Ngäbere, also known as Guaymí, Movere, Chiriquí, and Valiente, is a Chibchan language spoken by the Indigenous Ngäbe people in Panama and Costa Rica. The people refer to themselves as Ngäbe () and to their language as Ngäbere . The Ngäbes are the most populous of Panama's several Indigenous peoples. The language is centered in Panama within the semi-autonomous Indigenous reservation known as the Comarca Ngäbe-Buglé. Beginning in the 1950s, Costa Rica began to receive Ngäbe immigrants, where they are found in several Indigenous reservations: Abrojos Montezuma, Conteburica, Coto Brus, Guaymí de Alto Laguna de Osa, and Altos de San Antonio.Murillo Miranda, J. M. (2009). The nominal phrase ngäbére. Forma y Función, 22(2), 43-69.
Language family
Ngäbere is part of the Chibchan language family, which is Indigenous to an area that extends from eastern Honduras to northern Colombia. Ngäbere is one of two languages classified under a group called Guaymí. The other is a related but mutually unintelligible language called Buglere, spoken by the Buglé people within the Comarca Ngäbe-Buglé.Constenla Umaña, A. (1981). Comparative Chibchan Phonology. (Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Linguistics, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia). (1991). Las lenguas del Área Intermedia: Introducción a su estudio areal (Languages of the Intermediate Area: Introduction to its area study). San José: Universidad de Costa Rica. (1995). Sobre el estudio diacrónico de las lenguas chibchenses y su contribución al conocimiento del pasado de sus hablantes (Of the diachronic study of the Chibchan languages and its contribution to the knowledge of the past of their speakers). Boletín del Museo del Oro (38-39), 13-56.
While all varieties of Ngäbere are grammatically identical and mutually intelligible, there are phonological and lexical differences that vary from region to region. The people of different regions may use different words for the same concept or pronounce the same word differently.Rolando Rodríguez, personal communication, December 9, 2011 Vowel sounds may change; for example, the word for “to see” that is pronounced /toen/ in some regions may be pronounced /tuen/ in other areas; the word for “you” may be pronounced /mä/ or /ma/ depending on the region. Syllable stress may also vary regionally—for instance, the word for “dove,” ütü, may be pronounced with the accent on the first syllable, or with equal strong accents on both syllables, depending on the speaker's region.R. Mendoza, personal communication, June 2010 Penonomeño was somewhat more distinct, but is no longer spoken.
Ngäbere is directly referred to as dialecto (dialect) frequently by both Ngäbes and Latinos. Rolando Rodríguez remarks on this misnomer: “El ngäbere no es una variedad del español o de otra lengua conocida, de manera que por desconocimiento se suele decir dialecto al ngäbere, cuando en realidad es una lengua.” (Ngäbere is not a variety of Spanish or of any other known language. Through ignorance people usually call Ngäbere “dialect,” when in reality it is a language.) Personal communication, December 9, 2011
Phonology and Orthography
Consonants BilabialAlveolarPostalveolar/PalatalVelarGlottalplainlab.NasalPlosive/AffricatevoicelessvoicedFricativeTrillApproximant
Vowels FrontCentralBackCloseClose-midOpen-midOpen
As a traditionally oral language, the Ngäbere writing system has only very recently been created. An alphabet was developed using the Latin script, based on the Spanish alphabet. Given that Spanish is the most widely used language in the Central American region, the alphabet was based on the Spanish alphabet in the attempt to create a closer sense of correlation between the two languages.Lininger Ross, B. (1981). Estudios Sobre el Guaymí Ngäbere: Fonologia, Alfabeto Y Diccionario Provisional. Revista De Filología y Lingüística De La Universidad De Costa Rica, 7)
Some features of the alphabet are as follows: In the case of nasalized vowels and diphthongs, an is collocated after the nucleus. For example, /kï/ is written . In the case of the phonetic sound and , and and appearing in the middle of a word, the symbols used are and although it is pronounced as and . In a similar manner, when a appears in the middle of a word, it is pronounced as . Therefore, a word such as is pronounced , and is pronounced . In the case of labialized consonants, the grapheme has been collocated after the consonants where the labialization occurs. The allophones of the consonants are . The Spanish graphemes are used for , , . The Spanish is also used for the corresponding phoneme . In accordance with the system designed by Arosemena and Javilla,Arosemena, B., Melquíades, A.,. (1980). Observaciones analíticas de un texto narrativo guaimí (Analytical Observations of a Narrative Guaymí Text) Estudios Sobre El Discurso En Guaymí, 35-59; Arosemena, F. C., (1980). Los participantes en un texto narrativo guaimí (The participants in a Guaymí narrative text). Estudios Sobre El Discurso En Guaymí, 61-82. the phonemes /ï/, /ë/ and /ʚ/ are represented with the graphemes , , and respectively. The velar consonant phoneme is represented by the grapheme Lininger Ross, B. (1982). II-El Alfabeto Practico Ngäbere y las Listas Ilustrativas (II – The Practical Ngäbere Alphabet and Illustrative Lists). Revista De Filología y Lingüística De La Universidad De Costa Rica, 8(1-2), 137-154. Some letters in the Spanish alphabet are not present in the Ngäbere alphabet, such as and , , , , and , whose Spanish values either do not exist in Ngäbere or are represented by other letters. Loan words containing the phone , which does not exist in Ngäbere, are modified to /b/, such as /ban/ for “pan” (bread), and /bobre/ for “pobre” (poor)
Standardization of spelling has been slow to solidify after the creation of a writing system, especially regarding the transcription of vowels. This appears to have been influenced by the different alphabets and pronunciation of the various Spanish and English speaking researchers attempting to create a representation that corresponds to the spelling system in their language. For example, the word Ngäbe has been recurrently and erroneously spelled “Ngöbe” by many people, Latino and Ngäbe alike, because the phoneme /ä/ is heard and reproduced by Spanish speakers as /o/, and therefore they attempt to write it that way while continuing to acknowledge that it is in fact a different phoneme than the Spanish /o/. Along the same lines, Ngäbe has been spelled “Ngawbe” by numerous English speakers to reconcile English spelling and the pronunciation. Words that should be written with or in the middle of the word have also been the subject of non-standard spelling, since many write the word as it is pronounced rather than following the spelling rule. For the purposes of this article, all spelling will attempt to follow the standard writing and phonetics system.
