The Sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): a New Assessment

The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): A new assessment

Stephen A. Marlett Mark L. Weathers

Marlett, Stephen A. & Weather, Mark L. 2018. The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): A new assessment. SIL-Mexico Electronic Working Papers, #25. [http://www.mexico.sil.org/resources/archives/76311] © Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, A. C. Recordings (in zip files) pertinent to this work are included there: mp3 files (37 mb); wav files(299mb)

Abstract

This paper presents an assessment of the complexities of the sounds of the Meꞌphaa (Tlapanecan) genus, a cluster of closely related language varieties spoken in southern Mexico that form a separate branch of the large Otomanguean family. Various facts present analytical challenges; these are discussed in detail.

Resumen

Este trabajo presenta una evaluación de las complejidades de los sonidos del género meꞌphaa (tlapaneco), un conjunto de variedades lingüísticas cercanamente relacionadas que se hablan en el sur de México y que forman una rama separada de la gran familia otomangue. Varios elementos presentan desafíos para su análisis; estos se presentan detalladamente. 2 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec):

Contents

Abstract ...... 1 Resumen ...... 1 1. General background ...... 3 2. The sounds of early Meꞌphaa ...... 5 3. Consonants ...... 6 3.1. Voiceless plosives ...... 7 3.2. Simple voiced plosives ...... 9 3.3. Glottal stop ...... 10 3.4. Prenasalized plosives and affricate ...... 11 3.5. Labialized back consonants ...... 12 3.6. Affricates ...... 13 3.7. Nasals ...... 14 3.8. Fricatives ...... 14 3.9. Approximants ...... 16 4. Vowels ...... 18 5. Nasalization ...... 19 5.1. Nasalization of vowels ...... 21 5.2. Nasalization spreading ...... 22 6. Tones ...... 22 7. Prominence ...... 23 8. Syllable ...... 24 8.1. Onsets ...... 24 8.2. Rhymes ...... 25 9. Transcription of recorded passages ...... 25 9.1. Text in [tpl-Tlac] ...... 25 9.2. Text in [tcf-CVil] ...... 26 9.3. Text in [tpx-BDul] ...... 27 Acknowledgments ...... 27 Appendix A. Abbreviations ...... 28 References ...... 29 General background 3

1. General background

Meꞌphaa is a group of very closely related language varieties spoken by approximately 134,000 people (INEGI 2015) in the mountainous eastern part of the state of Guerrero, Mexico. Many others live in other places for reasons of work. Subtiaba (ISO 639-3 code [sut]), a language of Nicaragua that became extinct in the first half of the twentieth century, also clearly belonged to this smallLehmann family( 1920), better known as Tlapanec or Tlapanecan. These language varieties certainly comprise only one genus in the sense of Dryer (1989, 2013). As for the relationship of Tlapanec to other languages, it was not until substantive work by both Rensch (1977) and Suárez (1977, 1986) was published that Meꞌphaa was accepted by experts, if not widely known by the general public, as a branch of Otomanguean (Campbell 1997:324-325, 2007:26- 27; Kaufman 2006:119, 2007:53). This affiliation has displaced the proposal madeby Sapir (1925a, 1925b), often cited in earlier decades, that included Tlapanec in the putative Hokan family. Meꞌphaa [āhⁿɡáā mèʔpʰàà] (‘word Meꞌphaa’, in the Malinaltepec variety) has been sometimes considered one language (Suárez 1983 and INEGI 2005, for example), or presented as such by simple reference to “tlapaneco” without qualifiers in the title, asin Flores Galeana & de los Santos Galindo (1985) and Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988) and SEP (2015). But the situation is complex. Native speakers identify eight or nine varieties within Mexico, which recently have been officially recognized by the Mexican government as separate recognized “variantes” within the Meꞌphaa/Tlapanec group (INALI 2008:sec. 2:62-63). These ethno-varieties vary greatly in the number of speakers and vitality. Their traditionally recognized centers are (in alphabetical order): Acatepec, Azoyú, Huehuetepec, Huitzapula, Malinaltepec, Teocuitlapa, Tla- coapa, and Zapotitlán Tablas. See the detailed discussion of varieties and locations in Cline et al. (2011) and Suárez (1983). The town of Nanzintla is also listed by INALI in relationship to the “tlapaneco del oeste” variety, but, unlike the other towns listed in the second column of Table 1, we do not have information that Nanzintla was the historical center of that variety; today there are probably fewer than five speakers left, all elderly. (We believe that the data published in INALI 2008 is incorrect since our personal investigation in that area revealed that the other towns listed for this variety speak very much like the people of Acatepec.) Weathers (1976:367-368) refers to seven varieties (not separating out the Huitzapula and Teocuitlapa varieties mentioned above) and discusses their geographical distribution in some detail. Carrasco Zúñiga (2006b:27-32) refers to twelve regions in which recognizable differences are documented. For a small comparison of lexical data between several varieties, see Apolinar Antonio et al. (2010). Editions of Ethnologue through the twelfth (Grimes 1992:97), informed by the mutual intelligibility study done in 1972 (a summary of which was published in Egland 1978:58-59), listed one Tlapanec language with the code [TLL]. The next edition (Grimes 1996:101-102) added two more Tlapanec languages, using the codes [TPX] and [TPC]. The Tlacoapa and Malinaltepec varieties were separated off in 2001, triggering the addition of [TPL] and [TCF], respectively, and the retirement of [TLL]. In the fifteenth edition (Gordon 2005), the uppercase Ethnologue codes were converted to the lowercase ISO 639-3 codes. Thus, later editions (including the last one, Simons & Fennig 2018) list four Meꞌphaa languages in Mexico with the codes [tcf], [tpc], [tpl], and [tpx]. The major name was also changed from Tlapanec to Meꞌphaa in the sixteenth edition (Lewis 2009). The relationships of these classifications and labels to the data presented in this paper aregivenin Table 1 (arranged by the ISO 639-3 codes as of the year 2018 and then by the towns). It should be noted, however, that the relationship between the ISO codes as used in Simons & Fennig (2018), our only point of reference, and the INALI names in INALI (2008) is not always clear nor correctly deducible from the published information. 4 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Table 1: ISO 639-3 codes correlated with INALI names and locations

ISO INALI name Towns sampled Label in this 639-3 [Traditional center] paper, if referenced

tcf tlapaneco central bajo Cruz La Villa (Iliatenco), [tcf-CVil], [Malinaltepec] El Tepeyac. [tcf-Tepe]. tlapaneco del este Zilacayotitlán. [tcf-Zila]. [Huehuetepec]

tpc tlapaneco del sur Azoyú, [tpc-Azoy], [Azoyú] Zapotitlán de la Fuente. [tpc-ZFue]

tpl tlapaneco del centro Cruz de Gallo, [tpl-Gal], [Tlacoapa] El Campanario, [tpl-Camp], Tlacoapa. [tpl-Tlac].

tlapaneco del suroeste Barranca Dulce, [tpx-BDul], tpx [Acatepec] Caxitepec, [tpx-Caxi], El Tejoruco. [tpx-Tejo].

tlapaneco del noroeste alto Huitzapula. [tpx-Huit]. [Huitzapula]

tlapaneco del oeste Nanzintla. [tpx-Nanz].

tlapaneco del norte Escalerilla Lagunas, [tpx-EsLa], [Zapotitlán Tablas] Huiztlatzala, [tpx-Huiz], Xocoapancingo. [tpx-Xcpn].

tlapaneco del noroeste bajo Chichiltepec, [tpx-Chic], [Teocuitlapa] Zoquitlán. [tpx-Zoqu].

While there has certainly always been interaction between the various Meꞌphaa communities and a significant amount of multidialectalism has existed (which affected the 1972 mutual intelligibility survey mentioned above), in recent decades the variety centered in Malinaltepec has been especially influential on the others because many school teachers working in the wider region are from that variety. Efforts at unifying the varieties under one written standard (see, for example, Carrasco Zúñiga 2006b), or at least one set of alphabetic norms, have both had some successes and encountered some challenges. Nevertheless, interest in cooperating on language development is significant, and language congresses are held periodi- cally (more than one hundred four by mid 2018 since 1997), a phenomenon that has no parallel elsewhere in Mexico, so far as we know. Whether Meꞌphaa is a single language or more than one language is not a point addressed here, but it seems clear that there is more than one center of implicit normativity (Lara 2011:327). It remains to be seen whether explicit norms of the type elaborated in Carrasco Zúñiga (2006b) The sounds of early Meꞌphaa 5 will find popular acceptance by the Meꞌphaa community (and enable writers and readers to flourish),or present obstacles that actually impede literacy. Other indigenous languages spoken in the area include varieties from the Mixtec, Nahuatl, and Amuzgo genera. At least the first two of these have clearly been important in the Meꞌphaa linguistic context.In some areas Meꞌphaa people have become bilingual in a variety of Mixtec. At least the speakers of the Huehuetepec variety are also known for being adept at learning other languages for political, social and commercial purposes; see the Mixtec text in Hillman (1987) that talks about the multilingual nature of some Meꞌphaa communities. Speakers on the western border of the Teocuitlapa variety learned a variety of Nahuatl in order to deal with sociopolitical contexts (primarily the administration of the municipality), as did speakers in the Nanzintla area. With the expansion of the federal school system, an increasing number of Meꞌphaa people have become bilingual in Spanish or have even switched to Spanish entirely, especially as more roads connect remote towns with the rest of the state and as educational opportunities improve. This paper presents the sounds of Meꞌphaa as they are attested in the varieties that are still currently spoken in Mexico. The data have been carefully chosen to present a coherent picture of the native phonological system. Lexical, morphological and semantic differences between the varieties have been purpose- fully avoided. For that reason, the internal diversity of Meꞌphaa, and hence the potential evidence for there being more than one Meꞌphaa language, is barely exposed in this document. Furthermore, this presentation focuses on native words in order to present what we feel to be the Meꞌphaa system without an overlay of influence from Spanish; there is no satisfactory way to determine how many or which loanwords mightbe included if they were taken into consideration, and the effect of recent contact with Spanish would have quite predictable consequences. See the detailed discussion in Marlett (2017). We have benefited greatly from previous analyses, which focused on the MalinaltepecSuárez variety( 1983, Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers 1988, Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a and Oropeza 2014). And although Wich- mann’s published work (e.g., Wichmann 1996b) has not focused on phonology, it has been an important point of reference for the Azoyú variety.

