Atayal language

The Atayal language is spoken by the Atayal people of Taiwan. Squliq and C’uli’ (or Ts’ole’, which includes the well-documented Mayrinax) are two major dialects. The Mayrinax and Paʔkualiʔ dialects of Atayal are unique for having separate male and female registers that have differing vocabulary.

Currently there is an Atayal-English dictionary by Søren Egerod as well as a several grammars (see References). In 2002, a Bible text was published. Atayal is written in the Latin script.

Orthography

The Atayal language is most commonly written in the Latin script. There is one digraph, ng, representing the velar nasal /ŋ/, and an apostrophe (') is used to represent the glottal stop.

The schwa /ə/ is normally omitted, often resulting in long strings consonants (e.g. pspngun /pəsəpəŋun/). With the exception of ng, when there are two consonants in a row, the existence of a schwa between them is implied. [Rau, D. V. (1992). "A Grammar of Atayal". Cornell University dissertation. pp. 22–23]

The pronunciations of certain letters differ from their IPA pronunciations. The letter b represents [β], c is [ts], g is [ɣ], y is [j], and z is [ʒ]. On the other hand, q represents the uvular stop [q] and x represents the velar fricative [x].

Phonology

Atayal people resides in central and northern Taiwan, along the Hsuehshan mountains. The image depicts two major dialect groups of Atayal language.

Vowels

Consonants

Grammar

Verbs

Mayrinax Atayal (a Cʔuliʔ dialect spoken in Chinshui Village, Taian Hsiang [Township], Miaoli County) has 4 types of focus (Huang 2000b).^[1]

1. Agent focus (AF)
2. Patient focus (PF)
3. Locative focus (LF)
4. Instrumental/Beneficiary focus (IF/BF)

The following list of focus markers are used in Mayrinax Atayal.

• Agent focus (AF)
  • Realis: m-, -um- (more dynamic); ma-, ø (less dynamic / more stative)
  • Irrealis: m-, ma-, -um- ... -ay (projective/immediate); pa- (future)
• Patient focus (PF)
  • Realis: -un (neutral), ø (perfective)
  • Irrealis: -aw (projective/immediate); -un (future)
• Locative focus (LF)
  • Realis: -an
  • Irrealis: -ay (projective/immediate); -an (future)
• Instrumental/Beneficiary focus (IF/BF)
  • Realis: si-
  • Irrealis: -anay (projective/immediate); ø (future)

Aspect markers include:^[1]

• -in-: perfective
• pa-: irrealis (also serves as a causative marker)
• kiaʔ and haniʔan: progressive

Other verbal markers include:^[1]

• ka-: stative marker
• i-: locative marker
• ø- (null marker): agent-focus imperative

Dynamic and stative verbal prefixes run along a continuum. Here, they are listed from most dynamic to most stative.^[1]

1. m-, -um-
2. ma₁-, ø₁
3. ma-₂
4. ø₂

Case markers

Mayrinax Atayal has an elaborate case marking system. The Mayrinax case markers below are sourced from Huang (2002).

Wulai Atayal (a Squliq Atayal dialect spoken in Wulai District, New Taipei City) has a much simpler case-marking system (Huang 1995).

Pronouns

The Mayrinax and Wulai Atayal personal pronouns below are sourced from Huang (1995). In both varieties, the nominative and genitive forms are bound while the neutral and locative ones are free (unbound).

Affixes

The following list of Mayrinax Atayal affixes is sourced from the Comparative Austronesian Dictionary (1995).

• Note: Some affixes are unglossed.

• Male affixes (i.e., male forms of speech in Mayrinax Atayal) include (Comparative Austronesian Dictionary): -niḳ, -iḳ, -ʔiŋ, -hiŋ, -iŋ, -tiŋ, -riʔ, -ḳiʔ, -niʔ, -nux, -ux, -hu, -u, -al, -liʔ, -kaʔ, -ha, -il, -in-, -il-, -i-, -a-, -na-.

Notes

References

External links

• Atayal language at Ethnologue (16th ed., 2009)
• Entry for Atayal at Rosetta Project
• Ci'uli Atayal Wordlist at the Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database

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