Northern Pame-Spanish language acquisition in the context of incipient language loss

Abstract

Aims and Objectives/Purpose/Research Questions: Northern Pame (autonym: Xi’iuy) is an Otopamean language situated in the Mexican state of San Luís Potosí. Today over 90% of the Pame population speaks Spanish, and two-year-old children only speak Northern Pame in two Northern Pame villages. The paper explores differences in two-year-old Pame children’s production of words in Northern Pame and Spanish in order to assess the possibility that developmental constraints and/or language shift influence the form and distribution of the children’s words in the two languages. Design/Methodology/Approach: The study is based on video recordings of five Northern Pame children around the age of 2;0. The adult speakers included one father and four mothers. Four hours of production data were analyzed from each of the five children. Data and Analysis: We analyzed the following: (1) the proportion of major lexical categories; (2) the use of the Spanish copula ser in Pame; (3) the mean segmental length of words in Pame and Spanish; and (4) the syllable structure of words in Pame and Spanish. Findings/Conclusions: The overall results demonstrate that the children’s Pame and Spanish words have distinct linguistic properties. Originality: The study is the first to report acquisition data for the Northern Pame language. Northern Pame differs from Spanish on a wide range of lexical and grammatical features. The analysis includes four lexical features. The outcomes for these four features produce a multi-dimensional measure of language differentiation. Significance/Implications: The study shows that Northern Pame parents are successfully passing their home language to their children despite pressure from the contact language. The children acquired the features of Pame words even though some mothers produced over 40% of their nouns in Spanish. The Spanish vocabulary does not inhibit the children’s developing Pame lexical structures.

The acquisition of noun inflection in Northern Pame (Xi'iuy): Comparing whole word and minimal word accounts

“…For each child, we selected a one-hour session for the analysis of the speech of one adult participant. The children and adults produced words in Northern Pame and Spanish (Pye, Berthiaume & Pfeiler, 2019). For the purpose of this study, we focus on the words that the child and adults produced in Northern Pame.…”

“…Two-year-old children only speak Northern Pame in two of the seven principal Northern Pame villages that surround the town of La Palma. Due to massive lexical borrowing from Spanish in the adult language, children under three produce nearly half of their words in Spanish (Pye, Berthiaume & Pfeiler, 2019); the use of Spanish increases sharply once the children enter public school at age three.…”

Documenting the acquisition of indigenous languages

“…Such situations appear to be problematic at first glance, but actually present more opportunities than problems (cf. Pye, 2013; Pye et al ., 2020). We do not have a good record of children's language for communities that are in the process of abandoning the indigenous language.…”