2. The sounds of early Meꞌphaa

In this section we present what are arguably the sounds of early Meꞌphaa, which may correspond to proto- Meꞌphaa. The inventory shown here is the backdrop against which the sounds of modern day varieties are considered in later sections. The proposed list of consonant phonemes in early Meꞌphaa is presented in Table 2. The question marks next to the glottal stop and the /s/ are there because of questions relating to their exact analysis. The lateral approximant is parenthesized because of its rarity. 6 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Table 2: Consonants of early Meꞌphaa

Post- Bilabial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal Plosive p b t d k ɡ ʔ (?) Affricate t͡ʃ d͡ʒ Prenasalized ᵐb ⁿd ⁿd͡ʒ ⁿɡ Nasal m n Fricative s (?) ʃ h Approximant j w Lateral (l) approximant

The consonant inventory in Table 2 relates somewhat controversially to modern Meꞌphaa for various reasons, as we discuss below. The vowel inventory of early Meꞌphaa may have been as simple as /a/, /i/, /u/, given the less robust contrasts with /e/ and /o/ in modern varieties, but we do not know. It is likely that nasalization was a morpheme-level feature in early Meꞌphaa, as it is today. See the discussion in §5. This feature is represented in this paper by a superscript capital N (ᶰ) at the end of a morpheme. The tone system of early Me'phaa may have been very similar to what is found today: three tones (High, Mid, Low) that occur in various combinations and may sometimes co-occur on the same syllable. See the discussion of tone in §6. In the following sections we discuss the facts as they exist today, demonstrating the complexity of the situation and the reasons for the divergent presentations of phonemes that appear in the literature.

3. Consonants

Many issues relate to the inventory of consonants. We discuss them primarily by manner of articulation. When possible, consonants are presented generally in two contexts in the tables in the following sections: (a) in the simple onset of the penultimate syllable of a disyllabic root (a weak position); (b) in the simple onset of the final syllable of a disyllabic root (a strong position). Occasionally an additional context, such as the simple onset of a monosyllabic root (also a strong position), is used for illustrative purposes. The fairly strict conditions on the data that we present disallow certain data from being used as evidence. Most of the data in the various tables can be corroborated in other varieties; the data have been carefully chosen to make this possible. In fact, some data (e.g., data that work only in one or two varieties) have been omitted from these table so that the cross-dialectal utility of the presentation can be maintained. We use primarily the Acatepec variety [tpx-BDul] to illustrate the contrasts since on these points the data are so very similar from variety to variety, except where noted. The complexity of aspiration 7 3.1 Voiceless plosives

Voiceless plosives contrast at three major points of articulation (setting aside glottal stop until §3.3). In Table 3 they are shown in initial and medial positions. The voiceless bilabial plosive is less common than the others.1

Table 3: Evidence for the voiceless plosives (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety) excluding the glottal stop

p t tānā ‘medicine’ k kúbá ‘mountain’ āpūū ‘neck:3sg.d’ mātā ‘stream’ mēkū ‘sky’

3sg.d cross-references a third person singular possessor; the suffix is from set d.

3.1.1 The phonetic facts of aspiration

Voiceless plosives are commonly aspirated in some varieties; one analysis is presented in this section. In §3.1.2 we show why other analyses have taken the facts differently. Voiceless plosives are typically unaspirated in some varieties, while in others, especially [tcf], [tpl] and some areas of [tpx], they are aspirated in simple onsets, although the degree of aspiration varies consid- erably between speakers and rates of speech. Examples from [tpx-Zoqu]:/āpūū/[āpʰūū]‘neck:3sg.d’, /mātā/[mātʰā]‘stream’, /ìʔkà/[ìʔkʰà]‘skunk’, /mēkū/[mēkʰū]‘sky’. Under this analysis, the word [mèʔpʰàà] [tcf-CVil] (as in the phrase for ‘Meꞌphaa person’, [ʃàbù mèʔpʰàà]) is phonologically /mèʔpàà/, to be compared with [mēʔpàà] [tpx-BDul]. When a fricative precedes a voiceless plosive, the plosive may or may not be aspirated, with variation across varieties that has not been systematically explored. Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a:64) implies that only unaspirated consonants are found after fricatives, but see Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:23). An /h/ in a cluster may disappear completely in some varieties, thus giving rise to what may legitimately be considered contrastive aspiration in those varieties, as we discuss in §3.1.2. However, it seems clear that aspiration is not a fundamental, distinctive feature of the Meꞌphaa genus.

3.1.2 The complexity of aspiration

Previous published analyses, focusing on the [tcf] variety (and specifically the subvariety spoken in and around the town of Malinaltepec), have posited either distinctive aspiration (Carrasco Zúñiga & Weath- ers 1988:22, Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:44) or a sequence of voiceless plosive followed by /h/(Weathers 1976:368, Suárez 1983:31, 45-47), in contrast with unaspirated voiceless plosives. While it is true that this contrast occurs marginally in [tcf] and [tpl], a more general understanding of the genus suggests a different analysis. We propose that the superficial contrast between aspirated and unaspirated voiceless plosives foundin some varieties is the result of the recent loss of /h/. The loss is perhaps inconsistent or incomplete before voiceless obstruents in those varieties. In some recordings something slight can be detected. Speakers may insist that it is not there or may have been taught to ignore it when writing. /h/ is not lost before sonorants in any variety, and it is also found before voiced plosives in some.

1/k/ has been replaced by /h/ in weak syllables of many words in some varieties. (On the notion of weak syllable, see §7.) For example, the word /kúbá/‘mountain’ listed in Table 3 is usually /húbà/ in [tcf]. 8 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): That is, the general and basic distinction in Meꞌphaa, we claim, is actually the contrast between (i) simple voiceless plosive (commonly phonetically aspirated in some varieties, but not in all) and (ii) a sequence of a consonant followed by a voiceless plosive (unaspirated in that position). Table 4 summarizes this important phonological distinction. (The cognate forms do not always line up according to this table, but this is the dominate pattern. The use of the consonant followed by a superscript equals sign (as in p⁼), IPA symbol number 680, in our broad transcriptions is a pragmatic one for the cases when there is no cognate evidence immediately available to support the representation with /h/.)

Table 4: Typical cross-variety facts for voiceless plosives

Broad /hp/ or /p⁼//p/ /ht/ or /t⁼//t/ /hk/ or /k⁼//k/ transcription: [tpx-Huit], [hp] [p] [ht] [t] [hk] [k] [tpx-Huiz], [tpc-Azoy]

[tpx-BDul], [hp] [p] ~ [pʰ][ht] [t] ~ [tʰ][hk] [k] ~ [kʰ] [tpx-Zoqu]

[tcf-CVil], [h̆p] ~ [p][pʰ] [h̆t] ~ [t][tʰ] [h̆k] ~ [k][kʰ] [tcf-Zila], [tpl-Tlac]

The plosive is not aspirated in an /hC/ sequence (whether or not the /h/ appears superficially), just as it is typically not aspirated in other sequences of fricative followed by plosive. In each of the pairs of words in Table 5, the (a) examples are from [tpl-Tlac] (an innovative variety in which the /h/ tends to be reduced or deleted, as is evident in the recordings) and the (b) examples are from [tpx-BDul] (a conservative variety that keeps the /h/).

Table 5: Comparison of /hC/ clusters in (a) [tpl-Tlac] and (b) [tpx-BDul]

/hp/ (a) [wāpā] /ht/ (a) [rùh̆tù] /hk/ (a) [ʃùh̆kúʔ] ‘wide’ ‘gourd vessel’ ‘animal’ (b) [ᵐbāhpā] (b) [rùhtù] (b) [ʃùhkúʔ] /hs/ (a) [āh̆ᵗsú] ‘three’ /hʃ/ (a) [ràh̆ʃà] ‘grass’ (b) [āhsú] (b) [ràhʃà]

The /h/ follows mid or low tones in the examples in Table 5, but it may also follow a high tone, as in [ᵗsáhkù̃ʔ]‘godfather:1sg.d’ [tpx-Zoqu]. Thus it cannot be explained simply as a phonetic effect of non-high tones. The conservative varieties have obstruents without a preceding /h/ that contrast with the /hs/ and /hʃ/ sequences shown above: [wīᵗsū]‘five’, [rùᵗsī]‘a bird’, [rūʃī]‘weevil’, [lúʃū]‘a small fruit’(nanche, Byrsonima crassifolia) [tpx-Zoqu].2 Such facts are crucial, but were not taken into consideration when only the innovative varieties were examined.

2The words [rùᵗsī]‘a bird’ and [rūʃī]‘weevil’ may be compounds historically. The phonetics of voiced plosives and the development of the tap 9 3.2 Simple voiced plosives

Some basic evidence for the voiced plosives is given in Table 6. They contrast with voiceless plosives (see Table 3), prenasalized plosives (see Table 8), and approximants (see Table 15).

