User:Mjk388/Toba-Maskoy language

Toba-Maskoy, also known as Enenxet, Enenlhet, or Maskoy, is one of five languages in the Mascoian family, and one of the several languages of the sparsely inhabited Paraguayan Chaco region. It is mainly spoken on a 74,000-acre reservation in East Chaco near Puerto Victoria and Puerto Guaraní. Toba-Maskoy is currently a threatened language at risk of extinction. According to a 2007 census, there are 1,680 speakers.

Official status
Toba-Maskoy is not an official language of Paraguay.

Geographic Distribution
Toba-Maskoy is spoken within the Gran Chaco region near Puerto Victoria, in northern Paraguay.

The Gran Chaco is an extensive lowland plain stretching across a number of countries in central South America, including areas of northern Argentina, Paraguay, southeastern Bolivia, and Southern Brazil. It is home to over twenty languages, called Chaco languages, though some are now extinct. Chaco languages are categorized into six linguistic families: Guaicuruan, Matacoan, Mascoian, Zamucoan, Tupí-Guaranían, and Charrúan (now extinct).

Dialects/Varieties
Toba-Maskoy is one of the six members of the Mascoian family of languages of Paraguay. The other five languages of the family are Enxet (Southern Lengua), Enlhet (Northern Lengua), Kaskihá (Guaná), Sanapaná (Saapa), and Angaité (Enenhlet).

History
Toba-Maskoy was derived from Paraguay, specifically in the Chaco region of the Alto Paraguay department.

The decline of the language
The peoples of the Paraguayan Chaco were able to maintain their independence from White colonizers up until 1885. In 1825, the Paraguayan government had mandated the presentation of all land titles, deeming unclaimed areas as fiscal property and giving them ‘legal’ possession of the Chaco. Although the tribes were initially unaffected by this, in 1885, the government sold an expanse of the land in order to repay foreign debt. From here, the colonization of the Chaco progressed gradually through the region, and by 1924, it was occupied by the military. The Chaco War took place from 1932 to 1935, through which Paraguay won against Bolivia over the possession of the northern Chaco region. By this point, the languages of the Mascoian family were only spoken in the central and eastern areas of the Chaco near the Paraguay River. For all of the tribes, colonization had brought much poverty, starvation, and sickness upon their people; their populations had rapidly decreased and they were forced to work for their colonizers, under whom they were now much more sedentary and compliant. It was through this process of colonization and the resulting dynamic of inferiority-superiority of Indian and Western culture that the use of the native languages began to decline as well. This was particularly the case for Toba-Maskoy speakers, and by the 1980s, most spoke only or primarily Guaraní.

The linguistic status of Toba-Maskoy was described in 1977 as dire or moderately stable depending on the area. In Puerto Casado, the eastern region of the Paraguayan Chaco, the majority of adults were bilingual in Toba-Maskoy and Guaraní due to their work. They tended to speak in Guaraní throughout the day, regardless of if they were comfortable using Toba-Maskoy in the home or not. The school in Puerto Casado did not have a bilingual program for indigenous languages, and though most children were able to understand Toba-Maskoy, they had no desire to speak it. Due to its lack of reinforcement, Toba-Maskoy was predicted to die in the Puerto Casado area. Within other areas, mainly located in the central regions of the Chaco, Toba-Maskoy was given a relatively stable prognosis. The adults spoke the language more consistently than Guaraní or any other culturally prevalent language, regardless of if they were bilingual or not, and the children were taught the language and spoke it with their parents at home. The language was predicted to continue for at least another two generations.

A 1992 census reported 2,057 speakers.

Vocabulary and Grammar
It is believed that around 1870 some Toba chiefs immigrated from Argentina escaping constant victimization of their peoples, thus settling in Alto Paraguay. Since that transitional period, the language suffered both linguistically and culturally. The state of the language was further damaged by the effects of the Chaco War of 1932-1935. To this day it is rare to find grammar or writings in Toba-Maskoy due to a significant loss in the linguistic elements.