The accent system generally puts the primary accent on the penultimate syllable of words, although there many exceptions. A monosyllabic word always features a primary or strong accent. In a bisyllabic word the accent can fall on either syllable. In words of three or four syllables the primary accent often appears in the first or second syllable; in the rare longer word of three or more syllables, sometimes two primary accents may appear. The tone is slightly higher on the primary accent than on the rest of the word.
Ngäbere is largely a monotonous language, with few extreme fluctuations in tone. To listen to a recorded sample of the language, visit Global Recordings Network, where they have recordings of messages and songs created for the purpose of Evangelical missionary work, as well as the English scripts.
Grammar
Sentence structure
The word order of the Ngäbere sentence generally follows a Subject – Object – Verb pattern, which is a common feature of Chibchan languages.
Young and Givón describe the sentence features in which Ngäbere differs from typical S–O–V languages:
"Although the language bears the unmistakable marks of an SOV language, auxiliaries and modality verbs precede – rather than follow – their compliments. This also extends to the negative marker, which precedes the auxiliary verb (or the main verb in the absence of auxiliary). This feature of Ngäbére word order is at variance with the normal pattern of rigid SOV languages. Among Chibchan languages, some follow the Ngäbére word order pattern; others display a more conservative SOV pattern, with auxiliaries and modality verbs following their verbal compliments; while others yet display both patterns." (Emphasis in the original)Young, P. D., & Givón, T. (1990). The puzzle of Ngäbére auxiliaries. Grammatical reconstruction in Chibchan and Misumalpan. Studies in Typology and Diachrony, ed. by Croft, Koenning, and Kemmer. 209-243.
“An O – V – S order does occur, and is probably a contrastive-object device akin to English Y-movement. When this order occurs, however, the subject must be case-marked.". Similarly to Korean, another SOV language, “a ‘topic’ suffix may also partake in marking the contrasted noun phrase.” Givón, T. (2001). Syntax Vol. II. John Benjamins Publishing Co. Amsterdam, 262-263.
Additionally, in the passive voice the word order takes on an S – V – O arrangement, much like in English except that the auxiliary verb is placed after the main verb.Kopesec, M.F. (1975). Los Elementos Verbales y Sustantivos y la Oración en Guaymí (The Verbal and Noun Elements and the Sentence in Guaymí). Observaciones Preliminares Sobre Los Sistemas Gramaticales De Las Lenguas Chibchas,19-82.
The auxiliary verbs carry the timed or finite verbal inflections, while the complement verbs carry an untimed or non-finite inflection.
Negative sentences are most commonly formed in the arrangement of S + Negative + (Auxiliary) + (Object) + Verb.Kopesec, M.F.(1975). Los Elementos Verbales y Sustantivos y la Oración en Guaymí (The Verbal and Noun Elements and the Sentence in Guaymí). Observaciones Preliminares Sobre Los Sistemas Gramaticales De Las Lenguas Chibchas,19-82.
The negative marker precedes the finite verb.
Ngäbere is a split-ergative language. It also displays a number of suffixal tense-aspect-modality markers, as well as suffixal case markers and adposistions. These suffixes are attached to nouns and verbs. When used in the perfect aspect to indicate a nominative case, the suffix -kwe is used to show agency for transitive subjects.Payne, T. E. (1988). La Noción de Sujeto en Guaymí (The Notion of Subject in Guaymí). Revista Latinoamericana de Estudios Etnolingüísticos, 5, 169-206. In the imperfect aspect, -kwe also is used to indicate possession (see noun clauses).
The marker -e shows dative joining with verbs that show mental state (and may also be used to show possession):
Each Ngäbere suffix has a variety of meanings. Some of the most frequently used suffixes and their English equivalents are as follows. The suffix –be expresses “with,” “only,” or an immediate reaction. The suffix –btä expresses “over,” “to be in,” “going to,” “and,” “also,” and time. The suffix –bti expresses “over,” above,” “on top of,” “by,” “in,” “through,” “then,” “after,” “plus” (indicates addition or sum), “with” (indicates instrument), and “behind”Rodríguez, R., Gulick, B., and Flynn, J. (2004). Ngabere Manual. Peace Corps, Panama (unpublished).
Noun phrases
Nouns may be formed by combining two nouns or a noun with a verb:
Nouns may also be derived by placing a suffix at the end of another word:
gore (to rob) + -gä = gogä (robber) Ngäbe (person) + -re = Ngäbere (Ngäbe language)