Table 6: Evidence for the simple voiced plosives (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

b bìjú ‘hawk’ d dáɡá ‘white sapote’ (plant) ɡ ɡànùʔ ‘fresh corn’ ʃàbù ‘person’ ādà ‘child’ àɡā ‘pig’ bóō (a geographical term) dāāᶰ ‘pot’ ɡàà ‘armadillo’

3.2.1 The phonetics of voiced plosives and the development of the tap

An utterance-initial voiced velar plosive (especially of a monosyllabic word) is sometimes pronounced with slight prenasalization. This may be observed in the pronunciations of /ɡàà/ ‘armadillo’ in Table 6, for example and of the word /ɡòʔᶰ/ ‘moon’ in §3.3. Voiced plosives often have some kind of lenited pronunciation in weak (that is, non-final) syllables (see §7 for more discussion of this notion). This tendency has led to some phonological substitutions in some words in some varieties.3 For the voiced bilabial plosive, the tendency is for it to vary between a plosive and a voiced fricative in weak syllables; see /bìjú/[bìjú] ~ [βìjú]‘hawk’ in [tpl-Tlac] and elsewhere. As noted in Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:16), the voiced velar plosive commonly weakens as well. It may vary between a fricative or approximant pronunciation, or even be completely elided. Compare the following pronunciations of /ɡūmā/‘tortilla’: [ɡūmā] or [ɰūmā] in most varieties, with an even more lenis initial consonant in [tpx-Chic] and as [ūmā] in [tpx-Zoqu] (where writers prefer to write no consonant at all). The voiced coronal plosive has been replaced in weak syllables by a rhotic, phonetically either a flap or a trill (the latter primarily in utterance-initial position), in all varieties, although in [tpc] some words have kept [d] in that position (presumably due to an incomplete sound change). If the rhotic is seen as parallel to the weak allophones of other voiced plosives, then [rūʃī]‘weevil’ is phonemicized as /dūʃī/, and [rùdúʔ]‘mother:1sg.d’ as /dùdúʔ/ (data from [tpx-Zoqu]). This was the position taken in Marlett (2012). However, it has been traditional to include a flap or trill in the phonemic inventory, despite lackof convincing evidence internal to Meꞌphaa.4 The evidence in favor of a contrast between /d/ and /ɾ/ is usually unconvincing since the rhotic does not typically occur in the strong (final) syllable, nor the alveolar plosive in weak (non-final) syllables. In [tcf], however, there is overlap of [d] and [ɾ] in minor class words; see [dí]‘what?’ and [ɾí] (inanimate subordinator), and compare [díí]‘in vain’. The reduction of syllables

3/b/ has been replaced by the phoneme /w/ in weak syllables of some words in some varieties (and sometimes in strong syllables). For example, the word /bìjú/ ‘hawk’ listed in Table 6 is /wìjú/[wìjú] in [tcf-Tepe] and has a range of pronunciations with approximants, fricatives and plosive in [tcf-Zila] and [tpl]. 4As noted in Marlett (2017), Suárez (1979) claimed that the tap developed from pronto *d, but he did not discuss why he did not take it simply as an allophone of the same. The evidence presented in Suárez (1983:8) is from an enclitic, which of course is a weak position. Most presentations simply have not discussed the distributional facts relating to these sounds. 10 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): in compounds in [tcf] has also produced the phonetic sequence [dɾ], with the [d] coming from a strong syllable and the [ɾ] from a weak syllable, as in [tcf-CVil] [dɾíʃèʔ]‘niece/nephew:1sg.d’. (Compare this with the equivalent in [tpl-CGal] [āʔdáɾíʃjóʔ], literally ‘child:yard:1sg.d’.) The sequence [dɾ] occurs in a few other words in the [tcf] variety. Still within the general [tcf] area, Oropeza (2014:73) gives limited evidence for contrast between /d/ and /ɾ/ but without discussion of the general issue. Contact with Spanish arguably tilts the argument in favor of including the rhotic as a phoneme, presumably because it is perceived as different now due to its existence in Spanish; see Marlett (2017) for more discussion. It was noted in Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:18) that there is not a consistent pronunciation of the rhotic, with some words tending to have a tap and others to have a trill. Navarro Solano (2012), briefly discussed in Oropeza (2014:112), claims that there is in fact a contrast between the flap and the trill in some words. Unfortunately, such discussions focus on an extremely limited range of data by an undescribed distribution of speakers.

3.3 Glottal stop

It is uncertain how the glottal stop should be analyzed except that it is contrastive in some way. Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:19), Carrasco Zúñiga (2006b:23) and Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a:87) take it as a contrastive vowel modification, as posited for some other Otomanguean languages (see Macaulay & Salmons 1995, Chávez Peón 2010 and Coronado Nazario et al. 2009, for examples from the Mixtecan, Zapotecan, and Amuzgoan families, respectively). There may be a tacit consensus that this is the correct analysis for many languages in these Otomanguean families. Some evidence, such as the behavior of vowels in elision in Meꞌphaa, supports such a position. On the other hand, Weathers (1976:368), Suárez (1983:7), Wichmann (1992:114) and Oropeza (2014:66) posit a glottal stop. There is also some evidence in favor of that analysis. The phonetic facts discussed in §3.3.1 seem to support the segmental analysis. Furthermore, a simple monosyllable with a glottal stop meets the minimal word constraint (see §7), unlike simple monosyllables without a glottal stop. See, for example, the words /ʃèʔ/‘breath’ and /ɡòʔᶰ/[ɡòʔ̃ ] ‘moon’ [tcf]. In addition, in [tcf] at least, a few consonant-initial words are pronounced (and written by native speaker writers) with glottal stop at the beginning of them when not in utterance-initial position, a fact that is not expected if the glottal stop is only a vowel modification. One such example is the word /ʔᵐbàʔ/‘long’. Given the range of facts reviewed above, the analysis of glottal stop in Meꞌphaa is still an open question. The data in Table 7 present three common positions for a glottal stop.

Table 7: Evidence for the glottal stop (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

(preconsonantal) ɡáʔkù ‘adobe’ (intervocalic) wìʔì ‘sand’ (intervocalic) àʔùᶰ ‘iguana’ (final) jàhààʔ ‘louse’

The view taken here is that an intervocalic glottal stop is actually the coda of the first syllable and not the onset of the second syllable; thus /ᵐbāʔā/‘many (inanimate)’ [tpx] is parsed as /ᵐbāʔ.ā/. In careful speech the first syllable of such words is definitely terminated by glottal closure. (If the glottal stopistaken Prenasalized plosives and affricate 11 as a modification of the vowel, as in the works mentioned above, the second syllable is likewise without an onset.)

3.3.1 The phonetics of glottal stop in [tpl]

In the [tpl] variety, the glottal stop is released with aspiration when it occurs before a vowel: /wìʔì/[wìʔʰì] ‘sand’, /ⁿɡāʔá/[ⁿɡāʔʰá]‘foam’, /jàʔù/[jàʔʰù]‘edible wild plant’, /jùʔūᶰ/[j ̃ù̃ʔʰū̃]‘bird’, /d͡ʒáʔāᶰ/[d͡ʒáʔʰā̃ ]̃ ‘vulture’ [tpl-CGal]. Glottal stop is also aspirated before an oral central approximant: /dūʔwā/[rūʔʰwā]‘rain’. This approximant is, in some cases, simply a nonsyllabic version of the final vowel of the root; comparewìʔjùù / / [wìʔʰjùù]‘sand:3sg.d’ with the unpossessed word in the preceding paragraph. Aspiration does not occur before a nasalized approximant, however: /mīʔjūūᶰ/[mīʔj̃ũ̄ũ̄]‘purple’. Aspiration does not occur before the second glottal stop of the possessed form of ‘vulture’ (see the unpossessed form above): /d͡ʒáʔāʔᶰ-i-ā/‘vulture-cl.y-2sg.d’[d͡ʒáʔʰā̃ ʔ̃ i̯ā]. The second glottal stop appears in the possessed form, inexplicably, as in a handful of other possessed words. It is followed by /i/; see the discussion in §8.2. We assume that the lack of aspiration in this and similar cases is due to the position of the glottal stop in the word; it is not preceding the strong syllable. The aspiration also does not occur in the negative interjection [ú̃ʔù̃], presumably because this is not a lexical word, and not in the enclitic /=ʔã/‘́ somewhat’.5 Also in [tpl], as well as in some areas of [tpx], the glottal stop (and also the glottal fricative; see §3.8.2 below) has a nasalized transition, written here as a superscript velar nasal, instead of aspiration, after a low vowel when preceding a nasalized /u/, as in /àʔūùᶰ/[àʔᵑū̃ ̃ù̃]‘iguana’ [tpl-CGal]; compare [tcf] [àʔū̃ ̃].

3.4 Prenasalized plosives and affricate

Unlike Suárez (1983) and Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a), but following the lead of Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:22-23) (where the idea is suggested but not fully implemented) and Wichmann (1992:113-114), we posit prenasalized plosives and a prenasalized affricate. The prenasalization on these consonants is typically very short when not preceded by a vowel; after pause, it may often be barely perceptible (and in fact, native speakers sometimes overlook it when writing words in isolation). But while voiced plosives and affricates are also sometimes pronounced with slight prenasalization in utterance-initial position, the plain series and the prenasalized series are clearly distinguished by writers.

Table 8: Evidence for the prenasalized plosives (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

ᵐb ᵐbīʔī ‘day’ ⁿd ⁿdìhjàʔ ‘guayaba’ ⁿɡ hⁿɡāʔá6 ‘foam’ dàᵐbù ‘tomato’ nīⁿdāā ‘temporal rain’ ⁿɡāⁿɡīʔ ‘junebug larva’ ᵐbàà ‘big’ ⁿdíí ‘cigarette’ ⁿd͡ʒ ⁿd͡ʒàà ‘party’

The arguments for including prenasalized plosives (instead of positing a consonant cluster) are at least three, none of which is perhaps completely convincing. First, the prenasalization is typically very short.

5On the general topic of aspiration of glottal stops, see Fallon 2002:186-187. 6Cognates for this word do not have an initial glottal fricative, but it is quite evident in the pronunciation of the word here. 12 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Second, as we show in §8.1, onsets seem to be maximally biconsonantal, and there are examples of a fricative followed by a prenasalized plosive, such as /ʃⁿdú/‘lump, egg’ [tcf-CVil]. Third, as we show in §7, there may be evidence from the matter of supposed exceptions to the minimal word constraint. One might consider claiming that there is no real contrast between the nasal consonants and the prenasalized plosives, as has been proposed for Mixtec (Marlett 1992). The latter would be viewed as post-occlusive nasals that appear in oral morphemes while the simple nasals appear in nasal morphemes (see §5). How- ever, this proposal is not as attractive as it appears at first since it does not provide a means to account for the prenasalized velar plosives nor the prenasalized affricate. Furthermore, the addition of a nasalized suffix does not cause any change in the pronunciation of the consonants in question, which suggests strongly that whatever distributional limitations there are on these consonants, the facts are more than simple phonetics. Finally, to analyze words such as [máɡá]‘onion’ [tcf-CVil] under this proposal, one must abandon the claim that nasalization is a morpheme-level feature (see §5) and propose that this word is /máɡá̃ / (with a nasalized vowel in the first syllable), while a word suchᵐbāwī as[ ]‘thin (inan.)’ [tcf-CVil] — or rather, [mᵇāwī] — would be /māwī/ (with an oral vowel in the first syllable). Therefore we choose to posita prenasalized set of consonants and adopt the view that nasalization is a morpheme-level feature.

