Soyaltepec Mazatec

Soyaltepec Mazatec
(San Miguel Soyaltepec)
Temascal Mazatec
Native toOaxaca, Mexico
RegionSan Felipe Jalapa de Díaz
Native speakers
(28,000 cited 2000)
Oto-Manguean
Language codes
ISO 639-3vmp
Glottologsoya1237

Soyaltepec Mazatec is a Mazatecan language spoken in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, notably in the towns of Santa María Jacatepec and San Miguel Soyaltepec, and on Soyaltepec Island.

Due to flooding from the construction of a dam, the Soyaltepec-speaking area has had an influx of speakers of other Mazatecan languages. Perhaps only 900 people, mostly monolingual, still speak the original variety of Soyaltepec.

See Mazatecan languages for a detailed description of these languages.

Phonology

Vowels

The Soyaltepec Mazatec dialect contains five vowel sounds and nasals:

Front Back
Close i, ĩ u, ũ
Mid ɛ, ɛ̃ o, õ
Open a, ã

Consonants

Labial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
Plosive (p) t̪ k ʔ
Affricate t͡s t͡ʃ
Fricative f s ʃ h
Nasal m n ɲ
Rhotic ɾ
Approximant w l j

Glottal-sonorant consonants: /hm, hn, hɲ, ʔm, ʔn, ʔɲ, ʔw, ʔj/

Nasal-obstruent consonants: /nt, ŋk, nt͡s, nt͡ʃ/

References

  1. 1 2 Soyaltepec Mazatec at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. ↑ Beal, Heather (2011). The segments and tones of Soyaltepec Mazatec. University of Texas at Arlington.