This paper describes a specific non-standard negation strategy in Iquito, a moribund Zaparoan language spoken in northern Peruvian Amazonia. This strategy is used in finite subordinate clauses (namely adverbial dependent clauses and relative clauses), as well as information questions, and it utilizes two negative markers: a negative particle which is also found in standard negation, and a verbal affix which does not function as a negator in any other context. Using existing typological characterizations of subordinate clause negation, we see that Iquito exhibits the following attested traits: it uses the standard negator in a different position, it also utilizes a distinct negator, and it employs more negators in the subordinate clause than in the main clause. But unlike the languages presented in the literature, Iquito utilizes these parameters simultaneously. Additionally, the position of the standard negator changes within the subordinate clause, depending on the reality status of the clause. Using Iquito as a case study, I propose a set of parameters for comparing subordinate clause and interrogative negation strategies to standard negation strategies, which include the type of negator used, its position, the overall number of negators, the potential for interaction with other grammatical categories, such as reality status, and the resulting word order of the clause. This set of parameters expands the initial typological characterizations of subordinate clause negation strategies.

This paper investigates the role of negation in grammaticalization in Iquito, an endangered Zaparoan language of the Peruvian Amazon. Iquito has a verb, pajɨɨni, which has undergone two paths of grammaticalization only in negated clauses. First, pajɨɨni has grammaticalized from “learn” to “be able to.” Subsequently, it is undergoing grammaticalization from an ability verb to a future auxiliary. Given that ability verbs are an uncommon source for future auxiliaries (Bybee et al. 1994), this study provides a detailed case study of this rare path. Our analysis of Iquito demonstrates that grammaticalization paths are not limited to affirmative contexts and may behave differently depending on the polarity of the utterance.

TitleExploiting word order to express an inflectional category: Reality status in Iquito

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Language contact is the phenomenon that results when speakers use two or more languages in the same social context. The study of language contact is interested in both the factors that bring speakers, and by extension their languages, together, as well as the outcomes that result to the languages in contact and their community of speakers. Migration and immigration, colonialization, education, trade, and technology all contribute to language contact. Common outcomes include borrowing, code‐switching, bilingualism, and language shift. More extreme outcomes may result in the formation of a new language such as a pidgin, creole, or mixed language, or the loss of a language altogether through language endangerment and death.