3.5 Labialized back consonants

Labialized back consonants are included as phonemes in Marlett (2012), but this analysis of the facts is not without controversy. Previous analyses have posited sequences of a consonant and a non-syllabic vowel, the first part of a rising diphthong. The data in9 Table are relevant. (The transcription here obviously follows the labialized consonant analysis.)

Table 9: Data relating to labialized back consonants (from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

kʷ kʷēʔjūūᶰ ‘shapeshifter:3sg.d’ ɡʷ — ⁿɡʷ nàⁿɡʷá ‘no’ hʷ àhʷāᶰ ‘a type of ant’

3sg.d cross-references a third person singular possessor; the suffix is from set d.

The data in Table 9, trying to focus on monomorphemic words that have cognates across the varieties, are problematic in the following ways. First, they are few. Second, the distribution of the labialized consonants is not robust. Third, the example for the prenasalized labialized velar plosive is a minor class word. Two major reasons motivate an analysis that includes labialized back consonants as emerging phonemes. The first is that these sounds (however they are analyzed) are very common, as we show below, butparallel sequences (expected if the alternative analysis were correct) such as /bw/, /tw/, /dw/, /t͡ʃw/, /d͡ʒw/ do not exist or are extremely rare. These distributional facts contrast with sequences of consonant followed by diphthong beginning with /i/, which are very common. (On the analysis of the latter, see §8.2.) The second reason is based on the non-elision of the vowel /u/ in certain contexts. Compare the data in Table 10, again written with the use of labialized consonant symbols. Affricates 13 Table 10: Data relating to elision of vowels in the [tpx-BDul] variety

a. dùbú ‘chayote’ (a vegetable, Sechium edule) b. dùbáāʔ ‘chayote:2sg.d’

c. īdū ‘eye’ d. īdāāʔ ‘eye:2sg.d’

e. āɡú ‘palm.mat’ f. āɡʷáāʔ ‘palm.mat:2sg.d’

g. wīsū ‘five (inanimate)’ h. wīsīīᶰ ‘five:3pl.a’

i. àhkù ‘four (inanimate)’ j. àhkʷììᶰ ‘four:3pl.a’

2sg.d cross-references a second person singular possessor; the suffix is from set d. 3pl.a is used to signal the animacy of the plural referent that the quantifier is modifying; the suffix is from set a.

In examples (b) and (d), the root-finalu / /, evident in (a) and (c), elides before the person suffix. However, in (f) the /u/ seems to merge with the back consonant and is thus featurally retained; the elision facts are strikingly different. Similarly, in (h) the root-finalu / / elides before the suffix that signals animacy agreement, while in (j) the root-final /u/ again merges with the back consonant and is retained. Similar facts are found in all varieties, we believe, and other examples may be found (see Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:80 for examples with the locative suffix). Such facts, however they are to be accounted for, are at leastpart of the reason for the skewed distribution mentioned above.

3.6 Affricates

We posit three affricates (including the prenasalized one already discussed in§3.4). Data for the other affricates posited are given in Table 11.

Table 11: Evidence for the non-prenasalized affricates (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

t͡ʃ t͡ʃádā ‘sandal’ nāt͡ʃà ‘quickly’ d͡ʒ d͡ʒámá ‘boy’ —

Published phoneme inventories typically include an affricatet͡s / /; see the discussion of /s/ in §3.8. Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:15, 20-21) posits only the (non-nasalized) postalveolar affricates. Following unpublished work by H. V. Lemley (as reported in Weitlaner & Weitlaner de Johnson (1943:188) and evidenced in Lemley’s work in the [tpl] variety) and a suggestion in Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers 14 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): (1988:15), we take [ᵗs] as a very common allophone of /s/, as we discuss in §3.8.1. This pre-occlusive allophone is absent in a number of varieties, including [tpx]. Previous published work on Meꞌphaa has seen the affricate and fricative facts differently. Suárez (1983:7) (working on [tcf]) and Wichmann (1996b) (working on [tpc]) posited the affricate /t͡s/ as a phoneme, as did Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a:45) and Oropeza (2014:66). Weathers (1976:368) takes all of these potential affricates as phoneme sequences. We believe, however, that the distributional evidence and new evidence from the minimal word constraint (see §7), as well as the [tpx] facts, strongly support a non-cluster analysis for all of them.

3.7 Nasals

The basic inventory of nasals in early Me'phaa (and generally today) is /m/ and /n/, with examples in Table 12.

Table 12: Evidence for the nasal consonants (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

m máɡá ‘onion’ n náská ‘dry vegetable rubbish’ āmāʔ ‘net bag’ ʃāná ‘uncultivated vegetation’

It is arguable that the inventory has expanded to include a palatal nasal in modern Meꞌphaa due to a reanalysis of the nasalized palatal approximant (see §3.9.3 and Marlett 2017) and a velar nasal in the [tpl] variety (see §3.9.3).

3.8 Fricatives

We posit three fricatives (setting aside the question of the labialized glottal fricative mentioned in §3.5). Basic evidence is shown in Table 13.

Table 13: Evidence for the fricatives (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

s sùdù ‘back’ ʃ ʃāʃì ‘forest’ h hʷ īsí ‘stone’ māʃāʔ ‘green’ jāhā ‘bean’ èhʷìì ‘griddle’ (preconsonantal) àhmà ‘two’

Oropeza (2014:66) posited a voiced palatal fricative instead of a palatal approximant. See the discussion in §3.9 below. Following Weathers (1976:368) and Suárez (1983:7), we posit two glottal fricatives: a plain one and a labialized one, the latter being much less common.7 The plain glottal fricative patterns with the glottal stop in permitting nasalization to pass through it (see §5). It also permits cases of complete vowel harmony (translaryngeal assimilation), as does the glottal stop, unlike other consonants (thanks to Kevin Cline for bringing this to our attention). See, for example, [tpx-BDul] /ᵐbāʔā/‘many (inanimate)’ and /ᵐbīʔīīᶰ/ ‘many:3pl.a’ (the animate form); in the latter, the vowel of the first syllable has harmonized with that of the second syllable, which itself is due to the suffix added to indicate animacy agreement (compare the data shown above in §3.5). 7Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:38, as others, posits only the plain one but refers to it as a velar fricative while consistently representing it with the letter . As noted in §3.5 above, the glottal fricative patterns with the velar consonants in a key way. Therefore the ambiguity here is interesting. The phonetics of the glottal fricatives 15 The /h/ found in weak syllables in some varieties corresponds to /k/ in others (§3.1). Our examples in Table 3 are from a /k/-initial variety in which word-initial /h/ does not occur. A bilabial fricative has been regularly listed as a marginal phoneme (Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers 1988:17, Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:52, Suárez 1983:7), and that may be the case due to some loanwords. However, internally to Meꞌphaa, [ɸ] is an optional realization of /hʷ/; see §3.8.2. (We have also observed speakers occasionally using [ɸ] or [ɸʷ] when pronouncing words such as /xues/ juez ‘judge’ when speaking Spanish. The Spanish sequence /xue/ is thus being treated as being very similar comparable to Meꞌphaa /hʷe/.)

3.8.1 The phonetics of /s/

The dental sibilant typically has a significant non-continuant initial phase (that is, it is phonetically an affricate) when it occurs in the simple onset of the syllable in a number of varieties. This pre-occlusion does not happen at all in the [tpx-BDul] and [tpx-Huit] varieties (and many other neighboring towns). We understand the latter to be conservative, but without clear evidence. Compare /īsí/‘stone’, [īᵗsí] [tpl-Tlac] and [īsí] [tpx-BDul]; and /sìnù/‘grinding stone’, [ᵗsìnù] [tpl-Tlac] and [sìnù] [tpx-BDul]. The pre-occlusion is not insignificant; in fact, by the conventions proposed in Tserdanelis & Joseph (2006), the affricate might be more correctly represented as [tˢ]. In complex onsets with obstruents or when the fricative precedes a nasalized approximant, [s] is used in all varieties: /ᵐbá skíjúᶰ/[ᵐbá skíj̃ ̃ú̃]‘(a) twenty’, /sjāʔᶰ/[sj ̃āʔ̃ ]‘animosity’, /swāᶰ/[sw̃ā]‘̃ swelling’ [tcf-CVil]. The facts are slightly more complicated in [tcf-Zila]; the non-occlusive allophone also occurs in weak syllables that precede a syllable with a complex onset (including an erstwhile /hC/ cluster). Note the pronunciation of the initial fricative in the following words: /sòstà/[sòstà]‘chest’, /sùt⁼ūūᶰ/[sùtū̃ū̃] ‘goat’, /sí#t⁼ūūᶰ/[sítū̃ū̃]‘pestle’ (the latter is a compound; compare /īsí/[īᵗsí]‘stone’). It might be argued that, despite the lack of contrast between [s] and [ᵗs] in modern Meꞌphaa, the latter is now appropriately listed as a phoneme. See the discussion in Marlett (2017).8

3.8.2 The phonetics of the glottal fricatives

In some areas where glottal fricatives are still clearly heard before voiceless obstruents, they are greatly reduced in pronunciation before fricatives. Compare, for example, [tpx-BDul] /āhsú/[āhsú]‘three’ and /dàhʃà/[ràhʃà]‘grass’ with [tpx-Caxi] [āh̆sú] and [ràh̆ʃà], respectively. As mentioned above, /h/ has been lost entirely before voiceless obstruents in some areas, especially where the [tcf] variety is spoken. A preconsonantal glottal fricative varies in its pronunciation, especially when between a vowel and a sonorant, essentially a voiceless version of one or the other of these: /àhmà/‘two (inanimate)’, /mùhmùʔ/ ‘yellow (inanimate)’ [tpl]. /hʷ/ is phonetically something close to [ɸ] or [ɸʷ] under various conditions in various dialects. Compare the pronunciations in Table 14.