Some basic linguistic features of Toba-Maskoy can be recovered through the writings of W. Barbrooke Grubb in his missionary accounts of his time in the Paraguayan Chaco. Grubb recounted his experiences with the people of the land, particularly the Lengua people, who spoke variations of Enxet, Enlhet, and Toba-Maskoy, all members of the Mascoian family.

It is also possible to infer some aspects of the linguistic traits and grammar of Toba-Maskoy by observing the characteristics of other languages within the Mascoian language family, or even through the other languages of the Gran Chaco region.

Linguistic influences
W. Barbrooke Grubb's accounts record some occasions of Spanish and Guaraní influence in the vocabulary. Some of the examples he notes are the Toba-Maskoy word 'waitkya,' which is rooted from the Spanish 'vaca,' and 'lawa' from the Spanish 'clavo.' For Guaraní, he notes the Toba-Maskoy form 'káá' from the Guaraní root 'cáá.'"

Phonology
Though little is known about the specific phonological system of Toba-Maskoy, the languages of the Mascoian family are generally characterized by simple vowel systems, as well as certain vowel alternations which may suggest the presence of vowel harmony.

In regards to consonants, Mascoian languages contain /ɫ/ and glottalized sonorants /m’, n’, ŋ’, w’, y’/, all of which are uncommon among the other linguistic families of the Chaco.

Word order
Unlike the SVO ordered languages of the Guaicuruan, Matacoan, and Zamucoan families, Toba-Maskoy has a verb–subject–object (VSO) basic word order.

Verb alignment
The majority of the languages of the Gran Chaco can be characterized by an active-stative verb alignment, including those of the Mascoian family; this seems to be supported by Grubb's writings:

"To make quite certain of a sentence, e.g., 'The tiger killed the man,' it is necessary to say, 'The man is killed [neuter verb] ; the tiger's killing' (Abmatneyi enthlit, niptana apkyakhe). In an ordinary narrative the tiger will have formed the subject, and the simple statement, '(He) killed the man,' would be sufficiently clear."

Demonstratives
As is the case with many other South American languages, Chaco languages are characterized with grammatical gender, and the masculine-feminine gender distinction in Mascoian languages is exhibited through the variation of demonstratives used to modify each noun.

Beyond gender-varied demonstratives, Chaco languages typically contain an extensive system of demonstratives which may change based on a wide range of semantic parameters.

Pronouns
Pronoun inflections of Toba-Maskoy are exhibited as prefixes to the given noun or verb. In his book, Grubb provides examples of the prefixes attached to various words to communicate pronouns. He displays the appearances of the possessive pronoun prefix for 'my':

He also provides examples of the first person singular pronoun 'I' when used as the subject of verbs:

Verb affixes
Mascoian languages also contain a complex set of directional verb affixes, which attach to the verb to inflect location or direction.

Here, Grubb provides examples of the affixes attached to the word for 'to lead':

Genitive noun classifier
Chaco languages, particularly those of the Guaicuruan, Maskoian, and Zamucoan families, are distinguished by the rare use of a genitive noun classifier (also called possessive classifier) construction, which is specifically utilized when relating to the possession of domestic animals. In these cases, it is not possible to use a direct possessive term, such as 'our chicken'; the possessive domestic animal classifier is necessary.

Honorifics
According to Grubb's writings, Toba-Maskoy commonly employs forms of honorifics when the language is regarding or being spoken to the women of their tribes. Toba-Maskoy honorifics prescribe the use of different honorific prefixes, and in some cases, even completely distinct words, to express the different status of the women. The variation for when the speaker is addressing a woman is a form of Addressee honorifics, and the variation for when they are speaking about a woman is a form of Referent honorifics. Grubb provides one example:

Language sample
The following language sample was provided in a 1977 issue of Anthropological Linguistics to display the similarities and differences between the Toba-Maskoy language of the Mascoian family, the Toba Qom language of the Guaicuruan family, and the "Lengua" language of the Mascoian family. Lengua has since been separated into two distinct languages, Northern Lengua and Southern Lengua.

Toba-Maskoy and Toba Qom are often confused with one another, and this sample serves to display the complete distinctions between the two languages.