenango |
| Glottolog | east2556 Eastern Highlandtexc1235 Texcatepectena1241 Tenango |
Distribution
editMunicipalities with significant Sierra Otomi populations include the following (Dow 2005:236). Many of these municipalities also have Tepehua, Totonac, and Nahuatl speakers.
Phonology
editThe phonemic inventory given below is based on the particular phonology of the Otomi de la Sierra dialect as documented by Voigtlander and Echegoyen (1985), phonemic inventories of other dialects vary slightly from that of Otomi de la Sierra.
Consonants
edit| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ||||||||||
| Plosive | p | b | t | d | k | ɡ | ʔ | |||||
| Affricate | ts | dz | ||||||||||
| Fricative | ɸ | θ | ʃ | x | h | |||||||
| Flap | ɾ | |||||||||||
| Semivowel | j | w | ||||||||||
Vowels
edit| Front | Central | Back | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| oral | nasal | oral | nasal | oral | nasal | |
| Close | i | ĩ | ʉ | u | ũ | |
| Open-mid | e | ø | õ | |||
| Mid | ɛ | ɛ̃ | ɔ | |||
| Open | ɑ | ɑ̃ | ||||
Orthography
editAlphabet
edit- a - [ɑ]
- a̱, ä - [ɔ]
- b - [b]
- ch - [t͡ʃ]
- d - [d]
- e - [e]
- e̱, ë - [ɛ]
- f - [ɸ]
- g - [g]
- h - [h]
- i - [i]
- j - [x]
- k - [k]
- l - [l]
- m - [m]
- n - [n]
- ñ - [ɲ]
- o - [ɔ/o]
- o̱ - [ø]
- p - [p]
- r - [ɾ]
- s - [s]
- t - [t]
- th - [θ]
- ts - [t͡s]
- u - [u/w]
- u̱, ʉ - [ʉ/ɨ]
- x - [ʃ]
- y - [j]
- z - [z/d͡z]
Other letters
edit- ą - [ɑ̃]
- ę - [ɛ̃]
- į - [ĩ]
- ǫ - [ɔ̃]
- ų - [ũ]
Tones
editTones are usually not marked.
- a - low tone
- á - high tone
- ǎ - rising tone
- à - falling tone[3]
Notes
edit- ^ Eastern Highland at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
Texcatepec at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
Tenango at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) - ^ Lastra 2006 p 57, Wright Carr 2005
- ^ "Sierra Otomi language". Omniglot. Retrieved 31 August 2021.
References
edit- Dow, James W. 2005. "The Sierra Ñähñu (Otomí)." In Sandstrom, Alan R., and Enrique Hugo García Valencia. 2005. Native peoples of the Gulf Coast of Mexico. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
- Voigtlander, Katherine; Artemisa Echegoyen (1985). Luces Contemporaneas del Otomi: Grámatica del Otomi de la Sierra (in Spanish). Mexico, D.F.: Instituto Lingüístico de Verano.
- Wright Carr, David Charles (2005a). "Precisiones sobre el término "otomí"" (PDF). Arqueología Mexicana (in Spanish). 13 (73): 19. Archived from the original (PDF) on November 8, 2005. Retrieved 2006-12-06.
- Lastra, Yolanda (2006). Los Otomies - Su lengua y su historia (in Spanish). Universidad Nacional Autonoma de México, Instituto de investigaciones Antropológicas. ISBN 9789703233885.
- Lastra, Yolanda (2001). Unidad y diversidad de la lengua. Relatos otomíes (in Spanish). Universidad Nacional Autonoma de México, Instituto de investigaciones Antropológicas. ISBN 968-36-9509-4.