8One word has been found in [tcf-CVil] that has a [s] after glottal stop rather than the expected [ᵗs] is the compound word [jāʔsí] ‘drinking water’, which can be compared with [nāʔᵗsíì̃ ]̃ (impf:3sg.play:m.f, the suffix m.f indicating that no noun phrase subject appears in the context) ‘s/he plays’. 16 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Table 14: Pronunciation of /hʷ/

‘griddle’ ‘sibling:2sg.d’* ‘long (plural, inanimate)’ [tcf-CVil] /ìhʷìí/ [ìɸʷìí]/d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ/[d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ]/ᵐbīhʷā/[ᵐbīɸʷā] [tcf-Tepe] /ìhʷìí/ [ìw̥ʷìí] [tcf-Zila] /ihʷìí/ [ìɸìí]/d͡ʒàhʷáāʔ/[d͡ʒàɸáāʔ]/ᵐbīhʷā/[ᵐbīɸā] [tpl-CGal, Tlac] /èhʷìī/[èw̥ʷìī]/d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ/[d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ]/ᵐbīhʷà/[ᵐbīẘʷà] [tpx-BDul, Zoqu] /èhʷìì/[èw̥ʷìì]/d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ/[d͡ʒáhʷāāʔ]/ᵐbìhʷà/[ᵐbìẘʷà] * The root is {d͡ʒahu}. 2sg.d cross-references a second person singular possessor; the suffix is from set d.

In [tpl] the glottal fricative has a nasalized velarized transition when it occurs after a low vowel and precedes a nasalized /u/; the transition is written here as a superscript velar nasal, as in /māhūᶰ/[māhᵑū̃ ̃] ‘six (inanimate)’ (compare [tpx-BDul] [māhū̃ ̃]). In [tcf-Zila] the transition is not velarized: [māhʲ̃ ū̃ ̃].

3.9 Approximants

Two central approximants are common, as shown in Table 15.9

Table 15: Evidence for the central approximants (data from the [tpx-BDul] variety)

w wàhīᶰ ‘rabbit’ j jāhā ‘bean’ áwáʔ ‘an herb’(Piper sp.) ījāʔ ‘water’

The lateral approximant is fairly rare and for that reason we parenthesize it in Table 2 in §2. No native word of a major class with /l/ occurs cross-dialectally so far as we know, but it generally occurs in the pronominal enclitics for first person plural inclusive and second person plural, as in theɾùdálóʔ words[ ] ‘mother:1pl.incl.d’ and [ɾùdálāʔ]‘mother:2pl.d’ [tcf-CVil] and in some monosyllabic (minor class) discourse words. It is also found in loanwords from Spanish and Mixtec throughout Meꞌphaa.

3.9.1 The phonetics of the labial-velar approximant

The approximant that is labial-velar in most varieties is often labiodental in [tcf-Zila]:/wītsū/[ʋītsū]‘five’, /wìʔì/[ʋìʔì]‘sand’, /ɡùwàʔ/[ɡùʋàʔ]‘ten’, /dūʔwā/[rūʔʋā]‘rain’. Some speakers in this area do use [w] rather than [ʋ], however. (It may alternate with [b] in some words, including the word for ‘sand’ given here.)

3.9.2 The phonetics of the nasalized approximants in general and the development of the palatal nasal

The approximants are nasalized when the nasalization of a morpheme reaches them (see §5 and also §5.2). Nasalization of the palatal approximant is quite notable. Weathers (1976:368), Suárez (1983:23), Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers (1988:17), and Carrasco Zúñiga (1995:282) consider the nasalized approximant, which

9We assume that the voiced palatal fricative reported in Oropeza (2014:66) (not found in our data, but not surprisingly) is simply a variation on the palatal approximant in oral contexts. This is typical of regional Spanish (and even more distant dialects) and of other languages of southern Mexico. Elision of the nasalized palatal approximant 17 is often written impressionistically as a palatal nasal, as an allophone of the palatal approximant. See the data in the first two rows (data from the wide [tcf] area) of Table 16.

Table 16: Variation in the pronunciation of the palatal approximant

‘deer’‘coyote’ ‘air’ /àjàʔᶰ//ìjàʔᶰ/ /ɡìjááʔᶰ/ (with variations) [tcf-CVil], [tcf-Tepe] [àj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ][ìj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ] [ɡíj̃ ̃á]̃ [tcf-Zila] [àj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ] (loanword) [ɡíj̃ ̃áá̃ ʔ̃ ] [tpc-Azoy] [àɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ][ʃùwíɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ] [ɡìɰ̃á̃ ʔ̃ ] (dog#coyote) [tpl-Camp], [tpl-CGal], [tpl-Tlac], [tpx-Huit] [àɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ][ìɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ] [ɡìɰ̃á̃ á̃ ʔ̃ ] [tpx-BDul] [à.à̃ ʔ̃ ][ìj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ] [ɡìj̃ ̃áá̃ ʔ̃ ] [tpx-EsLa], [tpx-Huiz], [tpx-Xcpn], [tpx-Zoqu] [àɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ][ìɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ] [ìɰ̃á̃ ʔ̃ ]

Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a:44) on the other hand, posits a palatal nasal consonant on the basis of the example [j ̃áʃtà̃ ] (our adaptation, glossed ‘pechuga’ in the source), which is an apparent compound. See also the word [hj ̃āɡū̃ ] (glossed ‘renuente’ in the source) included in Carrasco Zúñiga (2006b:34); it requires a similar explanation. We have been unable to corroborate these data and point out, at any rate, that they are highly exceptional and insufficient in themselves to support a major reanalysis of thefacts. It may be the case, however, that contact with Spanish and other factors have led to a reanalysis of these facts; the evidence is not particularly strong. See the discussion in Marlett (2017).

3.9.3 The development of the velar nasal

An intervocalic palatal approximant is pronounced velar in some varieties when it precedes nasalized /a/; it may sound quite like a velar nasal (Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:56). See the examples in the third, fourth and sixth rows of Table 16. Cases of prevocalic [ŋ] or [ɰ̃ ] also occur somewhat unsystematically in [tpl], sometimes corresponding to /ɡ/ or /ⁿɡ/ in other varieties. Compare, for example, [tpl-Tlac] [nīɰ̃à̃ ʔ̃ ](pfv:1sg.drink) ‘I drank it’ (which one might try to analyze as /nījàʔᶰ/) with cognate [tpx-Zoqu] /nìɡàʔᶰ/[nìɡà̃ ʔ̃ ]; and [tpl-Tlac] [ŋãh̄ ̆kū̃ū̃] ‘certain’ with cognate [tpx-Zoqu] /āhkōᶰ/[āhkō].̃ These velar nasals in [tpl] are perceived by speakers as the same as the intervocalic nasalized velar approximants shown in Table 16, and all are written with a distinct nasal symbol in the current writing system. These facts suggest that a phonemic velar nasal is now present in those varieties.

3.9.4 Elision of the nasalized palatal approximant

In the speech of some people in some areas, including [tpx-BDul], the palatal approximant between open vowels in nasal morphemes is elided (see /àjàʔᶰ/[à.à̃ ʔ̃ ]‘deer’ in the fifth row of Table 16) while in the speech of others in that general variety the approximant is clear (see [àj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ] [tpx-Caxi]). Another example is /mājāʔᶰ/‘red’, pronounced [mā.ā̃ ʔ̃ ] in [tpx-BDul] and [māj̃ ̃àʔ̃ ] in [tpx-Caxi]. Likewise, the palatal approximant is elided between close front vowels in [tpx-BDul], such as in /mīɡījīīʔᶰ/ ‘eight:3pl.a’ (derived from /mīɡījūʔᶰ/‘eight (inanimate)’ and the suffix /-īīᶰ/). Thus while in [tpx-Caxi] the word is pronounced [mīɡīj̃ ̃īī̃ ʔ̃ ], it is pronounced [mīɡī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ ] in [tpx-BDul]. 18 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec):

4. Vowels

Five vowels are found in modern varieties; see Figure 1.

Figure 1: The vowel inventory

The vowels /i/, /a/, and /u/ are much more widely distributed than the others, but /o/ and /e/ are also well attested even as they often vary with /u/ and /i/, respectively. The vowels /o/ and /e/ occur often through coalescence of the vowel /a/ of a root and the vowels /u/ and /i/ of suffixes, respectively. It appears to be the case that the [tcf] variety has innovated here, commonly lowering high vowels to mid in uninflected words when the tone melody is low (but not exclusively in that situation; nasalization may also be a factor). Compare [tpl-Tlac] /ìɡì/‘fox’ and [tcf-CVil] /èɡè/; [tpl-Tlac] /ɡùhùᶰ/‘tuber’ and [tcf- CVil] /ɡòhòᶰ/; [tpl-Tlac] /ʃùwì/‘opossum’ and [tcf-CVil] /ʃòwè/. But see [tcf-CVil] /ìɡìʔ/‘fish’ for a word in which the vowels are high despite having low tones; the word is /èɡìʔ/ in [tpl-Tlac]. The vowels of inflected words in [tcf] (at least the central subvariety) may alternate because of vowel harmony (Suárez 1983:48-49). We do not discuss this topic further here, since it remains to be studied in detail, except to point out that one should not assume that the surface vowels of the uninflected words are the underlying vowels, especially in the [tcf] variety. For the vowels, we include representative data from [tpl-Tlac] in Table 17. Three contexts are given when possible: in a weak syllable preceding a strong syllable with /a/, in a strong syllable following a syllable with /a/, and in a monosyllabic word. (Words that are obviously nasalized have been excluded from consideration.)

