Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository May 2015 The Mako language: Vitality, Grammar and Classification Jorge E. Rosés Labrada, The University of Western Ontario & Université Lumière-Lyon 2 Supervisor: Heap, David J., The University of Western Ontario Joint Supervisor: Rose, Francoise, The University of Western Ontario : Granadillo, Tania, The University of Western Ontario A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in French © Jorge E. Rosés Labrada 2015 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Anthropological Linguistics and Sociolinguistics Commons, Comparative and Historical Linguistics Commons, Language Description and Documentation Commons, Morphology Commons, Phonetics and Phonology Commons, Syntax Commons, and the Typological Linguistics and Linguistic Diversity Commons Recommended Citation Rosés Labrada, Jorge E., "The Mako language: Vitality, Grammar and Classification" (2015). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 2851. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/2851 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Mako language: Vitality, Grammar and Classification (Monograph) by Jorge Emilio Rosés Labrada Graduate Program in French Studies (Linguistics) and Laboratoire Dynamique Du Langage A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degrees of Doctor of Philosophy and Docteur en Sciences du Langage The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies The University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada and École doctorale en Lettres, Langues, Linguistique et Arts Université Lumière-Lyon 2 Lyon, France © Jorge Emilio Rosés Labrada 2015 This dissertation was presented and defended on April 15, 2015 Cette thèse a été présentée et soutenue le 15 avril 2015 Before an Examination Board composed of/Devant un jury composé de: Joyce Bruhn de Garavito, Professor, The University of Western Ontario Spike Gildea, Professor, University of Oregon Antoine Guillaume, Chargé de recherche de 1ère classe, CNRS et Université Lyon 2 Marianne Mithun, Professor, University of California at Santa Barbara Ileana Paul, Associate Professor, The University of Western Ontario Françoise Rose, Directeur de recherche de 2ème classe, CNRS et Université Lyon 2 (Lyon Co-supervisor/co-directrice) UWO Co-supervisors: Tania Granadillo, Associate Professor, The University of Western Ontario David J. Heap, Associate Professor, The University of Western Ontario ii Abstract This dissertation focuses on the documentation and description of Mako, an indigenous language spoken in the Venezuelan Amazon by about 1,200 people and for which the only available published material at the start of this project were 38 words. The project creates a collection of annotated ethnographic texts and a grammar that could serve as a starting point for both language maintenance in the community and for further linguistic research. Additionally, the project assesses the language’s vitality in the communities where it is spoken and demonstrates the relationship of Mako to the two other extant Sáliban languages, namely Piaroa and Sáliba. This research thus includes an assessment of language vitality in the Mako communities of the Ventuari River, a comprehensive description of the Mako language—heretofore undescribed—, and an evaluation of the genetic relationship between the three Sáliban languages. The description of the language covers a wide range of topics in areas such as phonetics and phonology, nominal and verbal morphology, and syntax of both simple and complex sentences. Discourse-level morphology and discourse-organization strategies are also covered. Aside from facilitating the study of other members of the Sáliban family and the reconstruction of the common ancestral language, the description of Mako also contributes to the typology of Amazonian languages and to our understanding of the pre-history of this area of the Orinoco basin. The products of this project also have the potential to be mobilized in language literacy efforts in the Mako communities. iii Keywords Mako, Piaroa, Sáliba, Sáliban Languages, Language Description and Documentation, Amazonian Languages, Historical Linguistics, Classification, Language Vitality and Maintenance iv Résumé Le principal objet de cette thèse est la documentation et la description du mako, une langue indigène parlée en Amazonie vénézuélienne par environ 1200 personnes et pour laquelle les seules données disponibles préalablement à ce projet étaient 38 mots. Ce projet crée une collection de textes ethnographiques annotés et une grammaire qui pourra servir comme un point de départ pour d’autres projets de recherche linguistique et pour des projets de maintien de la langue dans les communautés mako. De plus, cette étude évalue la vitalité de la langue dans les communautés où elle est parlée et démontre le lien entre le mako et les autres deux langues sáliba existantes, à savoir le sáliba et le piaroa. Cette recherche inclut donc une évaluation de la vitalité de la langue dans les communautés mako du Ventuari, une description générale de la langue—jusqu’à maintenant non-décrite—et une évaluation de la relation génétique entre les trois langues sáliba. La description du mako proposée ici aborde un vaste éventail de sujets tels que la phonétique et phonologie, la morphologie nominale et verbale, et la syntaxe des phrases simples et complexes. La morphologie associée au discours et des stratégies d’organisation du discours sont aussi abordées. Outre faciliter l’étude des autres langues de la famille sáliba et la reconstruction de la proto-langue, la description du mako contribue à la typologie des langues amazoniennes et à nos connaissances sur cette région du bassin de l’Orénoque. Les résultats de ce projet pourront aussi servir dans des projets d’alphabétisation dans les communautés mako. v Mots clés mako, piaroa, sáliba, langues sálibas, description et documentation des langues, langues amazoniennes, linguistique historique, classification, vitalité et maintien des langues vi Acknowledgments This project would never have been possible without the help and support of many individuals and institutions along the way. First and foremost, I would like to thank the Mako people for welcoming this sa’balari into their communities. Special thanks go to the communities of Arena Blanca and Porvenir II and their members for being such wonderful hosts. Thanks are also due to many members of these two communities for their willingness to tell stories, be interviewed, or just letting me take pictures or film of their daily activities. I am forever indebted to my primary consultants Eliseo Gónzalez of Arena Blanca and Nepo Camico of Porvenir II, whose help and charisma not only made this project possible but also fun. In Arena Blanca, I would also like to thank Neipo Gónzalez for all his help and Rosalba for all her patience and all the laughs. In Venezuela, I am also very grateful to the Department of Linguistics and Anthropological Linguistics (DLA) at the School of Anthropology (EA) of the Universidad Central de Venezuela. The DLA and the EA provided a Venezuelan home to my project and helped me with the practical issues of fieldwork in Venezuela in numerous ways. Three people deserve special mention: Jeyni Gónzalez, Francia Medina, and Ángel Reyes. Without the support of Jeyni and Francia, the incredible hospitality of Francia’s family who opened the doors of their Caracas home to me, and the many support letters of Ángel Reyes, fieldwork in Venezuela would have been almost impossible. I would also like to acknowledge the generous funding of The University of Western Ontario, the Department of French Studies at Western and the Western Faculty of Arts vii and Humanities in the form of a French Department Graduate Chair’s Entrance Scholarship, a Mary Routledge Fellowship, twoWestern Graduate Thesis Research Award and a Global Opportunities Award. I am also thankful for additional funding received from the International collaborative publication of the Atlas Lingüístico de la Península Ibérica project [SSHRC International Opportunities Fund Grant 861-2009- 1072] for my participation in InField 2010, and from an Internal SSHRC Research Award and a Social Science Alumni Research Award awarded by UWO to Tania Granadillo for the 2011 exploratory trip to the Mako area along the Ventuari River. This project also benefited from the generous funding of a 2012-2015Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship [Award No. 770-2012-0151], and a bourse de mobilité from the LabEx ASLAN (ANR-10-LABX-0081) of the Université de Lyon and I greatly appreciate this support. I started the writing of my dissertation at the University of Oregon Linguistics Department in 2013. I owe Spike Gildea special thanks for inviting me to join UO Linguistics and for the interest he took in my work, and the department there for the many interesting discussions regarding language and linguistics. I particularly profited from discussions with Scott DeLancey, Tyler Kendall, Manuel Otero, Sarah Pacchiarotti, Doris Payne, Shahar Shirtz, Becky Smith Patterson, Zoe Tribur, and Prakaiwan Vajrabhaya, and with the other two ‘guest’ Amazonianists Flavia De Castro Alves and Natalia Cáceres. The bulk of this