Table 17: Evidence for the vowels from the [tpl-Tlac] variety

a àɡā ‘pig’ mātā ‘stream’ jàà ‘ear of dry corn’ e èhnà ‘box’ i ītā ‘corn cob’ ʃábí ‘earring’ ʃtííᶰ ‘cloth’ o ʃtòò ‘corn plant’ u kùbàʔ ‘earth’ ɡàjú ‘raccoon’

Vowels may be long, often as the result of affixation, as the examination of unpossessed and possessed nouns reveals, regardless of the tones involved. See, for example, /sìnù/‘grinding stone’ [tpx] and /sìnùù/ ‘grinding.stone:3sg.d’. The same is true of inflection for animacy. See, for example, in [tpl] /wīsū/‘five (inanimate)’ and /wīsūūᶰ/‘five:3pl.a’; the latter is morphologically marked. A full analysis of such (pre- Nasalization 19 sumed) false geminates has not been given—the facts vary in interesting ways across the varieties—but in each case one presumes that there is some kind of suffix that is responsible for length. One may also detect the lengthening of a vowel when it is in the penultimate syllable; see the words in Table 3 in §3.1, for example. This is generally taken to be subphonemic; systematic investigation of the phonetic facts has not taken place. However, long vowels also seem to exist in many cases to fulfill what is a restriction on the minimal word (see §7). In some cases it may be thought that the vowels are long to accommodate a complex tone melody (Wichmann 2006:338). Regardless, not all vowel length can be attributed to one of these factors. Cline (2013:34), among others, gives examples of long vowels in uninflected bisyllabic words that have no tone transitions on the syllable in question, as in /èⁿdīīʔ/‘jaguar’. Similar facts are found across the varieties. As Cline (2013:42) notes, not all of the long syllables in these uninflected words are synchronically attributable to having resulted from compounding. As noted in Marlett & Neri Remigio (2012), but first pointed out to them by Mark Weathers, long vowels are analyzed as tautosyllabic because words such as /dāāᶰ/‘pot’ and /dūūᶰ/‘chili pepper’ have the allophone [d] as expected in root-final (strong) syllables and not ther [ ] expected in non-final (weak) syllables (see §3.2.1). Most descriptions have claimed that contrastive vowel length is not found in syllables other than the final one of the word. Oropeza (2014:124, 139) reports limited evidence (some that is different from well- documented examples from the same general variety, [tcf]) of a long vowel in a non-final syllable. (One crucial form is presented in a different way on page 126.) Regardless, the general situation as traditionally claimed seems to be true.

5. Nasalization

Nasalization of non-consonantal phonemes is primarily due to a feature of the morpheme. (Previous references to restrictions on the distribution of nasalized vowels have been to the word rather than to the morpheme; see Weathers 1976:368, note 10; Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:41; and Suárez 1983:47-48. Wichmann 1992:114 points out that “nasalization is restricted phonologically to final syllables.”) That is, nasalization of a vowel or approximant is not a feature of that vowel or approximant, but rather of the morpheme in which it occurs. And that distinctive nasalization always links only to the right edge of the morpheme and then spreads leftward and rightward in the word until it is stopped by a true consonant (that is, not a central approximant, glottal stop, or glottal fricative) within the same inflected word.10 For this reason nasalization is shown in the broad transcriptions in this paper as a superscript capital N (ᶰ), which is not part of the IPA set of conventions. This section examines the phonological properties of nasal morphemes; phonetic details are discussed in §5.2. A monosyllabic morpheme with an obstruent in the onset, as in (a) in Table 18, may be oral or nasal. A disyllabic morpheme with an obstruent in the onset of the final syllable, as in (b) in that table, may have the second syllable nasalized, but not just the first nor both. Our analysis accounts for the impossibility shown in the final column since there is no way for the nasalization to get to the first syllable.

10 Nasalization does not spread to the suffix in words with the intrusive final glottal stop, like thosefor‘vulture-cl.y- 2sg.d’ described in §3.3.1, but the reason is not clear. 20 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Table 18: Oral and nasal morphemes; data from [tcf-CVil]

Oral morpheme Nasal morpheme Impossible /ɡàá/ /dùùᶰ/ a. [ɡàá]‘armadillo’ [dù̃ù̃]‘cloud’ /ʃàbò/ /sídììᶰ/ b. [ʃàbò]‘person’ [ᵗsídìì̃ ̃]‘plum’ *[tãda], *[kõto], *[kõtõ] /jáá/ /jùùᶰ/ c. [jáá] ‘honey’ [j ̃ù̃ù̃] ‘corn dough’ *[jũũ] /jùwàʔ/ /jàʔjúúᶰ/ d. [jùwàʔ]‘crow’ [j ̃ãʔj̀ ̃ú̃ú̃]‘ink’ *[juwã], *[j ̃ũwa] /ʃìjú/ /ʃájáᶰ/ e. [ʃìjú]‘scorpion’ [ʃáj̃ ̃á]‘̃ nest’ *[ʃãja], *[ʃaj ̃ã] /jāsò/ f. [jāᵗsò]‘pig fat’ *[j ̃ãʃa], *[j ̃ãtũ] /jāhā/ /jòhòᶰ/ g. [jāhā]‘bean’ [j ̃òhò̃ ]‘̃ gnat’ *[j ̃õho], *[johõ] /jūʔwā/ /jòʔòᶰ/ h. [jūʔwā]‘agave’ [j ̃òʔò̃ ]‘̃ bird’ *[j ̃õʔo], *[joʔõ]

Morphemes with approximants in the onset of the final syllable may be oral or nasal, as in (c-d); the nasalization extends through all adjacent sonorants (and passes through /h/ and /ʔ/). Our analysis accounts for the impossibility shown in the final column since it is impossible for only the first syllable to benasalized or for the nasalization to not affect the approximants. The onsets of the two syllables of a disyllabic morpheme may be heterogeneous (non-approximant, approximant; or approximant, non-approximant), of course, as in (e-f), and the nasalization properties are as expected. By our analysis, there is no way for only the first syllable to be nasalized nor for the first syllable to be nasalized if the final syllable begins with an obstruent. Nasalization passes through /h/ and /ʔ/, as in (g) and (h). The facts in the last column follow directly from our analysis here as well, for the reasons stated above. All of the examples that show the possibility or impossibility of nasalization on the palatal approximant are important since the nasalization of this approximant is quite perceptible phonetically (see §5.2). Nouns that are typically or always possessed (such as kinship terms) may have oral roots or nasal roots, as expected. Verbs may likewise have oral or nasal roots. In these cases the facts are the same, and nasalization spreads rightwards as well. The examples in Table 19 from [tcf-Zila] cite the kinship forms with a first person singular possessor for the sake of comparison and the same array is shown (aspossible) corresponding to Table 18. (Some possibilities not shown here, such as both oral and nasal options for (f), are attested in other varieties.) Nasalization of vowels 21 Table 19: Oral and nasal morphemes; data from [tcf-Zila]

Oral root Nasal root

a. [dìíʔ]‘brother.(of. woman):1sg.d’ —

b. [ɡìʔtʰìʔ]‘younger.sibling:1sg.d’ [ɡùʔɡʷíʔ̃ ]‘daughter-in- law:1sg.d’ c. — —

d. — [nìj̃ ̃óʔ̃ ]‘aunt:1sg.d’

e. [d͡ʒíjòʔ]‘older.brother.(of.man):1sg.d’[ʃìʔj̃ ̃óʔ̃ ]‘grandfather:1sg.d’ f. — —

g. — [ìhì̃ ʔ̃ ] ‘children:1sg.d’ h. — —

1sg.d cross-references a first person singular possessor; the suffix is fromset d.

The outstanding question is how do nasal consonants fit into the system outlined above given the fact that there is no oral versus nasal contrast found after nasal consonants (Suárez 1983:40). Specifically, do we know whether hypothetical morphemes such as /jama/ or /jono/ are oral or nasal or either? Curiously enough, the data needed to answer the question are virtually non-existent, so far as we have been able to discover. The one datum that exists, discussed in Suárez (1983:40), not attested in all varieties, suggests that either the morpheme is oral or that the nasal blocks the leftward spread of nasalization. For the present, therefore, we take morphemes such as /āmāʔ/‘net bag’ [tpx-BDul] and [tpl-Tlac] as oral morphemes. (If this word were analyzed as a nasal morpheme, it would be transcribed /āmāʔᶰ/.) It is also interesting that a morpheme that is nasal in most varieties is sometimes explicitly oral in another variety, at least for some speakers.

5.1 Nasalization of vowels

A vowel is nasalized following a nasal consonant (regardless of the nasality of the morpheme): /máɡá/ ‘onion’ [tcf-CVil]. This nasalization does not appear to be greater or less than that which occurs distinctively. Nevertheless, consider the words in Table 20. The suffix for third person singular is an oral suffix while the one for third person plural is nasalized; this is clearly evident from the data in the first column. The difference in nasalization of these two suffixes appears to be persistent in the paradigms where nasalization also appears because of the consonant in the root (the case of ‘father’) or because of the root-level nasalization (the case of ‘clothing’). We have attempted to indicate this in a unconventional way by superimposing another tilde above the vowel.11

11This situation has presented some difficulties for the writing conventions in use in the community. Some writers have compromised by using only the tone marks to differentiate the third person singular and plural suffixes inwords like ‘father’ and ‘clothing’. It may also be the case that some speakers do not make a phonetic difference. 22 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Table 20: Examples of nasalization of vowels (data from [tpx-BDul])

Root with oral consonant Root with nasal consonant Nasal root

Suffix {uu}[rùdúū] [ānù̃ù̃] [ʃtíj̃ ̃ú̃ū̃] ‘mother:3sg.d’ ‘father:3sg.d’ ‘clothing:3sg.d’ Suffix {uuᶰ}[rùdú̃ú̃] [ānù̃ú̃] [ʃtíj̃ ̃ú̃ú̃] ‘mother:3pl.d’ ‘father:3pl.d’ ‘clothing:3pl.d’

3sg.d cross-references a third person singular possessor; 3pl.d cross-references a third person plural possessor; the suffixes are from set d.

5.2 Nasalization spreading

It was claimed in §5 that nasalization on vocalic elements is due to a morpheme-level feature that docks on the right edge of a morpheme and then spreads to adjacent non-consonantal sounds, with the glottal stop and glottal fricative allowing the nasalization to spread through them. The degree of nasalization that occurs is quite strong, but possibly it does not go beyond the foot in which it begins. As mentioned in §5, nasalization spreads in both directions. It may spread from a root to a suffix. See also the examplesì [ h̃ ̃ìʔ̃ ] ‘children:1sg.d’ and [ìh̃ ̃ĩàà̃ ʔ̃ ]‘children:2sg.d’ [tcf-CVil], where the normally oral vowels of the suffixes are nasalized as a result of being contiguous to the nasalized root {ìhìᶰ}. Nasalization may also spread from a suffix to a root (and to other suffixes). Compare the formsofthe lexeme {dij-}‘brother (of woman)’, which takes the suffix /i/ mentioned in §8.2 when it inflects: [díjèʔ] ‘brother.(woman.speaking):1sg.d’ and [díj̃ ̃ìí̃ ]‘̃ brother(s).(of.women):3pl.d’ [tcf-CVil]. Also compare the third person plural possessed forms of /ījā/‘water’, /jáá/‘honey’ and /jāhā/‘beans’ (some from Carrasco Zúñiga 1995:282):[īj̃ ̃ú̃ù̃]‘water:3pl.d’, [j ̃áú̃ ̃ù̃]‘honey:3pl.d’, [j ̃ũ̄h̃ù̃ù̃]‘bean:3pl.d’ [tcf-CVil].12 The pronunciation of the nasalized palatal approximant may sound quite like a palatal nasal, as in the following examples (similar for all varieties, cited here in the [tpl-Tlac] variety): /jùhùᶰ/[j ̃ù̃h̃ù̃]‘gnat’, /jūùᶰ/[j ̃ū̃ù̃]‘worm’, /ᵐbá skíjúʔᶰ/[ᵐbá skíj̃ ̃ú̃ʔ]‘(a) twenty’, /ɡāhjāᶰ/[ɡāhj̃ ̃ā]‘̃ centipede’. See also §3.9.3.

6. Tones

Tones have been analyzed as being basically three (High, Mid, and Low) in all of the previous work and in the exposition of tone in the Acatepec variety [tpx] found in Cline (2013). The presentation below assumes the presence of tone melodies on roots, regardless of the number of syllables in the roots. All of the possible combinations of one and two tone melodies seem to be well attested on two syllable roots. The data presented in Table 21 ignores small segmental differences between the words from different varieties. The tone melody on a given word is true for various highland varieties (that is, excluding Azoyú [tpc]),

12These possessed forms are presented in the so-called marked form; the final low tone indicates that the antecedent is not in the immediate context. The topic is mentioned under various labels in the published works. For one view on this phenomenon, see Wichmann (2007). Prominence 23 although not necessarily all since there is certainly a good amount of variation in tonal melodies across the varieties.

Table 21: Examples of tone melodies (data from [tpx-BDul])

Melody Examples Low jàhààʔ ‘louse’, dàhʃà ‘grass’, kùbàʔ ‘earth’, jàà ‘ear of corn’ Mid jāhā ‘bean’, mātā ‘stream’, ījāʔ ‘water’ High kúbá ‘mountain’, ɡúní ‘smoke’, hjááʔ ‘honey’ Low-Mid àɡā ‘pig’ Low-High ʃùhkúʔ ‘animal’, bìjú ‘hawk’ Mid-Low īʃì ‘tree’, īsù ‘bone’ Mid-High īsí ‘stone’, ʃāná ‘uncultivated vegetation’, dūtá ‘charcoal’ High-Low méɡjùʔ*‘father-in-law:1sg.d’ High-Mid t͡ʃáʔūʔᶰ ‘ear:1sg.d’ * The suffix receives its tone from the melody of the root. 1sg.d cross-references a first person singular possessor; the suffix is fromset d.

Some of these melodies occur on monosyllabic words and some of them occur on syllables with a single vowel; other melodies may also exist; further analysis of the tone system is necessary.13

7. Prominence

It is not clear whether something comparable to stress is appropriately identified in Meꞌphaa. However, there is evidence that words and phrases are prosodically right-headed. Rensch (1978:631) refers to the “tonic ultima”. Suárez (1983:26) likewise gives reasons for considering that, at least at an earlier stage of the language, the final syllable was accented. Poser (1990) has provided ample evidence that a language (Japanese, in his case) may have foot structure despite not having a “stress system”. First, as we have alluded to already, various phonetic details require reference to a weak syllable of the root. In a disyllabic root, the final syllable is strong and the first is weak. Beyond displaying slight phonetic differences (always lenition) not observed as frequently in strong syllables, weak syllables areoftenthe locus for more significant substitutions historically, including replacingb / / with /w/ and /k/ with /h/, as mentioned earlier. Monosyllabic minor class words (discourse markers, subordinators) typically have the properties of weak syllables. The addition of an affix does not affect the basic prosodic structure; theroot in the word continues to have a weak syllable followed by a strong one. Second, when phrases become lexicalized, the syllables on the left tend to lose vowel length and even the complete vowel. For example, compare the place name /ᵐbāmàjàáʔᶰ/‘Tierra Colorada, Guerrero’(Car- rasco Zúñiga & Weathers 1988:129) with its etymology /ᵐbāā màjàáʔᶰ/ (‘parcel.of.land red:loc’) (Carrasco 13It is also worth mentioning that competent Meꞌphaa writers, who are adept at writing tone once they have had training, usually do not write two tones on a single vowel because the community-based writing system provides no way to do so. Some contour tones on monosyllables are written over two vowel symbols and some contour tones are written as if they were level tones. 24 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Zúñiga 2006a:164), and the place name /ʃwājíí/‘Paraje Montero, Guerrero’(Carrasco Zúñiga & Weathers 1988:143) with its etymology /īʃè wājíí/ (‘tree old:loc’) (Carrasco Zúñiga 2006a:164). Also consider the compound noun /kāᵐbàà/‘road’ [tcf-Tlac] from /īkā/‘path’ plus /ᵐbàà/‘big’ in which the first vowel is lost. In other words that are known or presumed to be compounds, the vowel in the first part is qual- itatively variable across the regional varieties, which is indicative of its weaker position. Consider, for example, ‘dust of the earth’: /jūhⁿdàʔ/ [tcf-CVil] and /jōhⁿdàʔ/ [tpl-CGal] (the first syllable is a reduction of the word for ‘dust’). This view of the strong and weak syllables also clarifies what at first seems to be an anomaly. Thereisa minimal word constraint operative in Meꞌphaa, as in many other languages: major class words must have at least two moras. If one takes the traditional approach to this and looks only at syllable rimes, there are some exceptions. But the exceptions all happen to have complex onsets. See words like /ʃtá/‘skin’ and /sᵐbā/‘grime’ [tcf-CVil]. (The exceptions do not include words with only phonetically aspirated plosives, nor only prenasalized plosives, nor only affricates, providing another argument against an analysis ofeach of those as consonant clusters.) But consider the possible evolution of these words. If one starts with a two syllable word (meeting the minimal word constraint) and this word loses the first vowel (which is in the weak syllable), as we know happens, the result is a word with a complex onset and a simple vowel; the complex onset in such words is functionally on a par with complex codas of other languages that contribute to syllable weight.

8. Syllable

Syllable structure seems to be fairly uniform across the varieties of Meꞌphaa. This section summarizes briefly one perspective on this topic.

8.1 Onsets

With very limited exceptions, word-medial syllables have onsets. The exceptions include a significant number of words with glottal stops between vowels (and taken as the coda of the first, its only licensed position based on the situation in the language generally), as in /jàʔù/‘edible wild plant’ and /dìʔì/ ‘flower’ [tpl-CGal], with limited vowel options. (The bisyllabicity of the latter is evident from the fact that it is phonetically [rìʔʰì], with a rhotic; see §3.2.1.) Onsetless word-medial syllables also include ones with a round vowel preceded by a syllable ending in the low vowel; see [tcf] /tā.ūᶰ/‘sweet’, /dā.ūᶰ/‘mouth’, /jā.úᶰ/‘hand’, and /ā.úᶰ/‘belly’. Not surprisingly, word-initial syllables often have no onset as this is commonly the case even in languages that otherwise require an onset in each syllable. Multiple examples have been given above. Branching onsets are most commonly a fricative followed by another consonant, as in /ʃtá/‘skin’ and /sᵐbā/‘grime’. (Multiple examples have been given above of word-medial onsets beginning with /h/.) This fact provides strong additional evidence for the analysis of the prenasalized consonants as such (instead of a nasal plus consonant cluster, as in previous work) and, similarly, evidence against the analysis of aspirated consonants as clusters of voiceless plosive followed by /h/ (as in Suárez 1983). Text in [tpl-Tlac] 25 8.2 Rhymes

While most rhymes consist of a simple vowel, many end in a glottal stop. Some branching rhymes exist apart from those with glottal stop, but we believe that they consist only of a long vowel or a close front vocoid followed by the nuclear vowel, as in /siākè/[ᵗsi̯ākʰè]‘strength’ [tcf-CVil]. Words with these diphthongs are especially common in one derived situation. A large subset of nouns have a special conjugation pattern when inflected that involves the use of the suffix/i/[i̯] between the root and the person suffixes (see Wichmann 1996a for one attempt to make sense of this; one might view it as an old animacy class marker, glossed in this paper as cl.y). Examples from [tcf-CVil]:/àɡā/‘pig’, /àɡiāāʔ/‘pig:cl.y:2sg.d’; and /ʃùwáᶰ/ ‘dog’, /ʃùwiáāʔᶰ/‘dog:cl.y:2sg.d’. Syllables with long vowels are found only in the strong syllable or as the result of affixation, as in the case of marking of possessors on nouns; see the preceding paragraph. Words such as [ku̯ēʔē]‘shapeshifter’(nahual), analyzed by Carrasco Zúñiga (2006a:63) as involving a diphthong, are understood here as having a labialized back consonant, /kʷēʔē/. As mentioned in §3.5, when a back vowel is targeted for elision and the consonant preceding it is not back, the back vowel simply deletes. We believe this indicates the lack of a license for diphthongs such as [u̯a].

9. Transcription of recorded passages

Recorded texts are given below from three different varieties.

9.1 Text in [tpl-Tlac]

Emilia Neri Méndez wrote the following short text in 2011 in the variety [tpl-Tlac], published as Neri Méndez & Marlett (2011). It is about one of the edible plants in the area from the Xanthosoma genus.

Broad transcription: īná ŋàʔūᶰ māʃāʔ īnúú | ᵐbàʔù | wāp⁼ā | kāmí ᵐbājííʔ ēʔnī ʃⁿdúú ǁ ᵐbāʔā īnīī dí īná ŋàʔūᶰ ɡīì ǁ díɡá t⁼īkū dí nāʔnī ʃⁿdúú māk⁼āʔ ǁ díɡá t⁼īkū dí ᵐbīhʷà ᵐbàʔù ʃⁿdúú ēʔnī ǁ díɡá t⁼īkū dí ìⁿdóó īnúú mìʔsū ǁ nàⁿɡʷá ēʔnī ʃⁿdúú hā ǁ īkāā dí māk⁼āʔ ʃⁿdúú | nāʔɡàà hmàā īdú ǁ mīʔjūūᶰ níhjúúᶰ díⁿdòō dí nāʔɡàà ǁ dí ᵐbīhʷà ᵐbàʔù ʃⁿdúú | nāʔɡàà hmàā dí mītāūūᶰ ǁ mīwíʃá kāmí séhjúúʔ īʔɡàà ǁ

26 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): Narrow transcription: īná̃ ŋàʔʰū̃ ̃ māʃāʔ̃ īnú̃ú̃ | ᵐbàʔʰù | wāpā | kʰāmí̃ ᵐbājííʔ ēʔnī̃ ʃⁿdúú ǁ ᵐbāʔʰā īnīī̃ ̃ ɾí īná̃ ŋàʔʰū̃ ̃ ɡīì ǁ ɾíɡá tīkʰū ɾí nāʔnī̃ ̃ ʃⁿdúú mākāʔ̃ ǁ ɾíɡá tīkʰū ɾí ᵐbīhʷà ᵐbàʔʰù ʃⁿdúú ēʔnī̃ ǁ ɾíɡá tīkʰū ɾí ìⁿdóó īnú̃ú̃ mìʔᵗsū̃ ǁ nàⁿɡʷá̃ ēʔnī̃ ʃⁿdúú hā ǁ īkʰāā ɾí mākāʔ̃ ʃⁿdúú | nāʔɡàà̃ hmàā̃ ̃ īdú ǁ mīʔj̃ ̃ū̃ū̃ níhj̃ ̃ú̃ú̃ ɾíⁿdòō ɾí nāʔɡàà̃ ǁ ɾí ᵐbīhʷà ᵐbàʔʰù ʃⁿdúú | nāʔɡàà̃ hmàā̃ ̃ ɾí mītʰà̃ ù̃ ̃ù̃ ǁ mīwíʃá̃ kʰāmí̃ ᵗséhjúúʔ īʔɡàà ǁ

Translation: Regarding the elephant ear plant, its leaves are green, big and wide, and it produces its corm (bulbotuber) in the earth. There are various kinds of elephant ear plant. Some produce small corms. Some produce long and big corms. Of some of them you can eat only the leaf; these do not produce corms. Those that produce small corms can be cooked with salt; the exterior becomes purple when cooked. Those that have long and big corms are cooked with sugar. They are a bit dry and do not require long to cook.

9.2 Text in [tcf-CVil]

Próspero Zacarías Morán wrote the following short text in 2012 in the variety [tcf-CVil], published as Zacarías Morán & Marlett (2012).

Broad transcription: ná nūᵐbāā mīʃtdūʔwííᶰ ᵐbāʔā wáā īnīī īʃè dí ⁿdāʔjā | nūmūū dí hùbàʔ máháᶰ jāhūūᶰ nè ǁ díɡà āsú īnīī īʃè dí nāhmúú ʃàbò mèʔpàà dí nūnè ʃèɡùù ɡūʔwúùᶰ ǁ īʃè ʃtā | īʃè dījūᶰ hmàá īʃè t͡ʃābòʔ dúʔkʷèᶰ pú ɡúk⁼ú īsúū dí séʔpò dūʃī | nīmáʔ síʔɡā nè wāpā ǁ díɡà t⁼īkū īʃè dí nūdū ʃàbò mèʔpàà dí màʔnē táāᶰ ʃkāmīʃūū ná díɡà ɡīdūū īʃè kāfé | dí īkāā máʔ īnúū nè nāʔnē jūskàāʔ lā ᵐbāā ǁ díɡà t⁼īkū īʃè díɡèʔ máháᶰ dìʔjùù | ʃkūjīīᶰ hmàá máʔ ʃⁿdúū | nāʔpò nè ʃàbò mèʔpàà ǁ hāmí ʃúʔkʷèᶰ máʔ díɡà t⁼īkū dí tānāā īnúū ǁ t⁼īkū dí tānāā ʃtájōō ǁ

Narrow transcription: ná nūᵐbāā mīʃtɾūʔwíí̃ ̃ ᵐbāʔā wáā īnīī īʃè ɾí ⁿdāʔjā | nūmūū ɾí hùbàʔ máhá̃ ̃ j ̃āhū̃ ̃ū̃ nè ǁ ɾíɡà āᵗsú īnīī īʃè ɾí nāhmúú ʃàbò mèʔpʰàà ɾí nūnè ʃèɡùù ɡūʔw̃ú̃ù̃ ǁ īʃè ʃtā | īʃè ɾīj̃ ̃ū̃ hmàá īʃè t͡ʃābòʔ ɾúʔkʰʷè̃ pʰú ɡúkú īᵗsúū ɾí ᵗséʔpʰò ɾūʃī | nīmáʔ ᵗsíʔɡā nè wāpʰā ǁ ɾíɡà tīkʰū īʃè ɾí nūdū ʃàbò mèʔpʰàà ɾí màʔnē táā̃ ̃ ʃkāmīʃūū ná ɾíɡà ɡīdūū īʃè kāfé | ɾí īkʰāā máʔ īnúū nè nāʔnē jūskàāʔ lā ᵐbāā ǁ ɾíɡà tīkū īʃè ɾíɡèʔ máhá̃ ̃ ɾìʔjùù | ʃkū̃j ̃īī̃ ̃ hmàá máʔ ʃⁿdúū | nāʔpʰò nè ʃàbò mèʔpʰàà ǁ hāmí ʃúʔkʰʷè̃ máʔ ɾíɡà tīkʰū ɾí tʰānāā īnúū ǁ tīkʰū ɾí tʰānāā ʃtájōō ǁ

Acknowledgments 27 Translation: In the region of Iliatenco grows a great variety of trees because the land is fertile. There are three kinds of trees that the Meꞌphaa people use for the posts in their houses. The (name), (name) and yellow oak are trees with hardwood that the termites do not eat and which do not rot quickly. The Meꞌphaa plant other kinds of trees so there will be shade in the coffee plantations and so that their leaves will fertilize the earth. Some trees have flowers, seeds or fruits that are good and which the Meꞌphaa eat. Also, the leavesofsome of them are medicinal. And of others the bark is medicinal.

9.3 Text in [tpx-BDul]

Plácido Neri Remigio wrote the following short text in 2012 in the variety [tpx-BDul]. A slightly longer version was published as Neri Remigio & Marlett (2012).

Narrow transcription: náā̃ ̃ kú̃w̃íì̃ ̃ ʃàbù mēʔpàà̃ | ɾíɡá ᵐbāʔā ēnīī̃ ̃ ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ | ɾíɡá ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ mù̃hmù̃ʔ | ɾíɡá ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ mīʔʃá̃ | ɾíɡá ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ mīʔj̃ ̃ū̃ū̃ | ʃúʔkʷì má̃ ɾíɡá ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ ʃì māⁿɡāā̃ ǁ dí ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ īʃì | ᵐbɾūtū ʃóō dí ìʔwáʔ ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ | ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ ɾíɡì ʃóō ɡúhkúʔ kāʔnīī̃ ̃ īkāā ǁ māⁿɡāā̃ má̃ | ɾíɡá īj̃ ̃ū̃ū̃ʔ ɾùbú ǁ ᵐbá ʃúɡʷííʔ ī.ī̃ ī̃ ʔ̃ ɾíɡì nāhmà̃ à̃ ̃ náā̃ ̃ hᵐbāj̃ ̃ú̃ú̃ʔ ʃàbù mēʔpàà̃ ǁ

Translation: Where the Meꞌphaa live there are different kinds of cultivated tubers: there is the white yucca, there isthe yellow yucca, there is the purple yucca, and there is the “woody” yucca. The woody yucca is different from the other yuccas; this yucca is a bit hard. There are also the chayote tubers. All of these cultivated tubers are found in the Meꞌphaa region. They take these tubers to market to sell or they themselves eat them if they do not sell them.

Acknowledgments

We thank the following people who provided the data on the varieties of Meꞌphaa that they speak: Ben- ito Apolinar Antonio [tpx-Zoqu]; Florentina Bernadino Sierra [tcf-Caxi]; Moisés Cantú Ambrocio [tcf-Tepe]; Emilia Neri Méndez [tpl-Tlac]; Plácido Neri Remigio [tpx-BDul]; Catalina Antonio García and David Cortés Sabino [tpx-Chic]; Elías Tamarit Beristráin [tpl-CGal]; Gregorio Tiburcio Cano and Epigmenio Santiago Cano [tcf-Zila]; Próspero Zacarías Morán [tcf-CVil]; and Constantino Zavaleta Navor [tpc-Azoy]. None of them is responsible for any errors that we may have made in transcription or analysis. We have benefited greatly from discussions of these facts with H. Andrew Black (who also helped greatly with the use of XLingPaper), Cheryl Black, Philip Duncan, William Gardner, Aaron Hemphill, Hugh Paterson 28 The sounds of Meꞌphaa (Tlapanec): III (who also helped specifically with the discussion of the Ethnologue and ISO code history), Charles Speck, Cindy Williams, audiences at the Seminario de Lenguas Indígenas (UNAM), the Universidad de Sonora, and the University of North Dakota and, of course, most importantly, all of the Meꞌphaa contributors mentioned above. Kevin Cline merits special mention for his help in many stages. Peter Wulfing was kind to help with some final recordings and Valerie Hillman with editing. Our work was supported in part by a Documenting Endangered Languages grant from the National En- dowment for the Humanities (FN-50079-10) and also by SIL International. We gratefully acknowledge their important assistance in making this study possible.

Appendix A: Abbreviations

1pl = first person plural 1sg = first person singular 2pl = second person plural 2sg = second person singular 3pl = third person plural 3sg = third person singular a = person agreement set A cl.y = class Y d = person agreement set D m.f = marked form impf = imperfective incl = inclusive loc = locative pfv = perfective References 29

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